Covid Sucks, But At Least no SantaCon

1995, San Francisco

I've heard about SantaCon in NYC, but recently I discovered that it actually originated in San Francisco! In 1994, when I was negative 4 years old! The tradition was sparked by an article on Mother Jones, from 1977, about a Danish, anarchist theater group. In 1974, they protested the consumerist nature of Christmas alla Robin Hood, by stealing items from stores and passing them out to customers "for free". Although they were subsequently arrested, their political actions left an imprint on future Santa-haters.

The Cacophony Society of San Francisco then took inspiration from the Mother Jones article, thanks to Rob Schmitt, who was one of many people to have the idea to multiply the amount of Santa Clauses in one place and comment on the traditional practices of this holiday's season. On December 20, 1994, the very first SantaCon took place, under the name of Cheap Suit Santas. The event had only 38 participants, who met at the Embarcadero Ice Rink in SF. After, they travelled all over town, crashing company holiday parties and ruining strangers' lives. The night ended for them with a strip club, and John Law - one of Cacophony Society's members and Burning Man founders - pretending to hang himself in a Santa Claus outfit, to comment on the season's false narrative and general hypocrisy. The next year, SantaCon repeated with significantly more participants, involving more alcohol and strip clubs. The night ended, once again, with the hanging of John Law's Santa. 

After that, the tradition spread first up to Portland, Oregon, and then to other cities. At this point, SantaCon was a pub crawl, with participants in different metropolitan cities all over the world!

Probably the only good thing about this sh*tty virus shutting down bars is that inebriated 25 year-olds wearing Santa Claus outfits won't be able to pollute the streets with their inadequacy. Mother Jones has a fun SantaCon hating article, if you'd like. Have a nice day, you sexy, sexy Santa lovers.