Posted on 12/15/2005 4:31:58 PM PST by mylife
REAL OR FAKE? Choosing a Christmas tree can be an ethical quagmire for environmentalists
The cultural minefield of December has another politically loaded question to tiptoe around: Will you purchase a real tree or an artificial one?
And then, what will you call it?
Your answer will speak to your commitment to protecting American jobs, reducing the trade deficit, preventing environmental destruction, helping us breathe and, of course, showing where you stand on the Rev. Jerry Falwell's efforts to counter what he calls the anti-Christian "war on Christmas."
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
It doesn't matter as long as whatever they choose they just shove up...nevermind, it's the "holidays"! ;-)
We have a fake tree because we are allergic to real ones. It took a long time to discover that was our problem. I love the smell of real ones.
I have a real fake.
Why don't you just buy a REAL real tree... ya know, with a rootball that you can plant?
And then, what will you call it?
As an alternative, Sierra Magazine, a Sierra Club publication, suggests: "For a natural look, try making your own tree of trimmed evergreen boughs, a storm-felled branch, or a piece of driftwood."
San Francisco's Department of the Environment began a program this year for those averse to stringing lights on driftwood. For $90, the city will bring a live, 7- to 9-foot potted tree to your home for you to decorate. After Christmas, the city will retrieve it and plant it in one of San Francisco's tree-starved neighborhoods, like Bayview-Hunters Point.
But the city isn't offering pines. Officials said pines don't make the best street trees.
The simple fact that this is their biggest dilema at Christmas time, and not something like, "so who should we make a major contribution this Christmas, the orphanage or the homeless shelter", kind of makes me wonder what has happened to this country.
I don't like cleaning up the mess nor do I want to worry about the fire hazard.
I've gone with a tradition my entire life of having a live potted tree for a first Christmas in a new house then planting it in my yard.
Now I'm in an apartment and have a fake 5' all-white tree lit up with pulsating multicolored fiber optics.
It looks like a Christmas nuclear reactor and you can see it in my window a block away. Griswald would love it!
We bought a fake. The advantage for us was only having to buy it once and it will last ten or twenty years or whatever. Also, I think they are less likely to catch fire from the lights on them. Finally, as another poster already mentioned there are people who are allergic to real trees.
I have a good 4 foot artificial tree. It's up off the floor so my dog and cat can't get to it. This is the perfect size and solution for my condo.
Reminds me of a camping trip up in the Sierra Nevadas....
This was up at the Yuba River, near Grass Valley. The wife and I were at a semi-established yet popular campground. Late at night a van pulls in and a half-dozen young California Herbals pile out. We didn't think anything of them until we noticed a strange glow coming out of their campfire pit. I wandered closer to take a look--they had a flashlight laying in the pit, shining upward, and everyone was gathered around staring at it. It was a pathetic sight.
We opted for an artificial tree several years ago because me and my wife are so busy we are professional procrastinators. By the time we get around to finding a tree all that are left are scraggly looking ones. This way at least, we have a beautiful one each year.
OMG! Thats priceless!
Im not adverse to artificial trees, but artificial campfires with no warmth?
They worship the Great God Energizer! They just keep going and going and going...
Real, real, real, real. I cut my own at a local tree farm.
Picking and cutting my tree is as much of a tradition in my family as decorating it is in most others. Plus, it just doesn't seem like Christmas without the smell of an evergreen wafting through the house.
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