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IT IS AT this time of the year that decorations start going up and presents start being bought.
With Christmas less than eight weeks away, the build up to the holiday is poised to get into full swing.
As of yet, there have been no confirmed plays of a Fairytale of New York – but you can bet that the first one isn’t a long way off.
While the early marketing of Christmas is much derided each year, it can be confusing to know exactly when the festive season kicks off.
So we decided to find out.
When exactly is it OK to start celebrating Christmas?
The official version
Taking it back to its religious root, the season in the liturgical calendar begins with Advent, something that you might be surprised to learn begins this year on 29 November.
Speaking to TheJournal.ie, a spokesperson for the Catholic Communications Office explained:
According to the Church’s liturgical reckoning, Christmas begins on the evening of 24th December and runs until the Sunday after the 6th January which is the Feast of the Epiphany of Our Lord.
What about the shops?
One of Dublin’s biggest Christmas institutions is department store Brown Thomas – and its definition of when Christmas begins throws out the mean for all other start dates.
Back in August, the high-end retailer launched its Christmas markets at its stores in Dublin, Cork, and Limerick.
As the store’s managing director Stephen Sealey explained to TheJournal.ie: “It opens so early because it sells early.
Many of the pieces are unusual and exclusive, lot of interior designers, hotels, etc buy from us, and they buy early.
On the importance of Christmas, Sealey went on to say, “Christmas is a hugely important time for us. Customers know Brown Thomas is the place to come for that special gift. They love our gift-wrapping, and the magic of the Brown Thomas bag.”
Decorations at the store will be going up over the coming week, with music starting to be played from the beginning of December.
While shopping centres may not all start decorating and playing music at the same time, it is something that they each put a bit of thought into.
The Jervis Centre told TheJournal.ie that decorating has been taking place over the past week and Christmas music will start being played on the 14th of this month.
And is there any particular reasoning behind this?
A spokesperson for the centre said:
Not particularly- it just follows on from past years.
What do the institutions say?
Dublin Airport, the scene of so many happy reunions, will be starting to put up its decorations towards the end of this month, with the airside retail area already adorned with baubles and tinsel.
A spokesperson for the airport told TheJournal.ie that last year these featured 88,000 LED energy-efficient fairy lights, 780 snowflakes, and more than 100 Christmas trees.
Music in the the two terminals will kick off on 14 December – but won’t be limited to pumping Slade and Wizzard out over the PA.
Rather, choirs and local schools will be present to perform songs and carols, something the spokesperson said is ”hugely popular with our customers every year”.
The airport will also have extra staff on hand to help with increased demand during the holiday period.
Central to bringing Christmas to Dublin is a joint effort between Dublin City Council, Dublin Town and the Luas Cross City that has been called ‘Dublin at Christmas’.
This effort was launched earlier this week on the centre of O’Connell Street with models outnumbering elves by a factor of two to one.
The major dates in terms of lights being switched on by this initiative will be the 12, 15 and 29 November, when the lights will be turned on on Henry Street, Grafton Street and O’Connell Street respectively.
So when is it ok to start celebrating Christmas?
So there you have it folks – the Christmas season begins some time between 1 November and Christmas eve.
Absolutely concrete.
But if we boil these figures down – can we come up with some sort of average date?
Taking all the dates featured in this article where institutions or shops put up their decorations, start playing their music or turn on their lights (although discounting the August opening date of Brown Thomas’ Christmas stores as that would throw things out massively) and averaging them out, the date that the Christmas season starts on is…
… 27 November.
So there you have it, a highly-unscientific answer to the exact date it is OK to start celebrating Christmas on.
And it would seem that one thing that can be settled on is that the last day of Christmas.
January 6 – a day known as Little Christmas, Nollaig na mBan or Día de los Reyes Magos (Day of the Magic Kings) in Spain, is widely accepted as the conclusion of festivities.
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Does it really matter? Gay actors play roles as straight people and Straight actors play roles as gay people all the time. The team behind the film will just choose whoever they believe will best suit the role.
@Shane Corry: Large media companies will now be lying in the beds they made for themselves :-)
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: could be a plot point perhaps?
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: they’re all anchored on sexuality, it’s just usually straight.
@Shane Corry:
My god my comment was removed asking why sexuality was put into a children’s story. What’s going on at journal towers??
@Dave O Keeffe: nope. It never came into it.
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: always does. It’s just not mentioned. For example, if Princess Jasmine in Aladdin was prince Jason it would be essentially the same but with a gay lead.
