Time for the War on Easter!


I didn’t even know we were fighting over that one, but apparently we are. It’s an unexpected front. You might be wondering what deep article of Christian faith we’re going to be battling over. That too is unexpectedly trivial.

The war is to be fought over eggs.

The latest manufactured moral outrage came courtesy of the Archbishop of York, whose bandwagon was soon jumped on by none other than the Prime Minister. The cause of their holy indignation? Cadbury and the National Trust have had the temerity to advertise Egg Hunts, rather than Easter Egg Hunts. Well, there go hundreds of years of Christian-appropriated pagan religious tradition down the plughole!

It’s hard to believe, but the fanatics are up in arms over those totally biblical symbols of Jesus from deep antiquity, chocolate eggs.

Archbishop of York John Sentamu said Mr Cadbury, a Quaker who founded the firm in 1824, was renowned for his religious beliefs and would not condone dropping the word Easter.

He said if people were to visit Cadbury World in Birmingham “they will discover how Cadbury’s Christian faith influenced his industrial output”.

“To drop Easter from Cadbury’s Easter Egg Hunt in my book is tantamount to spitting on the grave of Cadbury,” Dr Sentamu added.

A spokesman from the Church added: “This marketing campaign not only does a disservice to the Cadburys but also highlights the folly in airbrushing faith from Easter.”

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said the issue reflected “commercialisation gone a bit too far”.

Are all the party leaders idiots over there? Even the prime minister, Theresa May, is whining about it. Doesn’t she have anything better to do, like preparing for the coming war with Spain?

P.S. Cadbury, the guy whose grave we’re supposed to be spitting on, was a Quaker. Quakers don’t actually celebrate Easter.

Comments

  1. wzrd1 says

    Hey, nothing spells free advertising as a maunversy.

    And to think, all this got started by a carpenter calling off work dead over the holiday weekend.

  2. Owlmirror says

    Easter.

    (from here)

    Orthodox Christians call the holiday Pascha.

    Wikipedia claims the Easter egg symbolizes the empty tomb — see, it looks dead on the inside, but has life within (but then why do they hard-boil them?).

    So the Cadbury egg, with something sweet on the outside, and something else sweet on the inside symbolizes — what, exactly?

  3. says

    This is relative chickenfeed. For the full, all you can eat, ten course meal, Winterval [pdf] is the one to check out. Then there’s the bi-annual “The Royal Mail are banning Christianity” farce, based on the tradition of alternating Christmas postage stamps each year between secular and religious themes. It’s all good fun.

    Owlmirror, The Daily Mash points out the relevant scripture.

  4. vucodlak says

    May your victory be swift! Even when I was a Christian I hated Easter. I tried to pretend I didn’t, because hell, but goddamn did I ever hate Easter. Funny; now that I work for the other side, I pretty much forget it even exists.

    Also, I wish WordPress would quit asking me to prove my humanity. I gave it up for lent.

  5. Larry says

    What I want to know is how in the heck did the Brits get out in front of our home-grown whack jobs on this controversy. I think its because they’ve been spending so much time sucking up to the orange cheetoh, they haven’t had time to wind up the faux-outrage machine.

  6. John Morales says

    wzrd1:

    And to think, all this got started by a carpenter calling off work dead over the holiday weekend.

    What?

    No. This is ostensibly about Easter, within the context of culture wars.

    (The Solstice ain’t Ēostre, though both have been Christianised)

  7. Athywren - not the moon you're looking for says

    I’ve always liked easter – it almost always falls within a week of my birthday, so I was always off school, and it makes taking time off work for birthday laziness reasons much cheaper.
    That said, what the actual fuck? The way they’ve been whining about it, you’d think they were being organised as “NOT EASTER, DAMN YOU!! BURN THE CHRISTIANS!!! Egg hunts,” but no… they just… didn’t explicitly say that these egg hunts are specifically easter-based… so what?

  8. zetopan says

    “To drop Easter from Cadbury’s Easter Egg Hunt in my book is tantamount to spitting on the grave of Cadbury,”

    PZ, you apparently forgot to finish the above line. What is the downside supposed to be? Of course I *usually* don’t go around literally spitting on the graves of religious fanatics, but if the Archbishop of York insists that I start doing that ….

  9. opposablethumbs says

    Oi oi oi! Point of order! Calumny! I put it to you, M’Lud, that Corbyn (who is emphatically not a religious nut) was objecting not on religious grounds at all but on the grounds that Cadbury’s is cashing in on a rip-off easter-themed marketing campaign to charge more for their product.

