No mo' "ho ho ho"

[Arnold M. Zwicky]

On Nov 15, 2007, at 6:08 AM, Charlie Doyle wrote:

> From the AFP wire, posted at Yahoo! News:
>
> << Santas in Australia's largest city have been told not to use
> Father Christmas's traditional "ho ho ho" greeting because it may be
> offensive to women, it was reported Thursday. >>
>
> Santas in Sydney now say "Ha ha ha."

next development, reported in several places, is rebellion.  from
   http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=323141
under the head "Sydney Santas rebel against ho-ho no-no":

Sydney Santas have reportedly defied a request from a recruitment firm
to replace "ho ho ho" with "ha ha ha".

Two Santa trainees from Westaff, which supplies hundreds of men in red
suits to Australian shopping centres, have quit over the politically
correct new greeting, the Daily Telegraph reports.

Trainees were told the traditional phrase could scare children and be
taken as derogatory to women.

"We ask our Santas to try techniques such as lowering their tone of
voice and using 'ha ha ha' to encourage the children to come forward
and meet Santa," Westaff's national Santa co-ordinator Sari Hegarty
told the paper.

But Santas at department stores David Jones, Myers and the Westfield
shopping centre chain will still use the customary greeting as part of
their customers Christmas experience.

"Senior management (at Westaff) have assured us that Santas provided
to David Jones have not been censored in any way," a David Jones
spokeswoman told the Telegraph.

Julie Gale from Kids Free to 2B Kids said Santa should be left alone.

"We are talking about little kids who do not understand that 'ho ho
ho' has any other connotation and nor should they," she told the paper.

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