The decline of the humble Christmas card
THERE are many metrics by which to measure society's growing coarseness. One perhaps overlooked yardstick is the humble card shop.
Walking through London the other week I realised I hadn't got any Christmas cards yet. Knowing that most years I leave it until 23rd December to start sorting things out, I decided to be proactive.
I don't consider myself overly puritanical, but I suffered a bit of a sense-of-humour failure when I started browsing the shelves.
My eyes glanced across the Christmas section – "Merry F**kmas", "All I want for Christmas is you anal", "Merry C**tmas".
A theme was developing. Some cards were more elaborate set ups of the same punchline, with season's greetings delivered alongside insult. Dozens of them adorned the shelves, offering every conceivable combination of f**k, c**t and Christmas.
"Merry Christmas You Fugly Slut" stated another, with "Merry Christmas You Miserable C**t" on the card next to it.
On a table not far away were some delightful stocking fillers. A "Shut The F**k Up" bell – could come in handy, now I think about it – which was sitting adjacent to the "Soapy T*t W**k", "Filthy Scrubber" and "T*ts 'n' Fanny" soap bars.
The comedy socks nearby did not offer much variety. "I love c**k", read one pair. "F**k Christmas", another. One pair had a picture of a bell with the word "end" underneath. "I'm a F**kin Ray of Sunshine" stated one more.
The rest of the shop carried on a similar vein. The more you looked, the clearer it became that the infantilised minds of the world have taken over.
A grimy coarseness and liberal application of foul language are today considered 'authentic'. The veneer of politeness and civility is merely a deceitful disguising of one's 'true' baser being. This reduction to the lowest common denominator – replete with Fs and Cs – is among the most signature feature of our age.
Whereas once cultivation of mind and manners were regarded as aspirational, they have been insulted into irrelevance. Once those of lower social status would try and ape their social betters, with books on manners and proper conduct bestsellers in Victorian England. Today we are reduced to a giant Gin Lane.
Let it all hang out, they say: don't pretend you are any better than anyone else. Don't worry about taking the path of least resistance. In a world striving for equality, it is far easier to bring us all down to the lowest level than to raise us higher.
Some alternatives! …
It's all embodied in that nonsense modern platitude: love yourself. No matter what kind of wreck you are or how much better you could be with even the mildest effort: love yourself.
It's the wrong message. Decide who you want to be tomorrow and do something today to make it happen. Do not loathe yourself, but realise that you can be incrementally improved.
And when someone tells you that the easiest path is the best – the one where you are not expected to have any morals, any values or any higher truth – don't listen to them.
Just ring your "Shut the F**k Up" bell instead.
This article was first published in Bournbrook’s December 2021 print issue (XXVI).
