The Myth Of The Myth Of Winterval

Now Christmas is upon us (honestly, look at the shops!) there will be two traditions that will be making a re-emergence. Firstly some conservative commentators will refer to the liberal hostility to Christmas by the left citing the case of Birming City Council replacing Christmas with "Winterval" one year. Next various liberal commentators will refer to conservative scaremongering about "the war on Christmas" by pointing out that Christmas was a part of the interval celebrations so the controversy was in fact bogus.

In fact there is an important point about the original "Winterval" that is often overlooked. As the Birmingham Post put it at the time:

A LEADING churchman has launched an astonishing attack on council chiefs over Christmas.

The Bishop of Birmingham, the Rt Rev Mark Santer, has accused Birmingham City Council of replacing Christmas with `Winterval'.

He calls the decision madness - and says there is a danger of the secular world becoming deeply embarrased by faith.

The Bishop's hard-hitting remarks are contained in his Christmas message which has been sent to all clergy and churches in the diocese.

Last night, the city council said Winterval was not another name for Christmas, and the winter festival would have traditional Christmas at its heart.

The row comes five years after the city council insisted on Christmas lights being called festive lights to avoid offending religious and racial minorities.

In other words, it wasn't irrational paranoia to suspect that Birmingham City Council were trying to phase out Christmas to be politically correct, because that was exactly what they had done just a few years previously. Given that most of the same people were in charge it seems to me that Winterval probably was an attack on Christmas- after all Christmas isn't usually a secondary festival- albeit more subtle than is often acknowledged.

A Propah Mayah

Sion Simon has decided to put his talents to good use, by announcing his candidacy for a job that doesn't exist- the elected mayor of Birmingham. Actually existing jobs aren't as much of a strong point.

In case anyone's forgotten who Sion Simon is, and if I can't forget then neither should you, here is a reminder:

Birmingham deserves someone with more gravitas but Benny from Crossroads has yet to throw his wooly hat into the ring.

Persecution Fantasies.

Salma Yaqoob, who represents the George Galloway's Ego Respect Party on Birmingham City Council, has been squealing in the Guardian about that councils leadership trying to ban a rally about Gaza earlier this month:

With days to go, in the full knowledge that thousands of people would gather in the city centre, permission to march was withdrawn. In an astonishing series of events, the West Midlands Police were forced to invoke emergency powers to permit the demonstration.

If you substitute the word "astonishing" for the phrase "completely made up" this is true. It doesn't even make any sense, why would the police have "emergency powers" to force councils to permit demonstrations? What are these powers?

Communal parties like Respect wither and die if the flames of resentment flicker out so they have to constantly stoke a sense of Muslim alienation if they are to keep the electoral gains that they have made since 2005.

Telly Savalas Looks At Birmingham.

And why not, it's his kind of town!


His awed reaction to an over 40s disco dancing competition doesn't quite convince.
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