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: maybe if the kid watching the movie is confused then seeing a character like this may help the kid see that it’s normal and nothing wrong with being gay ?
This is a disgrace. Next thing we’ll be told RoboCop wasn’t a actually a half robot.
@Féach News: hard to tell if you’re joking or not.
@Siobhán Ni Mhurchú: I don’t think kids at that age are confused, unless something is causing them to be. You’re an odd one Siobhan.
@Shane Corry: to the editors at the journal and the people complaining about my comments, it’s that type of political correctness that ultimately divides society and polarises opinion, because people can’t discuss. If you’re not open to reasonable discussion, youre just as bad as the people you think you’re protectibg against. Cop on.
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: were you ever confused Ms Jim?
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: Yeah, the deleting of comments has been very excessive on this article. There was nothing wrong with your statement at all. I felt it was inaccurate but not offensive or intentionally inaccurate.
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: what age might that be ?
@Dave O Keeffe: not really as the theme is Disney princess. Aimed at little girls who love princesses.
@Siobhán Ni Mhurchú: and maybe explain your last line too ?
@Shane Corry: comments turned off on article about the mother sleeping in garda station with her children. Also unusually high thumbs up on despicable comments trying to pin the blame on this innocent mother for being homeless and not placing the blame where it belongs on this sham government for housing crisis.
Yet an article about a gay character in an upcoming children’s film is a hot spot for discussion.
Sad reflection on the state of society’s priorities.
@Siobhán Ni Mhurchú: Yeah right let’s talk numbers shall we?
Maybe is the kid watching the movie belong to 2% of people who are confused and seeing a character like this may help the kid. Yet in the process, a character like that will confuse 98% of other kids.
@Pat Patovic: how would knowing that gay people exist confuse a child? Pretty sure they’d take the fact onboard better than some adults, not looking at anyone in particular
@Dave O Keeffe: And what makes you think they need to learn this from TV? It would be much better to leave parenting to parents and not TV.
@Ali Ní Dhomhnaill: I think you’ll find it’s actually about the title character.
@Shane Corry: maybe we should have roles specific disney characters :
Only straight people can play straight roles
Only gay people can play gay roles
Only princesses can play princesses
Only princes can play princes
Only orgres can play orgres
Only pirates can play pirates
They should at least give it a try to see how they get on
@Pat Patovic: why would a gay character confuse children? Gay/straight- not confusing and just an insight into some people’s normal.
@John O Connor: she’s on 55k a year while not working. Wake up.
@Citygal: Because of people with 2 seconds attention span like you. If you want to put some meaningful contributions to debate try to read whole thread next time when you decide to react.
I was replying to another poster who claimed that gay kid can be confused when they will see just heterosexual people on TV.
And yes, seeing gay couples on TV can confuse children. Kids do not suffer from political correctness and question everything usually to the point that they can be pretty blunt.
@John O Connor: State is you and me and everyone other. If your priority is to house this woman go ahead and share your place with her.
It’s called acting for a reason
@Del Boy: sexuality should not be written into a children’s story.
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: It always is though. Basic fairytale stuff. Boy + girl + happily ever after
@Dave O Keeffe: that’s not sexuality.
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: sexuality: a person’s sexual orientation or preference.
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: Why? Children know what it means. They have gay friends and family members. Why shouldn’t there be gay characters in their books and movies?
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: So you think straight people don’t have any sexuality?
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: Think you’d better quit while you’re behind.
@Jim Ni Suilleabhain: What is it then??
I actually thought Jack was gay but that’s beside the point. He’s a superb comedy actor. Acting by definition is pretending to be somebody else so what’s the issue?
Johnny Depp is not a real Pirate either.
@David McShite: it’s not beside the point though. His whole act is being overtly camp. That’s probably why he was cast.
@David McShite: Quite the opposite, He’s just out of a 6 year relationship with Gemma Chan!!
What if, and here me out here folks, someone pretends to be someone else. A different character with a different perspective, background and sexuality to the person pretending to be them. They could learn lines from a script and put on a costume. Then they could film that with a camera and we can all watch it as entertainment
We could call it ‘Acting’
@Conor: I HEARd you
@Conor: lol. Eric Stonestreet, who plays Cameron in Modern Family, is one such human who isn’t gay pretending to be gay. And the world hasn’t imploded.
@Football in the Groin: and he’s hilarious
@Football in the Groin: He got in their just before all this madness took hold. But I’d reckon he’d still get a pass given he is fabulous.
