Why I Have No Christmas Tree
By: Aimee Dyamond
Tags: Environment, Christmas, Plastic Pollution, Animal Rights, Consumerism

When this year’s Norway spruce made its way to the Rockefeller Center in New York City to be hoisted and decorated for the annual switch-on, it drew scrutiny not only for its bedraggled appearance, but for its symbolism.

The Rockefeller Center’s tree-lighting ceremony, a New York City tradition since 1933, attracts thousands of spectators in ordinary circumstances. This year — a year of hot flaming garbage, a year that launched a thousand memes and declared the ‘worst ever’ by Time — the tree herself, prior to being festooned in her customary trimmings, was the subject of sympathy and ridicule alike. Initial pictures of the honorary evergreen being hoisted into position by a crew of high-vis-jacket-clad workers attracted a few commiserating comments on Twitter comparing the tree (looking worse for wear after a 300km journey lying horizonal in a truck) to someone who’d cut their own hair, a forlorn figure as scraggly and weather-beaten as the rest of us are looking/feeling as 2020 finally wraps.

Photo by Wesley Tingey on Unsplash

But when a small owl was discovered in its branches, the environmental impact of the modern word’s extravagant Christmas traditions once again entered the spotlight. Whether the miniature stowaway hitched a ride in the branches undetected or came to roost in the tree only after its arrival at the Center will remain a mystery. The crew responsible for cutting down the chosen tree appease concerned members of the public by dutifully checking the boughs and branches for wildlife — and presumably, removing that wildlife before transit. The owl, named Rockefeller (‘Rocky’), was rescued from the tree and later rehabilitated at a New York wildlife centre.

Environmentalist Brian Kahn, writing for Gizmodo, singled out Rocky’s misadventure to highlight America’s ‘toxic relationship with nature’. Kahn called for the Rockefeller Christmas Tree, a symbol of ‘extractive capitalism’, to become the next casualty of cancel culture. The Norway spruce is, obviously, not native to the United States, yet it was a micro-habitat for numerous species of local wildlife for as long is it stood in the small town of Oneonta in upstate New York. There it grew from sapling to tree, unaware of its fate as a gigantic Christmas prop, a holiday amusement for a nation.

Photo by Josh Bean on Unsplash

From Kahn’s point-of-view, the Rockefeller Christmas Tree is a rather sad sight. Though technically an alien, it has been alienated from its purpose, stripped of the wildlife it once sheltered (with the exception of Rocky the owl who snuck past the tree crew) and dressed up in an undignified manner. Arguably the Christmas tree that started it all, it is strung with thousands of electrical bulbs to be stared at by millions as it stands, rootless, forestless, cold in the heart of New York City. Kahn’s heightened empathy with the Rockefeller Christmas Tree is probably to be expected from a staunch environmentalist, but I can see his point.

Photo by Christin Hume on Unsplash

It was a happy ending for Rocky the saw-whet owl, who was later released in to the wild, and the Rockefeller Tree, after recovering from its journey from upstate, turned out as beautiful as ever when it was illuminated on December 2. Kahn’s commiseration with the tree illuminates America’s toxic relationship with nature. It also lays bare the American Christmas season’s equally noxious attitude to the environment.