Life, 1920-12-02 · page 57 of 97
Life — December 2, 1920 — page 57: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This satirical essay mocks two anxieties gripping post-WWI America: the "Red Scare" and excessive Christmas philanthropy. **The "Red" references**: Leacock targets anti-communist hysteria sweeping 1920 America. He catalogs widespread panic about "Reds"—Bolsheviks, factory workers, college students, artists, and editors allegedly promoting communist revolution. The joke is grotesque exaggeration: even the cook, grocer, iceman, and furnaceman are "red," with the iceman literally delivering "vermilion ice." **The cartoon**: Shows Santa encountering Native Americans, with the caption "Three Hundred Years Ago" and Santa asking directions to a Puritan colony. This appears to satirize Christmas as an American tradition imposed on indigenous peoples, perhaps commenting on colonial exploitation masked by festive sentiment. **The philanthropy complaint**: Leacock warns that excessive Christmas charity and goodwill toward service workers threatens to undermine his misanthropic resistance. He threatens to abandon his annual dollar-giving ritual and drop "paving stones" on deliverymen instead. The satire mocks both Red-baiting paranoia and performative holiday generosity.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Berember 2, 1920 The Discolored Christmas DON’T want to grumble, but I must say that prospects for Christmas this year do not look bright. The more I look he world about me the less I like it. In the first place, there is altogether too much of this “red” business abroad among us. The newspapers tell us that the Bolsheviks are planning a huge “red” movement against Asia. I understand that half the factory hands in America are “red.” Most of the freshmen students in the colleges are turning “red are told, and there is a “red” movement spreading rapidly in art and literature. “Red” editors are writing inflammatory articles for “red” readers. Redness is invading the home. Our cook took a red streak yesterday. The A red groceryman throws packets of tea and sugar against our back door, and a red iceman smashes our refrigerator with huge blocks of ver- milion ice. furnaceman is red By Stephen Leacock Now, personally, I am getting thor- oughly fed up with this redness. If things don’t change soon I'm going to take a red streak myself. I give our cook fair warning, through these columns, that the next time she turns red, I'll bite her. I'll nip a piece right out of her. I am just in the mood for it. And the postman; of late there has been a kind of red touch in the way he delivers my letters. I don't like it. Let him take fair warning that if he doesn’t alter, I'm going to turn red on him my- self. And it will be on Christmas morn- ing that I mean to do it. Every Christ- mas morning for fifteen years he has come to my door with the Ictters and with the full geniality of the Christmas season blooming all over him. And every Christmas morning IT have come out to him in my pajamas and dressing-gown and given him a dollar. There was some- thing in the sheer geniality of the merry THREE HUNDRED YEARS AGO fellow that used to get me every time: 1 have that kind of feeble mind that easily responds to the Christmas. pleasant pretences of The thing always went to my head. And I was willing to stand on the doorstep in my pajamas in a snowstorm and to hand out a dollar ece to the postman, the groceryman, the policeman, the ta lector, and even the man that read the iceman, the milkman, the col- meter for the gas company. Now let them take warning. all gone red, and so will I. On Christ- mas morning I mean to sit at a top window and drop paving stones on t heads as they come along. But I wouldn't complain if it was only the redness that is perplexing the world at this glad season. Almost worse than the redness is the new form of whiteness that has broken out. I mean the overdose of philanthropy that is being thrust upon us. I am, I trust, as good a philanthropist “Sorry to trouble you, but can you direct me to the Puritan colony that’s just settled here in America?” comicbooks.com