So… They want a gay character to be played by a gay actor. Fair enough, but what if it backfires? I mean – if all the straight characters were to be played only by straight actors, many gay actors would end up unemployed… I thought the job of an actor was to pretend they’re someone who they are not, so what’s the difference if he’s gay or not…?
There wasn’t this much hullabaloo about Mrs Brown ffs…
Is Mrs Brown a lesbian?
@Michael Mclaughlin: Does she have to be gay to qualify her for use in the comments section?
@Paul Linehan: Come to think of it Michael. Eilish O’Carroll, who plays Mrs Browns best friend Winnie McGoogan (a straight married woman), is gay. And no one could give a fiddlers fcuk!!!
@Michael Mclaughlin: no, she’s a boy
This story makes sense and Whitehall should be denied the role, if Hollywood also implements a ban on gay actors playing straight characters, just to be consistent.
SJWs triggered by everything these days it seems ?
Movie execs, brands etc. – stop pandering to these Twitter airheads and caving in to their demands just because one random person’s tweet got more than a 1,000 times. Twitter is not a barometer of the general population’s feelings about this and other topics. Pandering to them gives them power. Give ‘em 2 fingers instead.
Oh ffs!!, why does the actor have to be gay??
Are they going to have to cast real aliens for the next sci-fi movie??
@Stephen: I agree with you but i could do without the aliens comparison
@Tim The Bear: cop on. That isn’t what they meant and you know it.
No problem when Tom Hanks played a gay man with aids in one of the best films ever. Humanity is f&£)ed
Isn’t it shocking that someone could have read my reply and gone “yeah, this guy gets it!”
@Dave O Keeffe: aww, it got deleted
I remember the backlash from the terminators when Arnie was cast.
Yer man in Modern Family (the fat one) is straight in real life. Nuff said.
@Liam Doyle: HE’s big boned
Turn off Twitter, controversy just disappears.
What next? Mortal humans playing superheros?
Actors will be portrayed flying planes, riding horses and doing stunts that they are incapable of in real life. It’s an outrage!
I’m still offended that C-3PO in star wars was played by a human instead of a robot.
FFS. People just look for something to be offended by . I dont remember the Straight outrage when the very gay Neil Patrick Harris played the womaniser Barney in How I Met Your Mother or when the straight Sean Penn played the openly gay Harvey Milk.
That’s just crazy. What about all the times they cast gay actors in straight roles .They are acting for fec$ sake
I thought that was the whole idea of “acting.”
Surely acting implies performing a role unfamiliar or even alien to the actors general behaviour. Good luck in the difficult role and fair play for taking it. A real actor, not someone playing a comfortable or heroic role, that’s easy.
But sure in beauty and the beast they got an actor to play the beast instead of a beast. I didn’t hear anyone giving out then
The opinion would be 180° different if it was Shawn Mendes casted for the role.. we’re not all hypocritical thankfully, just a few very vocal ones that live for the spotlight… I recall how excited we were when the openly gay actor, Brandon Flynn, was casted as a straight character for 13 reasons why, this whole thing stinks of hypocrisy and double standards. Disgraceful.
@Peadar Ó Rathaille: you remember how excited we were when who did what????
@Dave O Keeffe: a Netflix original, “13 reasons why”, had casted an openly gay actor to play a straight character.
At the time alot of gays were happy and clappy about it because “new era for lgbt” etc
Sorry I should have clarified.
Anyways my point is how hypocritical it is to denounce a straight man acting as a gay man, yet applaud a gay man acting as a straight man.
Another thing, Omar Sharif’s son fell far from the tree.
Pathetic,, imagine Sir Ian McKellen only being allowed play ‘straight’ roles, it would be the world’s loss,, as a gay man I’m quite embarrassed by this…
@Alan Watts: not being
Ruby Rose faces backlash because she is not gay enough. Jack Whitehall faces backlash because he is not gay. So now the left has threatened centrist and moderate left, is it literally only extreme left that are allowed be heard? Think the amounts of comments on dailyedge speaks volumes about that.
@Si Mac Ruairí: In what way dose a few random tweets make this a left supported issue?
@James Joseph Superior Power: you’ll be called a Terf soon enough for expression of an opinion soon enough
Clue is in job description!! Acting
The world has gone mad. Good night!
This is ridiculous. There have been gay actors playing straight roles for decades. Who cares? So, should a person who had a working-class upbringing be barred from playing an aristocrat in a movie?
What a non story, The Sun and some random tweets by no bodies… Can’t resist some click bait though, the mob love a good story they can all agree on.
