Yesterday was Kwanzaa, in case you missed it.
Who am I kidding? If you went on social media even just once on Friday, you were probably bombarded with Kwanzaa messages from your favorite sports teams that couldn’t help but pretend the holiday is some sacred cultural event.
I swear, my social media feeds became flooded with red, green, and black, and depictions of that weird “African” menorah thing. And it drove me nuts because, as we all know, but many won't say out loud, Kwanzaa isn't a real holiday. It's a modern invention, conceived in 1966 by Maulana Karenga, a black nationalist activist, right in the middle of the Black Power movement.
Karenga didn't hide what he was doing, either. He openly described Kwanzaa as a cultural and political project meant to give African Americans an explicitly ideological alternative to Christmas. Everything about it — the timing, the symbolism, the rituals — was deliberately constructed to serve that purpose. There's nothing ancient or traditional about it. It's less than 60 years old.
But tell that to the NFL.
On Friday, my social media feeds filled up with "Happy Kwanzaa" posts from professional football teams. MLB and NBA teams joined the parade, too. All of them rushing to celebrate a holiday that most black Americans don’t actually observe. But because Kwanzaa gets pitched as a black holiday, corporate America loves to virtue signal its support for anything related to diversity, and so it is essentially compelled to pretend the holiday is important. So the posts roll out, graphics get designed, and we’re supposed to “ooooh” and “ahhhh” and pretend this matters.
While professional sports teams were crawling all over each other with their stupid Kwanzaa messages, the real proof that posting about Kwanzaa is just shameless pandering came from none other than Kamala Harris.
Last year, when she was still vice president, she posted a Kwanzaa message from her official account. "When I was growing up, Kwanzaa was a special time of reflection with family and friends," she wrote. "Let us carry the wisdom of the seven principles with us as we work to build a brighter future. Happy Kwanzaa."
When I was growing up, Kwanzaa was a special time of reflection with family and friends. Let us carry the wisdom of the seven principles with us as we work to build a brighter future. Happy Kwanzaa. pic.twitter.com/LtMJdp4ss4
— Vice President Kamala Harris Archived (@VP46Archive) December 26, 2024
This year, however, the only holiday message she shared was a Christmas post, sharing a selfie of her and her Jewish husband.
From our family to yours, merry Christmas! We hope your day is filled with good people and good food. pic.twitter.com/SPQgkyRd8S
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) December 25, 2025
It is now the day after Kwanzaa, and there is nothing on her X or Facebook accounts acknowledging the holiday she previously claimed was a tradition in her household.
Of course, that story was a steaming pile of crap, too. Kamala was born in 1964, two years before the holiday even existed. No one truly believes her family celebrated this brand-new, barely known pseudo-holiday when she was a toddler. On top of that, Kamala is of Indian and Jamaican descent, not African. Her parents divorced in 1972, when she was seven, and she was raised primarily by her Indian mother, who followed Hindu traditions. The idea that Kwanzaa played any significant role in her childhood is absurd. Kamala didn't even try to identify as black until she ran for president.
Now that she's out of public office and not running for anything, Kamala couldn't be bothered to acknowledge Kwanzaa this year. The holiday she once claimed was central to her identity? Gone. Not even a perfunctory tweet. She doesn't need to pretend anymore.
But professional sports teams? They're still at it, flooding social media with Kwanzaa greetings for a holiday almost nobody celebrates. It's performative nonsense, and everyone knows it. But seriously, enough is enough. If Kamala can’t even bother to pretend anymore, neither should anyone else.
