6 ms·

This would have been a mistake if it was facebook's first rodeo, it's not. For the last couple of years anything that used to be "Merry Christmas" was actively

by sebow 5y ago

This would have been a mistake if it was facebook's first rodeo, it's not. For the last couple of years anything that used to be "Merry Christmas" was actively suppresed on mainstream social networks.Replaced with Happy holidays, whatever.A company adjusting this is fine,obviously(you don't have to repeatedly wish happy X, you just do it one time), however in the case of individuals where it's more common that a person only says Merry Christmas/Happy hanukkah/etc, we've repeatedly seen that such messages get "lost".Again, it's not a mistake, but then again if you point out that facebook actively engages in this behavior through leaked documents, nobody bats an eye.

userbinator 5y ago
Do you have some sources for further reading? That sounds disturbingly Orwellian.
- rightbyte 5y ago
  I don't like how those tin foil hats I used to laugh at were just ahead of their time. Your TV spying on you or your phone apps waging war against Christmas ...
hunter2_ 5y ago
It's possible that content-based suppression happens, but it's also possible that the genericized phrase organically generates more engagement by virtue of it being likeable to way more people. If all your followers celebrate the same holiday then it should be a wash but if huge chunks don't then it's purely the numbers doing their thing. Even some who celebrate the mentioned holiday might find the message exclusionary enough to not engage (a woke feedback loop, you could say), further burying it.
- simplestats 5y ago
  I don't think they're talking about just getting the most likes, or whatever but rather censorship via shadow-banning or outright deleting posts. I have seen it happen, and suspect there are those that work to "poison" the algorithms to get them to shadow ban the political side the hacker doesn't like.
  - driverdan 5y ago
    > I have seen it happen That's an extraordinary claim. Do you have evidence?
    - simplestats 5y ago
      No it is not an extaordinary claim at all. Moderators on any random forum can set these tools up. And yes I literally had my post shadowbanned for a benign statement that apparently had the wrong keywords in the wrong arrangement or something. So yes in that sense I have evidence.
- BuildTheRobots 5y ago
  I agree entirely with your point, but I'd take it one step further. Christmas for a lot of people (even those that do celebrate) can be a very depressing and lonely time of the year, even more so in these post covid times. I prefer a generic "happy holidays" as it applies to more people, though I've moved onto "happy solstice - the days are finally getting longer (or about to)". I think that's a little bit of positivity that it's actually worth reminding people of.
driverdan 5y ago
[citation needed]
walrus01 5y ago
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
john_moscow 5y ago
There's a fairly rational psychological explanation to it. When people cannot achieve a certain goal for a while, they convince themselves that the goal is not worth it, or tainted in some way. Christmas has been traditionally associated with family, kids, happiness, seeing retired grandparents, etc. All these things have been sliding out of reach for the middle class with no reversal in sight. So this creates tension against people that can still afford it, and a perception that these goals are unfair and should not be pursued. This is to be expected - it's not like the journalists writing the politically correct articles, HR people defining acceptable language, or moderators deciding on what gets approved are paid enough to afford what used to be a regular middle-class life 2 decades ago. So they rebel against it by trying to stigmatize it in the way they can. And it's not like you can blame them either - the human brain is very adaptive at picking goals and means. If you take personal prosperity through hard work out of question, people will find other goals to pursue, it's just they will be much more divisive...
- CactusOnFire 5y ago
  This seems like an awfully abstract theory. I think it's simpler to say that "Merry Christmas" vs "Happy Holidays" has become this point of contention because Merry Christmas only applies to Christians, whereas Happy Holidays does not. The divisive, bi-partisan nature of American politics has just turned this small distinction into a fight.
  - john_moscow 5y ago
    Oh, I think there's more than that. It's somehow not divisive for Jews to congratulate wide audiences with Hanukah. It's not divisive for Muslims to congratulate their audiences with Ramadan. It's not divisive for Chinese to wish others with happy Chinese New Year. But it's somehow "problematic" to say "Merry Christmas". In all honesty, I can't imagine being offended if someone congratulated me with a holiday they celebrate and I don't. I would congratulate them back and maybe ask how they celebrate it to learn something new. On the other hand, if the Christmas experience was something the previous generation used to have, and I got priced out of it, "Merry Christmas" would sound like someone is rubbing it in...
smsm42 5y ago
This year, Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah are almost a month apart (Hanukkah started on Nov 28th). So you'd have to either have Merry Christmas in November, or do it twice anyway :)
- josephcsible 5y ago
  Or you could say Happy Hanukkah at first and then switch to Merry Christmas once Hanukkah is over.
- walrus01 5y ago
  based on the dates that retailers put out all the christmas stuff immediately after halloween, it's apparent that christmas has already gone retrograde by date far into november already... there's stores around here with their whole aisle of valentines day candy, gifts, red heart balloons etc already stocked.
- Stratoscope 5y ago
  A Jewish couple that I'm friends with takes a pragmatic approach to this: they celebrate Hanukkah and Christmas!

