I begin to understand... no, I lie. I may never understand the US religio-political complex..

[commodorified]

So, let me get this straight:

You can't have abortions, contraception, or same-sex marriage, and people are still being jerks about female clergy, nevermind queer clergy, but y'all have to work Good Friday and Easter Monday and you don't even get time-and-a-half for it?

Ok, look. In the event that y'all ever do somehow end up with an Established Religion, may I just put in an extremely enthusiastic word for being ground under the merciless (Birkenstocked) heel of the Episcopalians/Anglicans/C of E?

Comments

[commodorified]

I'm going to need you to delete and repost that comment with 100 percent fewer misogynistic slurs, please.

[amberfox]

Sorry, it's late and I borrowed an acquaintance's latest favorite new word thoughtlessly. I apologize.

Still cranky about working holidays so people can get last-minute side dishes for family dinners I'll be missing so I can prevent them from being inconvenienced.

Sorry, though. =/

[commodorified]

Pas de problem; I've totally done it myself.

I wish I could send you a ham. And a very large chocolate bunny.

[amberfox]

Having planned ahead, I am already in possession of a ham, assorted vegetables, a carrot cake, and more candy that any 3 people should attempt to eat. Unfortunately my family will be having Easter brunch so I can *have* any of the food -- except the candy, which I will shamelessly take with and stash in my apron pockets for nibbles. (Brunch doesn't sound too horrible, but my family are all naturally nocturnal; we work nights whenever we can. So this is basically our 3am.)

I'll take the bunny, though. Solid, or hollow?

[commodorified]

Oh, solid, definitely. You deserve it. I mean, back when I dispatched I was young and single and so totally used to get stuck working the statutory holidays a lot, but the whole time-and-a-half, double-time-for-overtime thing was a considerable consolation.

[amberfox]

I worked for a company for a few lovely years who were open 24/7/365, but they took volunteers for holidays, and it was considered rather cushy; you got full pay for the holiday, plus you got time-and-a-half for coming in, so you actually made 2.5x your normal salary, and most of the time we only got a handful of calls all day. Some of the guys set up a Quake server and spent the whole day blowing each other up. I miss that job.

As the single girl, my sister gets stuck with the shifts no one else wants at her job. When she's going to be out, her coworkers fight viciously over who has to replace her. She works the closing shift, and someone absolutely has to be there until the last warehouse closes. No exceptions short of hospitalization. With traffic, this means some of her coworkers who live further out wouldn't get home til 9pm or so.

[alexbayleaf]

[Wild tangents 'r' us...]

I'm fascinated by this whole ham-for-Easter thing, or more generally with the North American (or perhaps mostly USAnian) tendency to say "there's an annual event, WE MUST HAVE A SPECIAL FOOD FOR THIS." We don't eat ham at Easter here. We mostly limit ourselves to chocolate and hot cross buns, and there's no particular tradition of a sit-down family dinner for the holiday.

I once made a list and came up with about 20 holidays/annual events that had special food in the US, but could only come up with half a dozen for Australia. Sometimes I feel like we're missing out. Other times I feel like we dodged a bullet.

[kyriacarlisle]

Oh, my, yes. I'm not going to be able to resist seeing how long a list I can think of.

[alexbayleaf]

I'd be interested in hearing your list/swapping notes! (if commodorified doesn't mind)

[commodorified]

(or perhaps mostly USAnian)

No, we do it too, recollect Thanksgiving meals. And, I mean, we're wildly unconventional about our Festive Meals due to allergies and other accommodations plus our basically experimental ways.

OTOH we're *more* rigid/traditional about food for some holidays cause we're often quietly doubling Pagan-stuff with Christian/broader cultural stuff in this family.

[aris_tgd]

I mean, on one hand, yes, more holidays would be nice? On the other hand, the only official US holiday which is also a Christian holiday is Christmas, and I'm kinda sore about that one. So I'm actually not bothered, no.

[commodorified]

Sure. I'm just saying, the ways of your people are strange.

