Who is Santa Claus to you? A man, a woman, a made-up person and excuse for various men of various inclinations to get children to sit on their knee in suburban shopping centres in the run up to Christmas?
Well, to one councillor in County Durham, Santa Claus is a man, and only a man. During a recent council meeting in Newton Wycliffe, two women residents volunteered to take on the upcoming role of Santa Claus in the town’s Christmas parade. The job is to dress up as Santa, stand on a float and wave to spectators, then hand out sweets.
The entire council voted to allow this, but Labour’s Arun Chandran is trying to overturn the decision on the basis there is ‘no shortage of male volunteers’ and ‘My understanding is that Santa Claus, otherwise called Father Christmas (among other names), is a male role.’
Children were expecting a male Santa Claus and it ‘may well reflect badly on the council’ if a woman were chosen for the role as ‘a form of political correctness.’
‘Santa Claus being a man is a long-held tradition accepted by the vast majority of society without question and change just for the sake of it, rather than a good reason or necessity is wrong, and will only serve to attract negative publicity.’
A meeting on December 12th will decide the fate of the female Santa, to which Mt Chandran said: ’I remain open if members can convince me that the Rotary Club and other councils are introducing women Santas everywhere, but they are not.’
Bill Blenkinsop, 70, told The Times that Mr Chandran’s objections were nonsense: ‘We voted unanimously, there’s nothing wrong with the lady Santa. Does it matter who Santa is?’
Not really - whoever it is tends to be dressed up in a beard and wig and hat and glasses, we'd recognise someone as a santa if they had just those things on, right?
It’s got us to thinking, of some more questions, though. The first one being, if this was a truly politically correct parade, surely sweets wouldn't be handed out? And, really, what is the point of Santa? And why must he be a man?
Is it to do with the famed Christmas tradition whereby children queue up to sit on an old man’s knee and ask him for something that their parents may not ever afford? Do kids trust Santa? Do they trust him too much? Do they know that sitting on a guy’s lap and asking him for something might not get them what they’re after? Is that a weird tradition to lend to a mid-winter celebration of the darkest days of the year being over? One thing's more certain - we know what will be on Mr Chandran's Christmas list this year - a great big male Santa!