Trees and Bowls

As we couldn't have guessed it would be coming, the cause celebre of this holiday season ... do I mean Christmas season? ... is the hand-wringing over the fate of the world because some places are calling their  evergreens "holiday trees" rather than "Christmas trees".

 

Jerry Falwell is in a leather about. As are writers on the al.com Auburn Tigers "Free for All" forum. (It seems Auburn has chosen to have a holiday tree on its campus.)   A search on Google using the phrase "holiday tree" and "politically correct" returned a listing of over 22,000 entries! (... in only .14 second, no less!)

 

If we really want to address the breaking down of traditions and community though, we should take on another change that was inflicted upon us many years ago.  As our friend at Red State Diaries reminds us, college football bowl games were not always named for their corporate benefactors.

 

What happened to the good old days when bowl games were the cap on the college football season played at host sites that had their own aura of greatness because of the exciting match-ups that pounded out wins and reputations and legends on the gridiron?

 

Now we have the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl. The Capital One Bowl. The Nokia Sugar Bowl.

 

Whatever happened to the old time names followed by the "proudly sponsored by whatever corporation" message? Whatever happened to corporations being willing to let their ads do the talking, rather than believing they are the king in whose court our teams play.