[aris_tgd]

Inorite? But at the same time I feel it just proves that they're assholes dressing up their assholery in religion, rather than very strictly religious. I think that's a clear way to point out what's really going on.

[commodorified]

That was sort of my thought. It also clarifies for me some behaviours and positions of US non-Christians which I find sometimes difficult to comprehend, and will probably make it easier for me to explain what I mean when I say "look, I'll listen sympathetically, because you absolutely have good reason to be pissed off, but actually, I both have a background in Religious Studies and live in a country with an official, established religion, and really, whether or not a country has one is ... not actually the predictor of social attitudes you may think it is."

[(Anonymous)]

love the icon. want one just haven't figured out how to download it when you send it Love you

[commodorified]

Right click and save image, hon :-)

[redbird]

I know quite well that theocratic policies, misogynist and otherwise (the "Jesus as crony capitalist" thing is just as hard on non-women), seem to be possible with or without an official established religion. Where I differ with some of my British friends is that I don't think having a state church necessarily protects you either (e.g., Franco-era Spain).

[auriaephiala]

I strongly agree with you and aris_tgd about the hypocrisy.

But ... Canada doesn't HAVE an official, established religion. We have a few references to God and freedom of religion that were inserted fairly late into the Charter of Rights and the Constitution bill (and into the anthem) but that's not an established religion in the same way that the UK has an established religion.

[commodorified]

OK, now I need to check this, cause I'm pretty sure the Anglican Church of Canada is still lurking around on the books somewhere, not that you can really tell.

[lenora_rose]

I don't think so. What little I remember, it was never fully codified as a state religion even when they were handed some privileges like land. Certainly, the RC in Quebec would have fought that hard.

[con_girl]

The Queen is Our Queen (hence the title) and she is head of the Church of England (and thus I think also the head of the church in Canada. I was taught that she was in communion classes years ago, if I remember right). In England, it is much clearer that the Queen's dual nature of head of church and state makes there be a state religion. I was sure this was true for Canada, until I just tried to look it up. However, we do not have a "separation of church and state" doctrine here - that's American.

[girlpearl]

I keep starting to respond to this and walking away. Marna, I love you, and I respect you, and reading this entry (and this comment) just... no. With all due respect, having a background in Religious Studies does not in any way give you an idea of what it's like to be a non-Christian (let alone atheist) in a Christian country--which, first amendment aside, the United States definitely is.

[commodorified]

Oh, I know that. The exact opposite, actually, which was kind of my point: what it gives me is a particular perspective on what laws about religion and cultural stuff about religion do and don't do, and how they intersect.

[girlpearl]

I have absolutely no reason to believe that laws establishing a de juro state religion would play out in the United States in the way they have in Canada. I will grant you that my knowledge of the Canadian established religion thing is limited but I do have extensive knowledge of how religion & politics intersect in the United States; codifying that into law--well, that's exactly why we can't have abortions, birth control, and equal marriage rights. Because that is how the particular religious group that is trying--and to a terrifying degree, succeeding--to take over the US government--is running things. I guarantee you they are not interested in equal protections for other religions, let alone other minority groups.

[commodorified]

No argument whatsoever.

We may actually be "agreeing at ever increasing volume". My point is, and you are not a person who does this, is that people who look at our structures and assume that they MUST play out the same way they would in the US are ALSO seriously missing the point.

Hence me pointing out, you know, how this particular deal DOES play out.

[crystalpyramid]

On the other hand, the NYC public (and some private) schools give both Christian and Jewish holidays off. Which was nice.

Pretending the Republican party is about anything deeper than corporate profits and the status quo turning back the clock is sort of a hopeless cause.

[wcg]

I can tell you a story about Scotch-Irish Presbyterians who were forced to live west of the Shenandoah to practice their religion openly, and how their descendants became the hillbillies of today. But it's a long story and you may not be interested. Suffice to say they don't ever take a day off work for any reason and they distrust established churches.

[zarhooie]

Feel my cork-soled oppression!

