holiday tact | essay | the len sousa pages

As we approach another Christmas season, I’m reminded of the way we still fail to acknowledge the annual horror of the holiday. It is my fervent hope that during this jolliest time of year we take a moment to remember something the animal rights group PETA pointed out to us in 2003. In a campaign deliciously titled “The Holocaust On Your Plate,” the organization compared the “suffering of animals caused by our meat-centered diet” to the slaughter of over six million innocent people during World War II. Despite their delicate handling of the material—juxtaposing images of dead men, women and children with dead cattle—it was unusually mired by controversy. But the real focus for me, as a practicing arboreal conservationist, was not on cattle but on the abhorrent treatment endured each Christmas by our Earth partner, the helpless tree.

Every December we must tolerate not only the harsh winter air but also the harsh winter treatment of our healthy wooden brethren—specifically members of the Pinus genus. Conservationists such as myself must contend with an ongoing system of cruelty focused on our oxygenating friends that is habitually ignored by every major news outlet in the world; what might be called “The Arboreal Holocaust In Your Living Room.”

Just as it was once tradition for Roman citizens to watch men die in the heat of a gladiatorial battle for mere amusement, and exactly the same way millions of innocents were shuttled to their deaths at the hands of an atrocious Nazi regime in the 1940s, so today millions of living beings that do nothing but spread life-giving oxygen into our atmosphere are seasonally crucified in homes across the country and across the world.

Pardon my lack of a sentence break, but with the mass murdering of trees at an all-time high, my fellow arboreal conservationists and I are intent on raising breathless awareness to this international crisis by next Christmas. Starting this coming January and continuing for the remainder of the year, we will be plastering arboreal concentration camps—or, as they are sweetly and misleadingly called, “tree farms”—with posters and pamphlets illustrating the emaciated appearance of all manner of conifers as they starve for proper nourishment in the homes of millions; decorated like macabre circus clowns, losing all their life-sustaining needles and slowly dying before a gleeful holiday photo—only to be tossed to the side of the road like so much garbage on December 26th.

There are those who may have the audacity to question our comparison of tree butchery to the Nazi-induced Holocaust. In that case, let me remind you that the sadistic tradition of the Christmas tree also had its origins in Germany. You might think of this as nothing more than pure happenstance, but I urge you to reconsider for the sake of our dear trees.

In the words of George W. Bush, “Fool me once, shame on you—you fool me, we can’t get fooled again.”

Allow me further to refer you nonbelievers to the columnist Lewis Regenstein, who supports PETA’s campaign and whose words have been slightly amended to fit our needs (changes in brackets): “The Holocaust and the suffering it entailed were unique in human history, nothing else can fairly be compared to it, and it must never be trivialized. But neither should we be treating animals [or trees] the way the Nazis treated their victims. And when that does happen, it should be condemned.”

We at The Arboreal Conservationist League for the Ethical Support of Spruce (TACTLESS) agree wholeheartedly with Mr. Regenstein. As a group, we have nothing but understanding for those families directly and indirectly affected by the Holocaust. Still, we believe it can be used as a vehicle through which new perspectives may be shared and a greater sense of empathy gained for other causes. It is my hope that those in support of PETA’s crusade will join us this coming year in our TACTLESS tactics and help make the next holiday season one of joy and cheer for people and pines everywhere.