Oh, Brighton.
You absolute clowns.
You’ve done it again.
You’ve reached a level of performative
cowardice so spectacular it deserves its own permanent exhibit: “The
Museum of Peak Institutional Spinelessness”.
This time, it’s not just a flag exhibition.
No, this time you’ve black-barred the word “Santa”.
Yes.
Santa.
As in Father Christmas.
As in the jolly fat man with the beard who brings presents to children.
As in the single most universally beloved figure in modern Western culture, short of maybe Taylor Swift.
And you – a publicly funded museum – decided that the word “Santa” was too risky to display in full.
In an exhibition about Christmas traditions, or winter festivals, or whatever anodyne seasonal theme you were pretending to care about, you literally covered up the word “Santa” with a black bar on the wall label.
Why?
Because some tiny, hyper-vocal minority of people apparently find the concept of Santa Claus “problematic”.
Not the actual man.
Not the reindeer.
Not the elves.
Just the word.
Maybe they’re offended because Santa is white.
Or because he’s fat (fatphobic).
Or because he rewards “good” children and not “bad” ones (classist, ableist, punitive).
Or because he’s a man (patriarchal).
Or because he’s fictional (anti-reality?).
Who knows.
Who cares.
The point is: you didn’t tell those hypothetical complainers to touch grass, or perhaps to consider that Christmas is a cultural festival that billions of people enjoy without needing a trigger warning.
Instead, you did the noble, progressive thing:
You censored the name of Santa Claus in your own museum.
Let that sentence land for a moment.
You are now the first publicly funded art institution in Britain to decide that the word “Santa” is too dangerous for adults to read unredacted.
This isn’t safeguarding.
This is institutional Munchausen by
proxy: you’re inventing trauma where none exists, then pretending you’re
saving people from it.
The only people being protected here are the museum staff who are terrified of a single negative tweet from a blue-check discourse merchant.
You’ve turned a place that’s supposed to celebrate culture into a giant apology factory that grovels to the thinnest-skinned people on the internet.
Well done.
Next time you’re thinking of hosting a “Winter Festival” or “Seasonal
Stories” exhibition, perhaps consider blacking out the words
“Christmas”, “Jesus”, “snow”, “presents”, “family”, “joy”, and “fun”
while you’re at it.
Just to be safe.
Or – wild idea – you could try the radical act of treating your visitors like grown adults who can handle seeing the word “Santa” without needing emotional support animals and a debrief session.
Until then, enjoy your black bar over “Santa”.
It’s the perfect visual metaphor for what Brighton Museum has become:
a place so afraid of its own shadow that it’s willing to censor Father Christmas himself.
Ho fucking ho.
Yours in weary disbelief,
Someone who used to think museums were for grown-ups
In the meantime, if you’re looking for some actual Santa-related joy that hasn’t been ruined by institutional cowardice, here are a few things that are still safe to enjoy (and buy) without black bars:
- A proper Santa Claus costume for your own house, because clearly the museum can’t be trusted with one: Santa Suit
- The classic Rankin/Bass stop-motion Santa movie that has survived every culture war since 1964: Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town (DVD)
- A nice big book of Christmas stories with Santa in it, no apologies needed: The Night Before Christmas by Clement Clarke Moore
- And, for the truly bold, an actual Santa hat that the Brighton Museum curators would probably demand be pixelated: Deluxe Santa Hat
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