[ursula]

I'm in Edmonton for work this weekend, and everything is closing early. Very disorienting!

[staranise]

I'm in Vancouver-not-Edmonton for the first time, and nearly everything is still open this weekend. Very disorienting!

[kutsuwamushi]

That one's easy.

When religion and business conflict, business usually wins. We don't even give people the day before or after Christmas off as a matter of course.

[twistedchick]

With a lot of companies, it's not a matter of holidays (anyone's) as much as it's that there are X number of days off, period, and how they are allocated depends on business. Not much difference between the Catholic hospital where I was a secretary, the newspaper where I was a reporter/editor, and the bookstore where I worked for a while -- when you get seven days off a year and the busy times are other people's holidays, you still have to pull a shift. I pulled work shifts on Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter and New Year's, and the easiest was Superbowl Sunday (secular holiday, all but) until the game was over.

Re time and a half -- places that are juggling time off as I described *don't allow you to take overtime*. They require you to take comp time off and adjust your work schedule accordingly.

[staranise]

Soviet Canuckistan is big on statutory holidays with mandated time-and-a-half: if someone who works on a statutory holiday (federally, New Year's Day, Good Friday, Canada Day, Labour Day, and Christmas Day) is not paid 1.5x their regular salary, it is a crime. (There are also provincial time-and-a-half stat holidays--my home province had seven, my current has five.)

[twistedchick]

Must be nice.

As a (non-union) reporter (most papers in the US are nonunion except for the press men), the only time I was allowed to have overtime was election night, for which I pulled a 40-hour shift. I didn't get overtime as a technical analyst (no need for it), or for any other job other than very rare instances where it was unavoidable. Actually, the most overtime I ever had was on the assembly line at General Motors.

[xinef]

I've often had similar thoughts about US holidays.

I find US Thanksgiving amusing too, in a similar sort of way. The #1 family holiday, and the #1 shopping weekend. Let's get together as a family and go shopping. As for the folks who have to work in those stores so you can go shopping, well, we don't think about them, do we.

And to make your point stronger, you could use Good Friday and Easter Sunday (instead of the Monday) as your examples, since Easter Monday is not actually a holiday here for most folks, and Easter Sunday is.

[auguris]

Wealth is our official religion, but no one wants to admit that.

[trouble]

Wait, what? Folks in the US have to work Good Friday AND Easter Monday? I mean, Easter Monday I know is a weird one, but Good Friday? That's... woah. :(

[ethelmay.livejournal.com]

Easter being by definition on a Sunday, unlike Christmas or New Year's, the surrounding events have never hit the consciousness of Whoever Plans These Things. Growing up in a Christian-only-by-vague-tradition sort of family, I never really registered Good Friday as a thing at all. In fact I was quite old before I realized that Ash Wednesday was not part of Holy Week (I'd been assuming that Holy Week had funny names for all the days).

On the other hand, I was shocked at the bit in Little Women where Amy goes out on Christmas morning and exchanges the skinflint present she'd bought for her mother for a handsomer one -- the stores were open *then*?

[amadi]

The Episocopalian church where I live got angry that the overall US Episcopalian trend is toward equality and egalitarianism and in protest of the making of qualified people bishops while women or queer, they're no longer Episcopal. They split with the USEC communion and so the local diocese is officially Anglican with all the anti-woman, anti-queer trappings of the highest highest old conservative recalcitrant stalwarts in the UK, but even more like the highly culturally conservative bishops of Africa.

So I'm not at all convinced that CoE/Anglican/Episcopalianism is any guarantee of a progressive happy live and let live form of Christianity at all.

[lenora_rose]

IMNcommodorified, but I think the point was less whether/how progressive the church is and more how they tend to keep their nose out of non church members' politics.

That being said, I don't think we do have an official religion in Canada.

[con_girl]

Just went through the 1962 version of the Book of Common Prayer (online). It calls the Queen Defender of the Faith so think she's still the head of the Anglican Church in Canada.

Also are numerous prayers for politicians to do good jobs. No idea if that means anything.