    He actually specified that it wasn’t the presence or absence of the word easter that he minded but “the presence of the word ‘Cadbury’s’.”

    For those less familiar with our sceptic isle, Corbyn is a centre-left democratic socialist (who campaigned vigorously against the Brexit fiasco while noting that there’s a lot of neo-liberal bollocks going on in the EU too, of course). (Sometimes likened to Bernie Sanders. Oh, and Bernie Sanders’ brother Larry, who is a UK Green party candidate, is a bit of a Corbyn supporter).

    Absolutely not associated with this pathetic-religious-excuse-to-distract-from-May-and-Fox-grovelling-to-sell-arms-to-murderous-rulers-in-Philippines-and-Saudi-Arabia easter nonsense.

  10. says

    But the Easter bunny is my most favourite part of the Bible, next to the one with the snow and the reindeer! And Eostre is my favourite Christians goddess ever!*

    But yeah, that’s what Brexit is all about: blue passports, imperial measurements, the word “Easter” and going to war with Spain.

    *Did you ever notice that all the decidedly pagan parts of Easter are the good ones while all the decidedly Christian ones suck?

  11. Athywren - not the moon you're looking for says

    “Enjoy Easter Fun
    Join the Cadbury Egg Hunt”

    Not Eastery enough!!
    Should be, “Enjoy Easter Fun
    Join the Easter Cadbury Easter Egg Easter Hunt Easter Easter”

  12. KG says

    Corbyn is a centre-left democratic socialist (who campaigned vigorously against the Brexit fiasco – opposablethumbs@10

    Campaigned half-heartedly, I’d say – he should have made much more of how a Brexit vote would deliver the country into the hands of the hard right, as it has done, with their ambitions to sell off the NHS, dismantle the welfare state, and subordinate the economy even further to the bankers and multinationals. Whether it would have made that crucial difference if he really had campaigned vigorously I don’t know, but I can’t acquit him of a share of the blame.

  13. cartomancer says

    This story is perhaps the most British thing I’ve seen in a long time. It essentially boils down to:

    1. Archbishop of York makes bland, non-threatening statement in desperate attempt to make Christianity still look relevant.
    2. Prime Minister echoes statement in order to show off to octagenarian Tory base that she is still living in the past like them.
    3. Labour leader uses kerfuffle as an opportunity to make gentle prod at excesses of capitalism. Nobody listens.
    4. BBC reports story, elderly National Trust members go through motions of outrage to remind the rest of us that they are still alive.
    5. Nobody else actually cares.

    The Church of England is kind of like the weakened strain of a virus in a vaccine – these sorts of twee outbursts over nothing in particular help us to avoid our national life getting infected with real religion like you lot have over there.

  14. nomistrek says

    At least the Lib Dems gave a sensible response

    http://www.libdemvoice.org/the-shameless-lib-dem-press-office-easter-egg-grab-53847.html

    Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn have got egg on their faces today. They both scrambled out eggs-traordinary statements criticising Cadbury’s and the National Trust for something they haven’t actually done.

    This is a eggs-tremely big distraction. I think we all feel poached by this whole sorry saga, but none of us more so than Cadbury’s and the National Trust, who have done nothing wrong and are right to feel egg-rieved by the criticism they have received.

    Happy Easter, everyone.

    But the funniest part was the “Notes to eggs” at the end:

    Notes to Eggs – FAO Cadbury’s Press Office – please send free samples to 8-10 Great George Street, London SW1P 3AE.

  15. alkisvonidas says

    @ Owlmirror

    but then why do they hard-boil them?

    Well, the custom is to paint them red and then bang them together to see whose eggshell cracks (that would be the loser). Try doing that with raw eggs ;-)

    In any case, the dye is usually applied in hot water, so hard-boiling is unavoidable.

  16. says

    @Giliell #12

    Did you ever notice that all the decidedly pagan parts of Easter are the good ones while all the decidedly Christian ones suck?

    I do not know where that tradition comes from, and probably nobody really knows it, but one of our Slavic traditions of celebrating Easter consits of braiding willow twigs into a bundle and symbolically beat women with it. And women are supposed to be gratefull and reward that symbolic beating with eggs, ribbons and shots of hard alcohol. Sometimes they are allowed to retailate and pour a bucket of cold water over the mens heads. I do not think this tradition stems from christianity.

