UnHerd's Freddie Sayers and Flo Read sit down with founder of The Idler magazine, Tom Hodgkinson, to discuss the fraught history of the winter festival and the moral good in having a merry Christmas. Read the accompanying article: https://unherd.com/thepost/christmas-is-a-time-for-chaos/ Listen to the podcast: https://plnk.to/unherd?to=page Follow UnHerd on social media: Twitter: https://twitter.com/unherd Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/unherd/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/unherd/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@unherdtv // TIMECODES // 00:00 - 01:29 - Introduction 01:29 - 05:23 - The Idler’s Tom Hodgkinson on the history, meaning and evolution of Christmas 05:23 - 10:30 - Christmas under the Danes and during the Medieval Period 10:30 - 16:07 - The winter festival during the Reformation and beyond 16:07 - 21:08 - The eternal battle between Merry England and the Puritan impulse 21:08 - 24:37 - Are we currently in a Puritan moment? 24:37 - 28:26 - Are periods of chaos morally good? 28:26 - 30:22 - Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol and the meaning of the Fezziwigs 30:22 - 32:03 - The modern attack on fire and the puritanical environmentalists 32:03 - 36:38 - What were Victorian Christmases like? 36:38 - 39:05 - G.K. Chesterton on Christmas 39:05 - 40:29 - Tom Hodgkinson’s Christmas sermon from The Idler 40:29 - 41:01 - Concluding thoughts #UnHerd #FreddieSayers #Christmas