CHRISTMAS cards are unnecessary and bad for the environment, there, I said it. While it can be sweet to receive a festive card around the holidays, with motifs of gonks, penguins, Santa or even a dinosaur, they aren’t needed.

Most people in the UK celebrate Christmas, around 92 per cent according to a consumer insights survey.

While many of us don’t celebrate the religious implications of Christmas, with England and Wales both considered minority Christian countries according to the 2021 Census, the Winter Solstice has long been commemorated.

The date we celebrate Christmas, December 25, was adopted in 274 AD to celebrate the Roman sun god Sol Invictus, was also celebrated by early Christians, with Christianity later being adopted as the religion of the Roman Empire by emperor Constantine the Great.

The Germanic and Nordic festival Yule, (pronounced yoh-l) was celebrated just after the midwinter solstice, lasting up to12 days (12 days of Christmas anyone?). Many Christmas traditions such as kissing under the mistletoe, ‘with you, shawty’ as Justin Bieber said, Yule logs and Christmas trees.

All of this is to say that collectively, as a group of people, we have celebrated some sort of Christmas-adjacent festival in December for hundreds of years, with or without religion, so why do we need to mark it with cards?

In fact, Christmas cards are a recent tradition by history’s standards, beginning in 1843 when Queen Victoria sent the first card, and Sir Henry Cole, known for being the first director of the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) commissioned the first commercial run.

They’re also not great for the environment, with each person in the UK sending and receiving, on average, 17 cards a year. One-third of these cards end up in landfills, contributing to greenhouse gas emissions, and deforestation, with thousands of trees cut down for Christmas cards every year.

At a time when we are all striving to be more eco-conscious, a term for being mindful of environmental impact, why are we so hung up on sending cards with messages we could express in person, or on the phone?