    And I hate that tradition from the utmost depths of my heart. No matter what rationalizations for it people concoct, I find it vile, idiotic and degrading to both women and men alike. That many of those endulging in these traditions defend them as “symbolic”, “mere fun” etc. has not changed my mind one bit – and I made up my mind about this at about five years of age when I refused to beat my mother even symbolicaly.

    I would not mind an effective war on Easter, one that would send these traditions on the trash pile of history, where they righfully belong.

    I would not mind egg hunts, but that tradition is germanic one, not slavic, and is not observed where I live. Fot me, Easters are a holiday involving beating, begging and obscene drunkenness.

  17. rietpluim says

    Hello, my evil athiest comrades! Are you all ready and armed for the War on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception?

  18. says

    As the old Venomous Bede once wrote:
    “Eostur-monath, qui nunc paschalis mensis interpretatur, quondam a dea illorum quae Eostre vocabatur, et cui in illo festa celebrabant, nomen habuit, a cujus nomine nunc paschale tempus cognominant, consueto antiquae observationis vocabulo gaudia novae solemnitatis vocantes.”

  19. says

    Charly “symbolically beat women”

    Hey, it cold be worse! Take Valentines Day:
    ‘First of all, forget all that Esther Howlandish crap with the red cardioid covered cards and the frilly sentiments, if you really want to celebrate the true St. Valentine’s spirit, then all you young men should be out there with raw and bloody strips of sacrificed goat, running around practically naked, thwacking away at any girls you can find to keep ’em fertile because the Februal fifteenth of February was the ancient Roman festival of the Lupercalia and, just like Christmas and so many other of our festivals, it’s something gross and Roman that lies behind our modern Day–so I say “Io! Faune! Bring on the sacrificial goats! And just remember to hold your nose!”‘ ——http://howlandbolton.com/essays/read_more.php?sid=235

  20. says

    Heh

    A crack about our politicians from someone in the country that just elected Trump.

    Interesting.

    As for the wicked witch of the west, I’m more concerned with her breaking bread with dictators who behead people for blasphemy than what she has to say about an easter egg hunt.

  21. Zmidponk says

    KG:

    Campaigned half-heartedly, I’d say

    I would say that no-one really had a robust ‘remain’ campaign during the Brexit referendum, I think mainly because the vast majority of people in political circles didn’t think the ‘leave’ campaigners had any kind of chance. Unfortunately, this left them free to fight a hard campaign pretty much unopposed, even going to the level of heavily implying things which were simply not true, and known to be not true (such as that leaving the EU would give the UK an extra £350 million per week to spend on the NHS), which allowed them to narrowly win. However, this now seems to be seen by May, et al, as instructions by the British people for a ‘hard Brexit’, where the UK even cuts ties with things like the European Common Market, as well as giving up membership of the EU itself – which even people like Nigel Farage were suggesting would NOT happen during the Brexit campaign.

    As for the story in the OP, I really think this is a non-story drummed up by someone. After all, even the URL for Cadbury’s campaign has ‘easter’ in it – easter.cadbury.co.uk

  22. says

    Charly
    OK, I think I stick to the German fun version with bunnies and eggs.

    +++

    In any case, the dye is usually applied in hot water, so hard-boiling is unavoidable.

    Other way round. Boiling eggs is a way to conserve them.

  23. Dunc says

    Boiling eggs is a way to conserve them.

    Actually, fresh eggs keep for longer than boiled ones.

  24. birgerjohansson says

    More on the prime minister:
    “What is ‘global Britain’? A financier and arms merchant to brutal dictators” https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/apr/05/global-britain-brexit-financier-arms-merchant-brutal-dictators
    Excerpt
    “Now we know what “global Britain” means. Optimists have clung to Theresa May’s phrase in the hope that Brexit might avoid falling into insularity and isolation; that a hint of liberal England might survive Brexit. But with May in Saudi Arabia, Philip Hammond trying to build empire 2.0 in India, and trade secretary Liam Fox visiting Gulf tyrants and a Philippines president busy wiping out his own citizens, we can rid ourselves of such illusions”

  25. Dunc says

    Not according to those I have in my fridge…

    Fresh eggs don’t normally need to be refrigerated (unless you’re in the US, where they do horrible things to them – but I seem to recall you’re not). Fresh eggs will easily keep at room temperature for over a month from laying. Hard boiled eggs barely keep for a week after boiling.

