The Grinch shows us why all other christmas specials suck

[Aerozord]

Reflecting abit on the vast majority of them I realized how often

"killed/ruined christmas" is actually just "no one gets gifts" in nearly every single holiday special I can recall. Remember The Grinch, and the entire message was how you specifically CANT do that because Christmas is supposed to be a celebration of life and family and giving gifts is merely a physical way to show affection so removing them doesn't do anything.

Maybe its not them forgetting the message and just not giving kids enough credit to understand a more complex plot than gifts = good, no gifts = bad

[Professor Smarmiarty]

Christmas isn't saved until the Grinch gives all the presents back. Thesis rejected.

[Aerozord]

Originally Posted by Professor Smarmiarty

Christmas isn't saved until the Grinch gives all the presents back. Thesis rejected.

what are you talking about? They were celebrating it just fine before him bringing them back. Him bringing things back was in no way conditional to their celebration.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

It was conditional to the story. The great tragedy was not concluded until they were returned. You did read to the end of the story right?

Did Lord of the Rings end 6 pages in when Sauron got so heartbroken that people didn't like him enough to try and blow up his empire that he gave up trying. The rest of the 1000 pages were just logical extrapolations of this behaviour, included for completeness.

NPF Posting Champion 2012

[Aerozord]

Originally Posted by Professor Smarmiarty

It was conditional to the story.

I never know what to do in these situations. Its like when someone says the sky is brown. Where do you even begin trying to explain that.

[Geminex]

Originally Posted by Professor Smarmiarty

It was conditional to the story. The great tragedy was not concluded until they were returned. You did read to the end of the story right?

Did Lord of the Rings end 6 pages in when Sauron got so heartbroken that people didn't like him enough to try and blow up his empire that he gave up trying. The rest of the 1000 pages were just logical extrapolations of this behaviour, included for completeness.

NPF Posting Champion 2012

Oh, it was certainly conditional to a satisfactory conclusion of the story, but that does not change the facts of the story. And the facts of the story is that, as far as the Whovians are concerned, the presents are not relevant to their enjoyment of christmas. Indeed, the sounds of Whoville's christmas celebration is what ultimately causes to Grinch to return the presents. True, the story is not over, but christmas is already saved, even without a lack of gifts.

The story goes on beyond this point, because the main tragedy in this story is not, and never was, the possible failure of the Whovians' christmas celebration. From start to finish, the chief tragedy is the evil nature of the grinch, and the story can only be resolved once this tragedy has been overcome. You might say that christmas isn't saved until the grinch overcomes his inner evil. And, from the view of the reader that is true. For all the Whovians' song and dance, it cannot be a merry christmas while the grinch plots in his cave. And to the redemption of the grinch, the gifts are indeed instrumental. But they are not important for their mere materialistic worth The gifts retain importance not because they are instrumental to the christmas festival (which they explicitely aren't) but because they of their symbolic and sentimental value. The returning of the gifts is an immensely emotional act, and a manifest expression of the Grinch's regret at his past self's pointless fury. It is through this expression of regret, to which the gifts were a mere vector, that the Grinch redeems himself. And it is this redemption that causes his heart to grow three sizes that day, and allows him to join the Whovians in their celebration.

Thus, it is not the having of gifts, that ultimately saves christmas in whoville. It is the giving of gifts. The sharing of wealth, so unjustly taken. And, to the whovians, who never needed their gifts in the first place, the christmas miracle lies not in the wealth they regain, but in the Grinch, joyously joining their fold. From start to finish, the story teaches not the importance of having wealth, but the importance of giving what you have, and above all, the value of community.

Edit:
The TL;DR is that equating the continuation of the story to the continuation of a conflict is fallacious. That is like saying that the siege of Helm's Deep was not lifted in Two Towers on the basis that the story continues beyond the siege. Stories have multiple conflicts, and the continuation of the story does not mean that the conflict hasn't been settled.

[Magus]

Well A Charlie Brown Christmas was about consumerism and commercialization of Christmas which is similar to the moral of How The Grinch Stole Christmas.

A Garfield Christmas seemed to have this, too, since the "gift" is nostalgia-inducing letters from Grandma's dead husband, although there was of course the comedy bit with Garfield's back-scratcher.

I'd say in general many of these tend to go with the "true meaning of Christmas" bent and not simply implying that a failure to receive presents is the worst thing in the world.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

Originally Posted by Geminex

Oh, it was certainly conditional to a satisfactory conclusion of the story, but that does not change the facts of the story. And the facts of the story is that, as far as the Whovians are concerned, the presents are not relevant to their enjoyment of christmas. Indeed, the sounds of Whoville's christmas celebration is what ultimately causes to Grinch to return the presents. True, the story is not over, but christmas is already saved, even without a lack of gifts.

The story goes on beyond this point, because the main tragedy in this story is not, and never was, the possible failure of the Whovians' christmas celebration. From start to finish, the chief tragedy is the evil nature of the grinch, and the story can only be resolved once this tragedy has been overcome. You might say that christmas isn't saved until the grinch overcomes his inner evil. And, from the view of the reader that is true. For all the Whovians' song and dance, it cannot be a merry christmas while the grinch plots in his cave. And to the redemption of the grinch, the gifts are indeed instrumental. But they are not important for their mere materialistic worth The gifts retain importance not because they are instrumental to the christmas festival (which they explicitely aren't) but because they of their symbolic and sentimental value. The returning of the gifts is an immensely emotional act, and a manifest expression of the Grinch's regret at his past self's pointless fury. It is through this expression of regret, to which the gifts were a mere vector, that the Grinch redeems himself. And it is this redemption that causes his heart to grow three sizes that day, and allows him to join the Whovians in their celebration.

Thus, it is not the having of gifts, that ultimately saves christmas in whoville. It is the giving of gifts. The sharing of wealth, so unjustly taken. And, to the whovians, who never needed their gifts in the first place, the christmas miracle lies not in the wealth they regain, but in the Grinch, joyously joining their fold. From start to finish, the story teaches not the importance of having wealth, but the importance of giving what you have, and above all, the value of community.

Edit:
The TL;DR is that equating the continuation of the story to the continuation of a conflict is fallacious. That is like saying that the siege of Helm's Deep was not lifted in Two Towers on the basis that the story continues beyond the siege. Stories have multiple conflicts, and the continuation of the story does not mean that the conflict hasn't been settled.

Do you know how the tragedy of the grinch is solved? Do you know what his miraculous case of heroism was?
It was bringing everyone presents. Like by your argument the Grinch would be redeemed simply by coming to Christmas and singing songs and everything.
But nope- he has a moment of heroism in the book, a deviant moment of character change- a moment where he saves all the presents. I think you forgot which side you were arguing- for the story not to be about consumerism the main conflict of the story has to be the Whovian's despair- this is not the main conflict, as you correctly ascertained, but your rampant hatred of poor people has blinded you to the true moral of the Grinch as you cannot conceive of a world where you are not surrounded by material gifts.
The story teaches you that you are a bad person unless you are rich and can afford lots of presents.

E: Here is how to rewrite the story so it says what you guys are saying:
Grinch is about to lose presents over the cliff- suddenly he realises it doesn't matter, he lets them go, goes back to whosville and everyone has a good time.

[Amake]

I posit that giving gifts is the Christmas miracle, as the Grinch finds out. Receiving them is just practice for children who don't yet have the resources to give in turn.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

And thus it is like every other christmas movie- a celebration of being rich. Blammo.