Breaking news snowflakes Tom Hanks wasn’t Gay and he Didn’t have aids but what he has got is an Oscar for his role in Philadelphia.
Jack should just come out of the closet and silence the critics
I don’t care about the sexuality of the actor, my objection is that after years of promising the LGBT community of a gay character, Disney falls back on the tired stereotype of the excessively camp gay, no different from the multitude of pretend gay characters they’ve shown over the years.
Let’s show young LGBT kids that being different is something to be ridiculed.
And Vin Diesel isn’t qualified to play a wooden character so he shouldn’t play Groo… oh wait.
So gay actors can’t play straight roles?
Plenty of gay people have played straight characters, where’s the uproar!
He’s an ACTOR. Rock Hudson was cast as a straight man
He’s an actor ffs
Utter nonsense,, the best person for the role should be cast. Just because you are gay it does not give a god given right to take up suck roles with the industry:
It’s in cases like these that you really begin to seem the intersectionality of the left begin to unravel.
@GerMcKenna: notice there’s nobody here outraged by it or even in any way annoyed by the casting.
This is bull…. it’s called acting
How come no offence over Rami Malek playing Freddie Mercury?
Anyone that complains about this is absolutely pathetic and needs to get a grip.
Ah For God’s Sake, it’s about getting the best actor, not the best ‘gay in the village’!
STOP PRESS!!
LASSIE REMAKE CANCELLED
AS REX A ST BERNARD CAST IN TITLE ROLE,,,ALSO DRINKING BRANDY ON SET BECAME AN ISSUE AS WAS HEALTH N SAFETY DUE TO SLOPPY DROOL ON FLOOR OF SET REX WAS DEVASTATED BUT CONTINUES TO PLAY HIS TV ROLE AS A YOUNG DONALD TRUMP.
I don’t see what the big deal is. Many straight actors have played gay roles. Eirc Stonestreet, the actor who plays Cameron in Modern Family is a straight man.
The kind of
@Lambo Moonski: people who take issue with such nonsense should be sacrificed for the good of mankind
So you need to be gay to play a gay role ?
Is this not a bit sectarian?
I was disgusted when Rock Hutson played all those suave masculine roles, driving our women folk to distraction. Crazy I tell ya, crazy.
never happy…ffs…never. object to a straight guy playing a gay guy…..
Okay so Gay actors can’t play straight roles??.
Pedo movies
@Jimmy Carroll: What has Pedo got to do with Gay?? Bloody idiot.
@Rob Cahill: I think he’s talking about that Mel Gibson foreign language movie
Erm Sean Pence played Harvey Milk in Milk and was absolutely fantastic! And he’s straight. Who cares about the actor’s pensonal life? Their job is to act and take on a role. This identity politics crap is ruining media. And btw I’m gay myself and have played straight characters in plays.
I seem remember a story (or perhaps it was a poll) about allowing female actors play male roles. Kinda similar. There is arguably a bigger difference there.
Then again in early tv white males played as black males and historically in theatre men played female roles.
So it’s a non story really.
I’m just waiting for all the upcoming Marvel and DC movies to be shutdown until they cast real super heroes.
He was never in.
I’m always offended when they hire a non-serial killer to play a serial killer….
They’re actors. They act. That’s what their job is. Its not always about looking for an exact match but maybe a look and experience. We’re constantly told that sexual orientation shouldn’t matter when it comes to employment.
Brent Spiner plays android in latest Star Trek reboot, Robots outraged.
A couple of social media wannabe “influencers” get their combined knickers in a twist over a stright guy who can play uber camp getting a gay role, while most of the rest of the world either doesn’t care or would actually enjoy seeing Jack Whitehall play the part.
The bigger story is Disney editing movies to suit markets such as China, because that’s where tickets sell these days…
Nowadays it seems every new movie or series need to show they are gay friendlies. Each time I’m watching a new movie or something on tv it seems that the directors have an obligation to put gays or lesbians in the script. I found it annoying, who cares if straight or gay or whatever. All that quotas seem forced, industrialized and biases the quality of the movies.
Twitter o.b.e.’s (offended by everything) throwing a Sissy fit
So if a gay person gets cast as a straight person, will these people lose their minds as well?
surpised Disney is having a gay character. they’ve been afraid of doing it for years because they get a huge audience from china, which bans homosexual content in media. so there goes some of their profits
Doesn’t make sense Robert Englund doesn’t slash people when not acting.
have your say