  26. robro says

    The distinction between “Christianity” and “Paganism” is one of the greatest, and most successful exercises in political propaganda ever. Christianity didn’t “absorb” pagan traditions and practices, it grew out of paganism in the first place.

  27. microraptor says

    robro @35:

    You say paganism like it’s a monophyletic clade.

    Christianity evolved from a type of paganism found in one region, then it spread to other regions after it had diversified from that regional paganism. At that point it began to adopt elements from the local religions of the regions it spread to.

  28. raven says

    Yes Virginia, there is a War on Easter.
    Fundies don’t have holidays.
    They have Wars on Holidays.

    It’s mostly an own goal.
    Fundies hate the word Easter.
    Because Easter is a Pagan holiday named after the Germanic goddess of spring and fertility, Estre.
    They keep trying to call it Resurrection Sunday but it hasn’t really caught on.

    The next fundie holiday is the War on Halloween.
    Last year was a disappointment. Instead of worrying about imaginary monsters, we had to worry about the election and the real monsters of the GOP.

  29. madtom1999 says

    Re egg storage. Eggs are generally well sealed from the environment and (with some aquatic bird exceptions) are relatively impermeable. A hens egg at room temperature will normally last 30 or 40 days without noticeable deterioration. Should they get wet their ‘impermeable’ membrane can fail. If they are kept in the fridge then they are subject to condensation when the door opens. This shortens their life noticeably. Likewise boiling will destroy the impermeability and, as eggs are quite a rich food source, any bacteria gaining access will, even in the fridge, rapidly taint the product.
    I keep hens and have found eggs that were left in the straw in a hutch after I’d moved the birds that had to be over 10 weeks old and they were still edible – though approached with great caution as the emetic power of the smell of an overripe egg is quite impressive.

  30. profpedant says

    Currently most Quakers do ‘celebrate’ Easter and Christmas, but the reason is assimilation into the local culture and not because it is a religious requirement.

  31. profpedant says

    Most Quakers do ‘celebrate’ Easter and Christmas, but the reason is assimilation into the local culture and not as a religious requirement.

  32. KG says

    Opposablethumbs@11,

    Looking for what Corbyn said, I find:

    Jeremy Corbyn gave his opinion: “It upsets me because I don’t think Cadbury should take over the name of Easter,”

    That’s just as ridiculous as anything May or Sentamu said.

    Giliell@18,
    I agree up to a point. It’s hard to see how any party or party leader could get away politically with opposing Brexit outright*, but Corbyn’s statement that “The fight starts now” – after failing to get, or even seriously try to get, any concessions from the Tories at all on the negotiation process – was rightly greeted with derision.

    *Except the pro-independence Scottish parties, of course, which can do so on the basis of the clear Scottish vote to Remain – and they are only opposing it for Scotland.

  33. robro says

    microraptor @ #37 — No, I don’t. Interesting that you note paganism isn’t monophyletic, but not Christianity. It’s not monophyletic either. Many paganisms, many Christianities, many Islams, many Judaisms, many Buddhisms, et cetera.

  34. Gregory Greenwood says

    Are all the party leaders idiots over there?

    Yes, yes they are. Just look at the monumental Brexit catastrophe if any further proof is needed. The war with Spain is still unlikely (though from some of the nationalist sabre rattling going on over here at the moment you wouldn’t know it), but that is just one in the endless litany of problems that Farrage’s misbegotten pet project is throwing up for the UK. WTO trade arrangements slapping as much as 25% duty on all UK exports without scores of trade deals (that we don’t have the necessary properly trained negotiators for, and would take years if not decades to negotiate even if we did) is going to put more than a little dent in the UK economy, and that assumes that the UK itself doesn’t fragment into its constituent parts first, and Scotland already seems to be heading for the door marked ‘exit’.

    Still, at least you lot over there in the colonies US still managed to out do us on the political stupidity front by electing Trump, which has helped deflect attention from how truly idiotic the UK’s recent actions have really been.

    With the carnage Trump is already unleashing on the US only likely to worsen, I guess both our countries will swirl down the drain of history together then? A special relationship indeed…

  35. colinday says

    Are all the party leaders idiots over there? Even the prime minister, Theresa May, is whining about it. Doesn’t she have anything better to do, like preparing for the coming war with Spain?

