The Story of Festivus 2017

Описание: Festivus: The Holiday For The Rest Of Us, Explained
Festivus started as a family tradition with Seinfeld writer Dan O’Keefe: O’Keefe has related, over the years, that his father had little patience for the commercialism or religiousness of the traditional holidays. In part, the O’Keefe patriarch seems to have been inspired by Samuel Beckett and in part to troll his kids:
O’Keefe originally didn’t want it on Seinfeld, however: It turns out that one of his brothers let the family tradition slip, and Seinfeld himself had to campaign to get O’Keefe to write it into the series. When he did, elements were changed and added, like the completely unadorned Festivus pole, to amp up the anti-consumerism tone, and it aired in the episode “The Strike” in 1997.
Something about Festivus struck a chord: The holiday is just one aspect of the episode, but it’s one that’s stood out over the years. Seven years after it aired, O’Keefe put out a book about it and in 2012, marketing professor Ilona Mikkonen noted that Festivus had become part of the “parodic resistance” against aspects of the winter holidays:
In contrast to dominant Christmas ideology, Festivus promotes a grand narrative of “meaningful nothingness,” wherein Festivus celebration is presented a viable means of circumventing the oppressiveness of Christmas (i.e. “meaningful”) through erasing the higher goals and conventions if Christmas (i.e. “nothingness”).