3 ms·
How Santa Claus Ended Up on U.S. Military’s Radar
- Shivetya 11y agoReally, the idea an ad could print a random number and have it be THAT number is fascinating. I wonder if the person creating the ad had knowledge of how phone numbers were assigned for the military and just randomly got that one? I assume they themselves never called to see if it actually rang through.
- ck2 11y agoIt is still an incredibly uncomfortable non-separation of church and state. Unless maybe we are just going to rename it santa-mas and celebrate it on solstice.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoSanta is a Christian figure, now? He's an amalgamation of various European Christmas myth figures.
- ck2 11y agoWhich holiday does Santa represent? A non-denominational holiday? Stop playing coy. If you rename Christ-mas, you can have the government endorse Santa all you want and I won't complain.
- strictnein 11y agoNext super scary word: "Holiday" which comes from, get this, Holy Day! > "The word holiday comes from the Old English word hāligdæg (hālig "holy" + dæg "day")"
- palmer_eldritch 11y ago> rename it santa-mas If you really want to go that way, it would be a good idea to also get rid of the -mas ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_(liturgy) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_(liturgy) )
- ianhawes 11y agoI've always maintained that this was not an accident at all. This was an attempt by the Soviet Union of psyops against NORAD. I would imagine they uncovered the number through other means and created the ad as a way to launch a "denial of service" against NORAD by having kids call them. The official story says that the ad was placed by a Sears store. What kind of department store would be able to handle calls "day and night"? And the ad specifically mentions "Kiddies be sure and dial the correct number". Has anyone bothered to figure out what the actual number for the Sears store was back then?