    Don’t be silly. She’ll accept the news that the Spanish are invading while bowling, and calmly dispatch her navy to repel the threat.

  36. microraptor says

    robro @43

    Monophyletic isn’t a synonym for monoculture. Christianity is monophyletic because all its various branches can still be traced back to a single origin point. “Pagan”, meanwhile, is used as a generic term for any non-Christian European religion, despite Slavic paganism having less in common with Celtic paganism than Judaism does with Islam.

  37. says

    KG

    It’s hard to see how any party or party leader could get away politically with opposing Brexit outright*

    Really? Have they tried? 48% of those who showed up voted remain and more than a third of people didn’t show up anyway.

  38. Athywren - not the moon you're looking for says

    @KG, 42

    I agree up to a point. It’s hard to see how any party or party leader could get away politically with opposing Brexit outright

    Yes, I suppose coming out in opposition to half the voting public would be quite bad. On the other hand, coming out in opposition to half the voting public is also quite bad. That they fell in line with the latter in fear of the former is, frankly, confusing. Not to mention not in the public or national good.
    I may just still be seething over it – which… might be a record – but I’m not sure I’ll be able to vote Labour again.
    Maybe I could go for the Lib D… ah fuck it. Is there an Unending Despair party?

  39. jrkrideau says

    @ madtom1999

    Should they get wet their ‘impermeable’ membrane can fail.

    Both Canada and the USA wash their eggs thus removing the membrane and reportedly leaving the egg vulnerable to salmonella infection.

    I have read that a) European flocks are vaccinated (?) against salmonella, and b) European chicken farmers are expected to maintain a standard of hygiene that makes washing the eggs unnecessary.

  40. wzrd1 says

    As for US vs EU commercially processed eggs, yes, US eggs would be prohibited in the EU and vice versa. There’s a difference in philosophy on which is a better processing/protective method.
    Washing, then spraying with a sanitizing agent, then drying or leaving the eggs as clean as from the laying facility, which leaves the cuticle on the egg. Either way, moisture from condensation would provide both a growth medium and carrier for bacteria on the egg shell, just from opening the refrigerator door.

    Personally, I leave my eggs on the kitchen counter. They get used long before they’d have a chance to spoil. On the few occasions that they did not, the consistency of the egg had changed enough to know that proteins were breaking down and the egg was discarded, the bowl I break eggs into one at a time washed, as well as my hands are well washed.
    While, I’ve acquired a degree of resistance to food borne infections, courtesy of a lack of a sense of smell, others in my household have not. No need to take chances.

    As for other food discussions, I now have a hankering for a couple of poached eggs, roasted duck and rabbit stew. ;)
    Although, I do miss the Oriental market we shopped at in Philly. Duck was cheap and a bit less fatty than supermarket ducks and, while offal was not inside of the bird, the head, neck and feet were still attached, which makes a great soup.
    Well, once one grows accustomed to seeing part of the soup looking back up at one. Then, the cat got a treat in the form of the head and feet.

  41. robro says

    microraptor #43

    Monophyletic isn’t a synonym for monoculture. Christianity is monophyletic because all its various branches can still be traced back to a single origin point.

    Well, you’re probably much better at the technical use of the words than I am, but from my reading, “single origin point” is part of the myth of Christianity.

  42. latsot says

    Sentamu is an embarrassment. He can be relied upon 100% to have the most idiotic opinion possible on any subject. His particular speciality is writing ill-informed articles about the problem of homelessness from one or the other of his two palaces.

  43. KG says

    Giliell@48,
    Yes, really. There was no requirement that turnout reach a particular figure, and none of them said in advance “I won’t accept the result if it’s for Brexit” – again, with the exception of the Scottish and as I should have added earlier, northern Irish parties that want to leave the UK. To refuse to accept the result now would be quite legitimately denounced as undemocratic. The most they could do – and I agree, haven’t done in any remotely adequate way – is to insist that no-one voted to leave the European Single Market, or for Theresa May to have any role in the process at all, let alone the sole power to determine negotiating positions. The Liberal Democrats and Greens have called for a second referendum to be held, on the final terms, but it’s not clear article 50 is revocable, so the result of that, if it went against the terms, might just be that the UK leaves the EU without any agreement.

  44. KG says

    That they fell in line with the latter in fear of the former is, frankly, confusing. – Athywren@49

    Why is it confusing that they accept the result of the referendum, not having said in advance that they wouldn’t if it went the wrong way?