Sublime, meet ridiculous

The pox of the politically correct continues to infect the furthest reaches of society. I know it's somewhat sacrilegious for me to even bring this up, but the PC revolution has now reached Santa's grotto.

The BBC, bastion of all that is truthful and good in media (excuse me while I cough up a hairball) reports this much in this web posting, Live camera protection for Santa. The fat old guy and webcams have now been united in commercial-technological glory. Why? To protect him and prevent lawsuits, of course.

Now there's some spirit of the season for ya!

Chicago Sun-Times columnist Zay. N. Smith summarizes this and other ridiculous snippets of the season in Sunday's column, Have a holly, jolly PC Christmas.

All of this, of course, diverts attention away from the fundamentally flawed logic that puts Santas into specially-constructed villas in malls around the world. As parents, we talk ourselves hoarse teaching our kids to never talk to strangers. Yet well-meaning Moms and Dads see nothing wrong with plopping their precious little ones into the lap of a Complete Stranger who may or may not have consumed mass quantities of alcohol so as to survive the endless onslaught of gift-seeking young 'uns.

I shudder to think what we teach them in the process - "It's OK, honey, go over to that man you've never met before and tell him what you want while we stand over here and cry while the elves over there take your picture. Mommy loves you."

If this is the lesson society wishes to teach its children, count me out. I know I've always been technically "out" of the whole Santa game by virtue of the fact that I don't celebrate the holiday (heathen!) but humor me anyway.

Humbug.