This past November has seen the rise of possibly one of the most ridiculous controversies of the year. On November first, Starbucks unveiled their holiday cup design. The design is a simple red and features no other adornation other than the Starbucks logo. Some conservative Christian have reacted strongly, viewing this simple cup as an attack on Christmas as it does not feature traditionally associated items, which have been featured on previous Starbucks cups. Interesting to note is previously featured designs such as snowflakes or snowmen, didn’t have any direct correlation to Christianity at all.

Joshua Feuerstein, a self-proclaimed “social media personality” asserts that Starbucks has altered their cup design this year to adhere to political correctness and “wants to take Christ and Christmas off of their brand new cups.” In a popularly shared video he posted, Feuerstein enters an Arizona Starbucks and gives his name as “Merry Christmas” so that the statement will be written on his cup. He is clearly very proud of what he presumes to be a clever trick and urges followers to behave similarly. Starbucks later released a statement in which they maintained that the purpose of this year’s cup design was to provide a blank canvas for customers so that they could create their own story. Another member of the “Starbucks is the Grinch” squad is Donald Trump who suggested a possible boycott of Starbucks.

Luckily the majority of people recognize the foolishness of this entire nonissue-turned-debacle. Kate Stupin, a freshman at Hingham High and a member of the Hingham Congregational Church’s youth group, seems to sum up this widely- held opinion saying ,”As a person and a Christian, I guess, I find the whole thing really dumb. It’s just a cup.”