Nazi Barbie Ruins Christmas

I keep seeing this ridiculously ahistorical “Truth About Yule” YouTube video by a known White supremacist—who recently appeared in Harper’s Magazine—because folks keep sharing it on pages and in groups dedicated to Norse history and spirituality.

These days it seems you can’t swing a dead cat in a room full of Viking enthusiasts without whacking a few Nazis. I find it every bit as consternating as J.R.R. Tolkien did during the West’s last round of Scandimonium. All this racial purity nonsense would surely befuddle our Norse forebears, who were more than happy to carry-and-marry fair maidens of every conceivable ethnic extraction, provided they had wealth and power.

The Yule video doesn’t just offend me as a Christian; it offends me as someone who reads books. Sadly, in order to break it down (as per a friend’s request), I suppose I ought to share the link, though I’ll feel better about myself if I balance it out with a link to Lutheran Satire’s still-reigning greatest video to date, Horus Ruins Christmas. If you haven’t already, take five minutes to check it out. I’ll wait, and you’ll be a better person for it.

Anyway, on with Nazi Barbie Ruins Christmas.

(0:11) Thousands and thousands of years before Christmas.

Really? Thousands and thousands? How about millions and bazillions? Reality check: the first written collection of Norse mythology is the Poetic Edda, often attributed to Saemund the Wise, a Christian priest, and none of its constituent parts can be dated any earlier than the tenth century A.D.

(0:20) Christianity was an attempt to unify Europeans under one God.

Look, whatever your gripes with Charlemagne and the Olavs, the fact remains that the Norse converted voluntarily, and often enthusiastically. Both the Danish and Norwegian royal families were baptized by the second generation. And Iceland voted peacefully to adopt Christianity around A.D. 1000.

(0:40) The Church had to keep the main elements of pagan myth.

Horse apples. The early Church didn’t give a flying fig what the barbarians of the north were doing at the time. The date of Christmas relates to the date of Easter, which is based on Passover—which, I’m hoping y’all know, is Jewish. In fact, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, in his Jesus Trilogy, recently highlighted a strand of German scholarship indicating that the date of Christmas falls quite purposely on the Julian calendar’s equivalent of Kislev 25, the date of Hanukkah.

Jewish. Not pagan.

(1:00) Odin uttered that he had sacrificed himself to himself.

Right. Odin crucified himself a thousand years after Christ. Nobody in first century Judea had ever heard of Odin. Everybody in tenth century Europe had heard of Christ. Guess which one scholars unanimously hold to be the original, and which the copy?

(1:45) Yule, a 12 day celebration in Old Norse.

False. Yule was not 12 days. Nor was it at the winter solstice. The date and length of Yule were altered by King Haakon the Good, a Christian, in order to coincide with the pre-existing 12-day season of Christmas. You can read all about it in the Heimskringla.

(1:50) The wheel marks the changing seasons.

Again, false. Yule doesn’t mean “wheel” at all. The Wheel of the Year is a 20th century Wiccan invention, based on back-paganizing the Christian commemoration of Quarter and Cross-Quarter Days. Again, Yule didn’t fall on the solstice. Neither did Christmas.

(2:15) Frigg … is associated with fertility, marriage, household and motherhood.

Golly, women are associated with fertility and motherhood? I bet you’re the only one to have thought of that, like, ever.

(3:20) What are the Yule colors? Red … green … gold.

You’re confusing ancient pagan wisdom with J.C. Penny’s.

(3:30) Decorating the tree … [is] pre-Christian tradition.

False. The oak was sacred to Thor because it tends to get struck by lightning. The ash was sacred to Odin as a type of the world-tree. An apple tree held up the great hall in the Volsunga Saga. While many cultures bring in evergreens at winter (including the Chinese) the Christmas tree is a uniquely Christian tradition dating from the Middle Ages. Here’s another book to read. Also, this one.

(4:00) Blot, sacrifice.

Read Adam of Bremen, for heaven’s sake. It was human sacrifice. They hung men from trees. While you’re at it, give St Boniface and Donar’s Oak a google.

(4:35) Odin leads a hunting party.

Fun fact: not Norse. The Wild Hunt originated in Celtic myth. And it didn’t involve any presents, believe you me. Here, read this.

(4:55) That’s why we hang stockings on the mantle.

Guys. No. C’mon now. St Nicholas? Anyone? He was from Myra. Which is in Turkey. Not Sweden. Read a book.

(5:05) How many reindeer pull Santa’s sleigh? Eight! Eight being the legs of Odin’s horse.

Clement Moore is not Odin. Please tell me I don’t have to link this one. It was written in 1823. In America. To make fun of the Dutch.

(5:15) Rudolf was added by a Jewish man!

Really, Nazi Barbie? Really?

(5:55) Kids today leave a cookie for Santa, no different than Vikings leaving a gift for their gods.

I might not make it through this whole video, guys.

(6:00) Elves like Santa’s helpers are very much from Germanic Norse myth.

Yep, I’ll give you that one.

(7:11) And if you’d lived through a Northern winter, you’d understand.

Lady, I live in Niflheim, Minnesota. Also, thank you for explaining what solstice means for those of us who’ve never seen the sun.

(7:20) Even the days of the week come from Norse gods.

Overlaid atop Greco-Roman gods. What’s your point?

(7:40) We come from the north, not the south!

Says the woman speaking an Indo-European language.

(7:50) The anti-White establishment demonizes Norse myth and calls it racist.

The box office for Thor: Ragnarok was $854 million.

(7:55) Europeans are told that they are the one group that can’t have exclusive cultural holidays.

You do realize that Christmas is celebrated in India, right? And Peru and China and Ethiopia and Armenia? And that the winter solstice actually occurs all over the freakin’ planet?

(8:15) They’re being told to say happy holidays to not offend newcomers.

Oy vey. This one’s right up there with “Rudolph’s a Jew.”

(8:25) Let’s go to Israel and tell them their manufactured Happy Hanukkah is offensive because they slaughtered pagans and we celebrate Yule.

Okay, first up: I would love to see you go to Israel and mouth off. Seriously.

Second: Hanukkah predates Christmas, which predates Yule. Cite me literally any primary source that indicates otherwise.

Third: Wait, the Israelis slaughtered pagans now? What? Are you saying the Israelis are Christians? Or are the pagans to whom you’re referring the Canaanites, who were definitely not Nordic, and did not celebrate Yule, like, at all? And why did you just slap down the graphic of a stave church, an explicitly and uniquely Christian building, in the middle of a desert?

Are you okay? Do I need to call someone?

(8:30) It’s time to reclaim your culture.

An American making a video with a fiery cross. I mean, this isn’t even a dog whistle. This is a fog horn.

Why do none of these Odinists ever point out that Odin was a betrayer and a loser? He elevated warriors for a time only to slay them in their prime, to enroll them in the ranks of his Einherjar, who murder each other ceaselessly until Ragnarok, when they lose and everybody dies again, for good. Valhalla isn’t Heaven; it’s hell. Helheim, in contrast, wins the day.

On a personal note, I’ve got Saxon and Norman royal houses up in the tangled limbs of my family tree, so I, like Richard the Lionheart, can claim descent from the devil (by which he meant Odin) on two sides. And on behalf of the family, just let me say, please stop worshipping grandpa. He was kind of an ass.

King Olaf crossed himself and said:
“I know that Odin the Great is dead;
Sure is the triumph of our Faith,
The one-eyed stranger was his wraith.”
—Longfellow