Saints need not apply

My friend Al wrote the other day to tell me that the agency where his wife works has prohibited its staffers from taking holiday decorations with them when they move into a new office.

Now, we’re not just talking Christmas decor here, folks. As Al points out, the list of proscribed items includes anything relating to St. Patrick’s Day or Valentine’s Day as well. Why? “Because they refer to SAINTS and the Committee to Avoid Any Potential Offense to Anyone has decreed these holiday decorations off limits,” Al writes. “The only decorations to be allowed will be seasonal, as in the four seasons.”

What we have here is another fine example of none-too-bright managers (Dilbert’s boss comes to mind) embracing a perfectly good idea - sensitivity to the beliefs of others - and taking it to an idiotic extreme.

On some level, I can understand not allowing Christmas displays in an office, even if they involve secular items. Christmas remains, at heart, a religious holiday, even in our materialistic era of over-the-top gifting, so there is a certain sad and twisted logic to banning all manifestations of it in some office settings.

But St. Patrick’s Day? Valentine’s Day? Whatever religious connotations they once had are long gone. No one associates leprechauns and rainbows and pots of gold and green beer with some guy who supposedly drove the snakes out of Ireland. As for St. Valentine, I’d bet serious money that you could not find one person in a thousand who knows anything about him, her, or them. (There were several saints by that name in ancient Rome, according to Wikipedia.)

“Ah, how we show our ignorance!” Al wrote. “If you're serious about eliminating religious references, you might be able to keep Tuesday, but the rest have to go being references to Woddin, Thor, Frieda, Saturn, the Sun and the Moon. January and March both have to go, being named for deities. They also need a new calendar not affiliated with a pope and a new year numbering system, since we can't have a numbering system based on the date of the birth of Christ.”

Come to think of it, the Declaration of Independence refers to a “Creator,” a “Supreme Judge,” and divine “Providence.” So all of those American flag pins and red, white and blue whatnots that go on display in offices across the land come early July? Gotta toss 'em.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to get back to figuring out what 2012 should be called under the new numbering system.