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Bizarro-world: Santa Claus' pipe snuffed out

BY Stephanie Klein  on October 15, 2012 @ 3:46 pm (Updated: 5:04 pm - 10/15/12 )

Yes, Santa Claus is a smoker. Jolly Old Saint Nicholas smokes a pipe and the smoke curls up into a wreath that hovers around his head. It's all in the story "Twas the Night Before Christmas," until now.

Canadian author Pamela McColl has cleaned up Santa in her new book, "A Visit from St. Nicholas." No longer do you have to read "The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth/and the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath." And don't worry, the illustrator also took out the smokey wreath.

Pretty soon, Santa will be a spinach-eating body builder who gives you three days notice before coming to your home.

Says the publisher:

"I am writing this letter to provide background information about this special edition. This poem is in the public domain and has been edited and altered countless times over the past 189 years - to my knowledge this is the first time Santa has specifically not smoked. Prior changes have including the very title...If you read historical accounts of the author's intent, it was to limit religious differences and spread a message of joy and grace. Santa not smoking does not distract from the sentiment or original goals of the writer. This edit was made for the benefit of young readers. In 1998 the United States Government made it illegal to use cartoon characters to advertise tobacco products as a result of research that established a causal link between young children exposed to cartoon characters smoking and a sympathy for tobacco products." And it goes on and on.

While we all understand three, four, and five-year-olds are very impressionable, Dori doesn't believe our kids are going to really light up and jump down a chimney.

That said, 6-year-old Dori could have really used this change to the story as a two-pack-per-day smoker.

What you're saying on Facebook:

Kim Taylor Santa probably has Type 2 Diabetes from being obese and eating sugary carbohydrates too. Who cares?!

Brian George Stuart Frosty the Snowman and his corn pipe rre next (evil laugh) ha ha ha.

Daniel Finnigan Santa needs his stomach stapled next.

Parke Schneider Well now the Cookie Monster eats carrot sticks.

Kevin Nelson Getting tired of all this PC BS. What's next, Oscar the Grouch becomes a nice guy and moves out of his garbage can and into a high rise?

Stephanie Klein, MyNorthwest.com Editor
Stephanie joined the MyNorthwest.com team in February 2008. She has built the site into a two-time National Edward R. Murrow Award winner (Best Radio Website 2010, 2012).
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Comments (14)


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  • ron prevost wrote...
    Watch out, Frosty - your corn cob pipe is next.
    October 15, 2012 4:29 pm
    And two eyes made out of COAL !!!!!

    Obama's gonna get you for that.

    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Kosh wrote...
    Of Course
    October 15, 2012 4:51 pm
    This means the Easter Bunny will soon be attacked and taxed for pooping on the grass
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • FormerMarineSgt wrote...
    geez... When did you become a cranky old man Dori?
    October 15, 2012 9:20 pm
    Dori - you sound like a cranky old man... Whining about changing 'traditions' to meet the realities of the day. I guess you've not noticed that there's many, many changes to the look and feel of many things over the 30 or 40 years since your own childhood... I guess 'nothing can change except those things that YOU choose to not like'.... You're beginning to sound just like the whiney liberals that you complain about ad nauseum on your show....
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • maplefish wrote...
    Whitney Liberals
    October 16, 2012 3:58 am
    Fake marine -You just proved to be exactly that.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • FormerMarineSgt wrote...
    @maplefish....
    October 16, 2012 6:38 am
    1) What's a 'Whitney Liberal'? 2) You keep throwing that lame insult of 'fake Marine' - are you that incapable of responding to the actual issue that your only way is to attack with that? 3) I don't need your 'approval' or 'appreciation'. I know that I'm a former Marine. I don't give a rat's _ss what you want to call me.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • FormerMarineSgt wrote...
    @maplefish
    October 16, 2012 6:39 am
    1) What's a 'Whitney Liberal'? 2) You keep throwing that lame insult of 'fake Marine' - are you that incapable of responding to the actual issue that your only way is to attack with that? Your approval (or lack thereof) is meaningless to me.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Forrest wrote...
    Sarge
    October 16, 2012 6:37 am
    Conservatives by definition don't like change. When progressives left Africa at the dawn of human kind, the conservatives stayed behind. When our progressive forefathers left Europe for a new life in America, the conservatives stayed behind. When the progressive American colonies wanted to form their own country, the conservatives wanted to remain loyal to the King of England. Thank God for progressives or we would still be living in a mud hut on the African savanna or bowing down to the Queen of England.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • FormerMarineSgt wrote...
    @forrest...
    October 16, 2012 6:42 am
    The problem is that Dori claims to be libertarian while screaming out on everything he doesn't like and ignoring everything else like a Glenn Beck wanna be who resents that he's gotten stuck at the local level. And like Beck, he's got his blindly allegiant followers who wait for his every statement as if it were absolute fact no matter how trumped up or blatantly incorrect it is.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Cat50 wrote...
    This makes me angry
    October 16, 2012 5:22 am
    As a distant relative of the author and unpublished author, I am very distressed and angry That they would make those kind of changes. Yes the poem is in public domain. But it is immoral to fool around with an author's work like that. Shame on them!!!
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • ron prevost wrote...
    @ the riffed marine lost in the forrest
    October 16, 2012 8:38 am
    Get real, guys. The story is about SANTA not being able to SMOKE A PIPE !

    And you both go off an political bents? And you think DORI over reacts ?

    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • FormerMarineSgt wrote...
    @ron prevost
    October 16, 2012 8:46 am
    My initial comment was merely pointing out that Dori sounds like a whiney old man complaining about traditions changing because of the way the world changes around him. I made the comparison between how he sounds and the liberals that he complains about because to my ear, it's the same AS HE complains about in others on his show. I wasn't being political - just showing the hypocracy in some of his positions.
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  • ron prevost wrote...
    Gitcha.
    October 16, 2012 9:05 am
    Like I've always said too. If you're going to be a Libertarian, you have to be consistent. Dori railed to outlaw smoking for people here - in bars and what have you, but Santa.........
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Chuck Gould wrote...
    Methinks the pipe is loaded with magic herbs...
    October 16, 2012 10:47 am
    how else does one travel in a flying sled, pulled by caribou? (A reindeer is a domesticated caribou)

    Santa should be hauled up on charges of sexual preference in employment. All of the reindeer pulling his sleigh have to be female. (Male caribou lose their antlers in the winter, and the females do not). Does this mean that male caribou applying for a job pulling his sleigh are rejected on the basis of gender? Or, are the male caribou lounging around the North Pole, munching oats in a nice warm barn, while the female caribou are out doing all the work?

    Magic sleigh flying around the entire world in a single night? I'll have whatever Santa's smoking, please. :-)

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