(China – January 8, 2024) During the Christmas season of 2023, schools in China, from kindergarten, elementary, secondary to universities issued prohibitions for students to celebrate Christmas and Christmas Eve. Threatening severe consequences if any class or student is found celebrating Christmas. Authorities also banned the sale of Christmas cards, Christmas apples with the word “peace” written on them, and prohibited the use of Christmas decorations.
Chinese authorities view Christmas and Christmas Eve as Western holidays with strong religious connotations. They consider such holidays as constituting a conflict of values with the socialist ideology controlled by the Communist Party and something that will have a direct impact on culture. Despite the government proclaiming socialist values having little genuine value and the reality that its regime has consistently opposed traditional Chinese culture over the decades.
With the growing hostility of the Chinese government towards the West, the general openness of the Chinese people towards Western culture has however increased. This has heightened the government’s vigilance against the West. The Chinese government’s ban of Christmas fundamentally reflects its wariness towards Christmas, Western culture, and Western religion, even as Christmas becomes increasingly commercialized in Western societies.
In a document titled “The Initiative to Embrace 2024 Without the Celebration of Christmas,” a company identified as Shenzhen Lianhua Property Management Co., Ltd. requests that merchants refrain from selling Christmas and Christmas Eve-related gifts, cards, and christmas apples. Merchants are also prohibited from hanging holiday decorations in malls and shops.
On social media, documents have surfaced regarding Chinese schools prohibiting students from celebrating Christmas and Christmas Eve. A secondary school in the Gaoxin District of Jining City, Shandong Province, issued an initiative to ban Christmas celebrations. The initiative states that Christmas is a Western holiday, and in recent years, there has been a trend of celebrating Christmas in society and on campuses. Therefore, teachers, students, and parents are not allowed to celebrate Christmas. Similarly, an elementary school in Harbin and two educational institutions, Houjie Kaixian School in Dongguan City, Guangdong Province, and Pingtan Pingyuan Central Kindergarten, respectively, issued a refusal to celebrate foreign holidays initiative, stating that Christmas is a serious cultural invasion, and advocating to be firm in the cultural confidence in Chinese traditional culture.
All the initiatives prohibiting Christmas share similar content, and some go further by specifying prohibitions, such as the use of Christmas-related themes in texts and decorations used in classrooms. Fireworks, snow sprays, Christmas hats, Christmas makeup, and similar items are not allowed to be brought onto the campus during the times before and after Christmas. Teachers and students are prohibited from exchanging gifts like “Christmas apples” on Christmas Eve as a form of celebration. Students and teachers are disallowed from organizing any sort of class or student assemblies or even festive activities.
A notice concludes by claiming that once a class or individual student is found to have committed any of the above behaviors, the school will deal with them seriously in accordance with the appropriate penalty regulations.
These initiatives to boycott Christmas have sparked strong sarcasm among netizens: “When will there be a ban on wearing suits?” “Now that we’re at it, the Gregorian calendar, also invented by foreigners, should not be used anymore.” “We are invincible. Starting now, let’s boycott everything invented by foreigners. No more QR codes because they were invented by the Japanese; this is called cultural confidence.”
Some netizens sarcastically pointed out that the entire foundation of the party is foreign in nature, saying, “What about Western cultures like Marx and Lenin?”
From the perspective of the history of Chinese Christianity and the local context, Christmas is not a “foreign festival” for Westerners but a universally celebrated holiday. Chinese Christians imbue this holiday with religious and redemptive significance, while the general public view it as a festive occasion with unique celebratory and commercial values.