Definition:
A “Christmas gift” is a present given during the Christmas season to celebrate the holiday, express love and gratitude, and share joy with others.
Etymology:
The term “Christmas” comes from Old English “Cristes mæsse,” meaning “Christ’s Mass,” and “gift” comes from Old English “gift,” meaning “something given.”
The English word “gift” and the German word “Gift” are cognates. Both the English word “gift” and the German word “Gift” can be traced back to Proto-Germanic roots. The English word “gift” comes from the Old Norse word “gift” or “gipt,” meaning “something given” or “a gift.” The German word “Gift” also comes from the Proto-Germanic root “*giftiz,” which means “something given.” Over time, the meaning in German shifted to specifically mean “poison.” This change likely happened because poison was often given or administered as a dose, hence “something given.”
Description:
Christmas shopping can be a particularly stressful activity because society often places high demands on giving gifts to loved ones to demonstrate care and generosity. For many, this means they have to work extra hard to earn the money, or they have to get by with very little themselves, to afford the gifts. As it is said that giving gifts demonstrates care and generosity, many will assume that people don’t care about them if they don’t receive gifts. At the same time, it is traditional for everyone to shop for Christmas gifts during the same period, instead of spreading the shopping throughout the year, which means that shopping centers are filled with extremely stressed people during the Christmas season. For very few people, it is important that the gifts are something the recipient actually needs, so a vast number of the gifts people buy for each other are completely unnecessary items that generally never get used.
Gift-giving is a central part of Christmas traditions worldwide, often taking place during Advent, on Christmas Eve, or on Christmas Day.
In the USA, children usually wake up on Christmas day to open presents. In Norway, children are mostly forced to wait until after Christmas dinner before they can open their presents. The reason for this is supposedly to ensure that the children eat their meal first, as otherwise they might become so preoccupied with their new toys that they won’t want to eat. Many of the adults often threaten the children that they won’t get to open presents if they don’t eat and behave. At the same time, the children become very impatient during Christmas dinner.
It is a tradition that millions of parents lie to their children about the existence of Santa Claus and that he brings gifts to good children on Christmas Eve. However, if children do not behave, he will not bring gifts. This is a common scare tactic, similar to how the fictional characters the Easter Bunny and God are used as scare tactics to control the behavior of the gullible. This lie tends to heavily distort children’s perception of how the world works, as it teaches them that the world magically gives them gifts.
Symbolism:
The gifts underneath the Christmas tree emphasize the symbolism of the global hierarchical monetary system: capitalism, as they symbolize the circulation of money at the bottom of the hierarchy keeping the system going.
The symbolism of a gift is poison, as receiving or taking may seem positive, but it is an illusion. One trains their thinking skills by being independent, working to achieve goals on their own. This is why many will say “it’s better to give than to receive.” Those who only wish to receive and never give back tend to suffer from selfishness.