- Ah, Christmas.
The merriest time of year.
It's a holiday filled with magic and wonder
as well as a lot of misconceptions and myths.
This is Myths You Still Believe,
the series all about explaining the truth
behind the most commonly believed myths.
Today, in celebration of the holiday season,
we're taking a closer look at some festive
white lies and full-blown fabrications
you likely still believe.
That's right.
This is Seven Myths You Still Believe
About Christmas.
The "True Love" in 12 Days of Christmas
is a romantic partner.
On the first day of Christmas,
my true love lied to me.
In the song 12 Days of Christmas,
there are multiple gifts that are given to the singer,
one more in every song verse.
It makes it seem like it's a romantic offering
from one lover to another,
but according to the Catholic church,
the gifts are actually from God to a practitioner
of the Catholic faith.
For instance, two turtle doves represent
the Old and New Testaments
and the six geese-a-laying represent the six days
it took to create the earth,
and the ten Lords-a-leaping
represent the Ten Commandments.
I have a feeling half of you are gonna be like,
"Oh that's really interesting."
The other half are gonna be like,
"No, religion! So bad!"
But either way, those are the facts.
Santa's reindeer are all male.
This myth comes from both the media
representing Santa's sleigh pulling team
as all male, and the fact that most of them
have male sounding names
like Blitzen and Comet.
However, according to scientists
at Edinburgh University in Scotland,
male reindeer shed their antlers
just before Christmas,
after their automating season is over.
So, if that's the case,
then the eight-antlered reindeer we see
in all sorts of media during the holidays
pulling Santa's sleigh are actually all female.
Yes, even Rudolph, who's traditionally seen
as an antlered, red-nosed version
wouldn't have the antlers around the 25th.
The official Christmas colors are red, green, and white.
A common belief is that the official colors
of Christmas are red, green, and white
but actually that's not the case.
Besides the fact that white is technically not a color,
the traditional three colors of the holiday
are red, green, and gold.
Red represents the blood of Christ.
The green symbolizes life itself along with rebirth,
and gold represents light, royalty, and wealth.
Gold is also the color of the sun,
symbolic of showing the way
through the dark winter
and keeping you warm.
It was also one of the gifts brought by the Wise Men
and is traditionally the color of the star
that they followed to find Jesus in the manger.
Christmas Day sees the most deaths.
It's a popular belief that loneliness and depression
on Christmas Day lead people to take their own lives
more than any other day of the year.
From 1973 to 2001, Christmas did see the most deaths occur,
making it the most deadly day of the year.
But those were mostly accidents and health issues,
not suicides.
In fact, the holidays actually see the lowest
number of suicides, which tend to occur
more in the late spring and early summer.
Christmas causes the most breakups.
The holidays are known to bring people together,
but the stress of family get togethers
for Christmas dinner, meeting your
significant other's family for the first time,
or just overall holiday stress
can lead to relationships ending, right?
Well as it turns out, the idea that Christmas day
brings about the most breakups
is actually a myth.
December 25th is literally the least popular day
to end a relationship, according to research and data
collected from Facebook.
However, one sad reality is that two weeks
before Christmas is actually one of the
most popular times to breakup.
Maybe it's just that cheap people don't
wanna have to buy a gift.
Then if you figure it's over, why spend your money
on something that's gonna be over?
It makes sense.
Boxing Day was created for returning Christmas gifts.
As most of you know, Boxing Day is December 26th,
the day after Christmas,
and many believe it was invented as a day
to either return unwanted presents
or take down all of your festive decorations.
But of course, that's a modern piece of fiction.
Boxing Day actually began in the UK
during the Middle Ages.
It got its name from churches taking
their collection boxes
and handing out the money they'd received
to poor individuals in the neighborhood.
It was the alms boxes that gave Boxing Day its name.
Now, traditionally, this is also the day
that butlers, maids, and servants
were allowed to celebrate Christmas
with their families, as typically,
they had to cater to their bosses the day before.
Jesus was born on December 25th.
Okay, I can tell already, some of you are like,
"I'm angry about this one."
But it is in fact, a myth.
While the church stands behind the original story,
multiple scientists have come forward
with evidence to the contrary
shrouding this myth in controversy.
For instance, in the nativity story,
the Bible says that shepherds were in their fields,
but it's very cold in Bethlehem in December
and nothing grows,
and sheep need to be sheltered at that time.
It also says that Mary and Joseph
were traveling for a census, but back then,
censuses took place in September or October
before travel would be impeded by harsher weather.
So, most scholars agree Jesus Christ
was likely born in late September.
Again, don't get mad at me.
I'm just telling you the facts.
And now, you're just a little bit smarter.
As always guys, if you enjoyed this video,
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by clicking the link in the description of this video.
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for daily fun.
I love you guys.
Thank you so much for watching.
Happy Holidays, and I will see you in the next video.
Peace.