Environmental Toll of Christmas: Carbon Footprint and Waste

As the festive season of Christmas approaches, Bollywood will start sharing pics of their decorated trees, beautifully wrapped gifts, and grand gestures to each other. No Unwanted Gyan videos shall be circulated about the wastage of trees, no one will ask about the impact on the environment. Unfortunately, the celebration has a very large environmental toll. Christmas, a season synonymous with giving, is also characterized by a darker side. The staggering amount of waste of resources for a one-day celebration leaves a massive detrimental mark on the world every year!

The Christmas Tree Conundrum

Over 120 million Christmas trees are felled every holiday season! This contributes to a carbon footprint of 2-3 billion kilograms!! The ecological impact of this mass deforestation raises questions about sustainability! Why do environmental activists not talk about these numbers? The deeply ingrained tradition directly impacts global warming. However, this conundrum is never spoken about in mainstream media!

Wrapping Up The Waste of Gifts 

If the wrapping paper was not enough, 1 billion Christmas cards end up in landfills instead of recycling bins. One tree can generate approximately 170 cards.

Can you imagine the number of trees that die every year for greeting cards meant for Christians to other Christians?

Bright Lights That Drain Big Energy

Every year Hindus receive a large bucket of gyan on how much oil is wasted by burning diyas!! Well, the dazzling displays of Christmas lights in the U.S. alone consume a staggering 6.63 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity yearly. This amount is more than the annual consumption of poor third-world nations like Ethiopia, Tanzania, etc. Does this extravagant illumination not raise eyebrows in the kind-hearted Greta Thunbergs and Diya Mirzas of the world?!! None of them want to prompt a reevaluation of festive decorations & lighting and their environmental impact. However, given a chance they will force Hindus to comply with every whim of their heart during Diwali and Holi! 

Celebrity Silent Spectators

Amidst the rising festive fervor in Bollywood and Influencers, there are pertinent questions that no one wants to ask! Is it secular to only send celebratory messages on non-Hindu festivals!? Where do the voices of environmental enthusiasts go on non-Hindu festivals?!

While celebrities often deliver sermons on sustainable living, they love driving gas-guzzling cars. Promotional activities like bike rides are never questioned for their environmental impacts!? The number of Christmas trees cut every year in India alone can replace the Aarey Forest many times over!!! But celebrities are silent due to their love for anyone else except the Hindus! They only remember Hindus when they want their movies to be multi-crore box-office hits!  

A Call for Reflection 

Festivals should not be used as a tool to shame anyone. However, any celebration should be accompanied by responsible behavior. As the second largest religion in the world, Christians should reflect on the ecological price the world pays for their celebrations. Thus, Hindu festivals should not be only one targeted for environmental impact! Christians also need to shift their celebratory practices towards more sustainable traditions that do not contribute to the growing environmental crisis.

Since the Christian annual festival is projected as a season of goodwill and compassion, it should not be a day of doom for the planet. Thus, it should not be allowed to harm the very planet humans call home. Therefore, it is time for environmental activists to unwrap and talk openly about a more sustainable approach to Christmas celebrations. However, the challenge lies not in reimagining sustainable Christian traditions. The real challenge is asking the first-world religion to acknowledge the negative impact their festive season has on the Earth!