How Comcast Single Handily Almost Ruined Christmas

Comcast on My Naughty List

Published on December 23, 2005 By HappySteph In Home & Family

As my son and I were listening to the radio on his way to Preschool, we got a chance to hear Comcast' commercial for the Holiday's. Comcast, promoting their Digital Cable Television service, decided to bring Santa into it. They came up with this idea that Santa doesn't come to houses that have a Satellite Dish saying that the Satellite equipment, as clunky as it is, got in the way on the roof.
My 5 year old son happens to still remember the day that the DirectTv guy came to put up our new satellite at our house 6 months ago. Watching this man climb to the top of our two story house was very interesting for him and he was very fascinated by what he was doing and why.
As we were listening to this commercial for Comcast, my son took in all the information and felt that we had to get rid of our Satellite if we wanted Santa to come. I tried everything to calm him down and he said we needed to get it down "NOW".. I told him that Santa actually likes Satellite Dish's, because it gives him something to hold on to, and with that, it was decided that we would have to talk to Santa and make sure. "No Chances," he said. So off we went, back to Santa"s Village in the mall, for the 3rd time this year! With the hour long wait, around all of those over excited kids once again, we finally made it up to Santa. I whispered in Santa's ear telling him that He needed to make sure to say he was coming no matter what!

"Can you still get onto my roof, even though I have a satellite dish"

Santa looked at me and I shook my head up and down to make sure he said yes.

My son looked up at him, gave him a thanks and hopped off saying, "just in case I'll leave the backdoor unlocked"

He's calmed down now and knows Santa will be coming Christmas Eve Night, but still very confused about what was said on the radio. Doesn't Comcast realize that children will and can believe anything that is told to them, especially if it's not parents saying it! It's scary to believe that my child was this upset over a stupid promotion that was supposed to be funny to adults but ended up being devastating to children.

Bad Comcast, You're on my Naughty List from now on!

Comments

terpfan1980

on Dec 23, 2005

That's a cute and funny story, though I'm no fan of Comcast when it comes to their mis-leading and downright evil commercials.

I've had DirecTV, then Dish, then back to DirecTV again fro a long time. I'd rather gnaw off my own arm with the remote control still held firmly in hand before going back to Comcast for TV service. I have "lifeline" cable from them only because I either pay for it and get a discount on hi-speed internet or I don't pay for it and get hi-speed internet at the same price. The channels on there look pathetic in comparison to DirecTV.

The other thing holding me to DirecTV is my TiVo units (dual-tuner PVR boxes). I know that Comcast is now "in a relationship" with TiVo, but until they can give me equivalent service to what I get for much less on DirecTV, they are not gonna get my money.

Meanwhile Comcast and the other grinches that are out there that like to ruin kids impressions of Christmas should all get worthless rocks in their stockings. I'd recommend coal but that might be useful and I wouldn't want to give them anything that is useful at all.

JillUser

on Dec 23, 2005

I really dislike anyone using Santa in their advertising. Kids are too impressionable and sometimes once something is set in their mind it is difficult to undo. I was even caught off guard the other day when my son heard a radio ad for Walgreens that said they had stocking stuffers. Of course my 5yr old said "why would anyone buy stocking stuffers when Santa stuffs the stockings?" I told him that was for people who don't believe in Santa....good grief!

terpfan1980

on Dec 23, 2005

Wow, almost as if you were clarvoyant - check out the following news article.

Grinchy remark sends kids home in tears

By RORY SCHULER
Staff Writer
Lebanon Daily News

LICKDALE — Jamey Schaeffer stretched her mouth open wide, showing off a pair of twin gaps in her smile. With a mouthful of fingers, she said she has no interest in two front teeth for Christmas.
Instead, she’d like a Barbie doll from Santa Claus — and Santa Claus only.
But a substitute music teacher almost came between the 6-year-old and a Christmas Eve spent dancing cheek to cheek with sugar plums.
Theresa Farrisi stood in for Schaeffer’s regular music teacher one day last week. One of her assignments was to read Clement C. Moore’s famous poem, “A Visit from Saint Nicholas” to a first-grade class at Lickdale Elementary School.
“The poem has great literary value, but it goes against my conscience to teach something which I know to be false to children, who are impressionable,” said Farrisi, 43, of Myerstown. “It’s a story. I taught it as a story. There’s no real person called Santa Claus living at the North Pole.”
Farrisi doesn’t believe in Santa Claus, and she doesn’t think anyone else should, either. She made her feelings clear to the classroom full of 6- and 7-year-olds, some of whom went home crying.
Schaeffer got off the school bus later that day, dragging her backpack in the mud, tears in her angry little eyes.
“She yelled at me, ‘Why did you lie?’” recalled Jamey’s mother, Elizabeth. “‘Why didn’t you tell me Santa Claus died?’”
Elizabeth Schaeffer said she was appalled by Farrisi’s bluntness.
“I had to call the school,” said Schaeffer, a part-time custodial employee for the school district who is on temporary leave after complications from her last child’s birth. “I had to do something.”
Meanwhile, Farrisi, who is well versed on the history of “Santa Claus” — the traditional and literary figure — clarified her comments.
“I did not tell the students Santa Claus was dead,” she explained. “I said there was a man named Nickolas of Myrna who died in 343 A.D., upon whom the Santa Claus myth (is based).”
On Monday night, Jamey started to recite Moore’s famous poem while sitting on a couch next to a freshly cut tree, trimmed in tinsel and topped with a golden star: “’Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house. No creatures stirred.”
She paused, looked up, and said that’s when the teacher interjected, just a few lines before the verse that announces the arrival of “a miniature sleigh and eight tiny reindeer.”
“The teacher stopped reading and told us no one comes down the chimney,” Jamey said, curling into a ball on the couch, bracing her chin on her knees, her voice shrinking away like melting ice cream. “She said our parents buy the presents, not Santa."

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