by sebow 5y ago

userbinator 5y ago

Do you have some sources for further reading? That sounds disturbingly Orwellian.

rightbyte 5y ago
I don't like how those tin foil hats I used to laugh at were just ahead of their time. Your TV spying on you or your phone apps waging war against Christmas ...

hunter2_ 5y ago

It's possible that content-based suppression happens, but it's also possible that the genericized phrase organically generates more engagement by virtue of it being likeable to way more people. If all your followers celebrate the same holiday then it should be a wash but if huge chunks don't then it's purely the numbers doing their thing. Even some who celebrate the mentioned holiday might find the message exclusionary enough to not engage (a woke feedback loop, you could say), further burying it.

simplestats 5y ago
I don't think they're talking about just getting the most likes, or whatever but rather censorship via shadow-banning or outright deleting posts. I have seen it happen, and suspect there are those that work to "poison" the algorithms to get them to shadow ban the political side the hacker doesn't like.
- driverdan 5y ago
  > I have seen it happen That's an extraordinary claim. Do you have evidence?
  - simplestats 5y ago
    No it is not an extaordinary claim at all. Moderators on any random forum can set these tools up. And yes I literally had my post shadowbanned for a benign statement that apparently had the wrong keywords in the wrong arrangement or something. So yes in that sense I have evidence.
BuildTheRobots 5y ago
I agree entirely with your point, but I'd take it one step further. Christmas for a lot of people (even those that do celebrate) can be a very depressing and lonely time of the year, even more so in these post covid times. I prefer a generic "happy holidays" as it applies to more people, though I've moved onto "happy solstice - the days are finally getting longer (or about to)". I think that's a little bit of positivity that it's actually worth reminding people of.

driverdan 5y ago

[citation needed]

walrus01 5y ago

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

john_moscow 5y ago

There's a fairly rational psychological explanation to it. When people cannot achieve a certain goal for a while, they convince themselves that the goal is not worth it, or tainted in some way. Christmas has been traditionally associated with family, kids, happiness, seeing retired grandparents, etc. All these things have been sliding out of reach for the middle class with no reversal in sight. So this creates tension against people that can still afford it, and a perception that these goals are unfair and should not be pursued. This is to be expected - it's not like the journalists writing the politically correct articles, HR people defining acceptable language, or moderators deciding on what gets approved are paid enough to afford what used to be a regular middle-class life 2 decades ago. So they rebel against it by trying to stigmatize it in the way they can. And it's not like you can blame them either - the human brain is very adaptive at picking goals and means. If you take personal prosperity through hard work out of question, people will find other goals to pursue, it's just they will be much more divisive...

CactusOnFire 5y ago
This seems like an awfully abstract theory. I think it's simpler to say that "Merry Christmas" vs "Happy Holidays" has become this point of contention because Merry Christmas only applies to Christians, whereas Happy Holidays does not. The divisive, bi-partisan nature of American politics has just turned this small distinction into a fight.
- john_moscow 5y ago
  Oh, I think there's more than that. It's somehow not divisive for Jews to congratulate wide audiences with Hanukah. It's not divisive for Muslims to congratulate their audiences with Ramadan. It's not divisive for Chinese to wish others with happy Chinese New Year. But it's somehow "problematic" to say "Merry Christmas". In all honesty, I can't imagine being offended if someone congratulated me with a holiday they celebrate and I don't. I would congratulate them back and maybe ask how they celebrate it to learn something new. On the other hand, if the Christmas experience was something the previous generation used to have, and I got priced out of it, "Merry Christmas" would sound like someone is rubbing it in...

smsm42 5y ago

This year, Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah are almost a month apart (Hanukkah started on Nov 28th). So you'd have to either have Merry Christmas in November, or do it twice anyway :)

josephcsible 5y ago
Or you could say Happy Hanukkah at first and then switch to Merry Christmas once Hanukkah is over.
walrus01 5y ago
based on the dates that retailers put out all the christmas stuff immediately after halloween, it's apparent that christmas has already gone retrograde by date far into november already... there's stores around here with their whole aisle of valentines day candy, gifts, red heart balloons etc already stocked.
Stratoscope 5y ago
A Jewish couple that I'm friends with takes a pragmatic approach to this: they celebrate Hanukkah and Christmas!