Gadfly is always a bit worried that “comments” to posts get lost by the WordPress format, which sort of renders them almost invisible.
So I’m raising Peter Crownfield’s comment to Stephen Antalics’ recent “Have Bethlehem’s holiday lights lost their original purpose of unity?” post to top-level here because it is really striking. Gadfly doesn’t want it to get lost.
Here’s what Peter said:
Definitely missing an opportunity to have a more unified display. There may be some historic justification for white lights in the Moravian area, but people have pointed out many times that the use of all white lights north of the river and all colored lights south of the river is seen by many as a racist scheme.
And, in similar vein, Gadfly #1 Antalics also wrote me this recently:
I questioned a number of bus drivers who acted as tour guides and some local individuals dressed as Moravians [Gadfly is not sure whether this is recent or back c. 2000 when the article was published] and the comments of quite a few were that the colored lights of the Southside represented the pagan origins of Christmas (red and green were pagan color schemes) and the white lights of North Bethlehem represented the purity of the birth of Christ. Really!! I could not find my socks.
Are these Christmas tales from the dark side?
