My own views on the subject are here in a post I wrote earlier this year, tongue in cheek, arguing we should consolidate some controversial federal holidays and replace them with one we can all agree on, Valentine's Day. While I might have been kidding to a degree, one basic point remains true: the USG should not be defining cultural standards. As individual members of churches, schools, families, communities, and other organizations, we can come up with our own idea of what deserves a day off, and how exactly to celebrate it.
Holidays have always been used by governments to promote legitimacy or authority. In the third century Rome turned the December feast of Saturnalia from second rate religious day into a weeklong festival of decadence and indulgence. It was like Burning Man with better sewage. The motivation was to make the population forget about a recent humiliation on the battlefield by Carthage. Unfortunately for the Republic, the citizens enjoyed the holiday so much later attempts to shorten the festival were met with civil unrest. Governmental desire to return the people to full productivity failed. Christmas, as every leftist article will point out when December rolls around next week, is merely a collection of pagan holidays collected and fused together by the early Church to influence Europeans. In fact most of the Church's feasts and major holidays were simply adopted from earlier customs.
Holidays didn't always grow organically; sometimes they were crafted, twisted, and presented according to a storyline convenient to those in power.
Although the American and French Revolutions marked the beginning of the modern nation-state, it was only in the 1800s that the movement swept completely across the Continent. By 1875 most formerly imperial holdings in Europe were new, independent nations. These new countries, which previously had been subservient to larger European nations like the Austrians or Russians, or of course the Ottomans, struggled to affirm their own sovereignty.
Holidays were a useful tool.
Romania, for example, embraced the notion of "Martisor," a springtime holiday dating back perhaps a thousand years in the Black Sea region. Under Romanian nationalists, Martisor was no longer an ancient coal rite. It was a uniquely Romanian holding, celebrated only by Romanians in Romania. Never mind the fact that Bulgaria and other neighbors also celebrate Martisor.
Following the Russian revolutions, the Soviets quashed Orthodox holidays and fabricated their own. May Day and Women's Day were the two most encouraged pre-war holidays, but New Years Eve was the most popular.
Enough with the holiday history lesson- the point is made.
My objection today is to the president pardoning turkeys on Thanksgiving to grow the Imperial Presidency even further. The fact is, despite the White House propaganda saying turkeys have been pardoned for years, the tradition just started under Dubya's dad in 1989.
Except for patriotic holidays- Memorial Day, Independence Day, Veteran's Day, and a handful of others, how we celebrate events should be our business, not the government's. The danger in the USG setting the tone of holidays is twofold. First of all, the feds have a monopoly on everything. So if the president wants to turn Turkey Day into a lesson in some social lesson- perhaps promoting child nutrition, like the current president's spouse has already embarked on- he has a great platform to do it. Secondly, if we start to associate the federal government with holidays, then we are mixing being sentimental with being practical. Government should be a neutral, efficient, impersonal but effective process, not a paternalistic overlord.
Anyway, I don't want to get too carried away with this. Thanksgiving is awesome. And turkey is delicious. And if the president wants to pardon a bird, it's okay as long as we keep it all in perspective. We are the ones who craft holidays. The president can try and expropriate them, but they are the domain of the people. So on the one hand, don't be too impressed by the White House and its use of holidays to appear like a kindly, inspiring institution we should unquestioningly follow. But on the other, don't buy into the cynics who pump out articles telling you Christmas is a pagan festival and the pilgrims never ate turkey. Sure maybe our traditions are new and maybe they were adopted with less than clear motives (Thanksgiving was started, it's said by Lincoln at the behest of a woman seeking to sell greeting cards), but they're still enjoyable.