I don’t know when radio stations first decided to start playing Christmas music 24/7 from the day after Thanksgiving right through Christmas but whenever that was, it was a very bad day.

I think it’s the worst thing to happen to Christmas since Elf on a Shelf, which is how today’s parents introduce their children to Orwell’s “1984,” a whimsical way of telling the little ones there can be no expectation of privacy throughout the span of their entire pitiful existence.

I’ve despised Elf on a Shelf since its inception, but I did not always feel that way about “Continuous Christmas Music,” as it is called. I first encountered the format in the early 2000s when I was living in Arizona. It struck me then as a good way to inspire a sense of Christmas in a place where it is always a sunny 80 degrees all through the winter and, therefore, never really feels like Christmas.

Back then I had an hour commute to work, so I listened to a lot of radio and soon the corrosive effect of hearing those old familiar Christmas tunes — sometimes twice or three times a day, every day for a month — started to reveal itself.

Here is what happens:

A Christmas song you have always enjoyed is played. You smile, maybe even sing along. After the third time you’ve heard it, you’re bored. Ten times and you’re mildly irritated. Twenty times and you begin to notice little things that really annoy you.

It’s like a relationship: At first, the object of your affection is without flaw. Then you notice little imperfections that you generously dismiss as part of her charm. Later, sadly, those small defects begin to become magnified until, at the end, the internal dialogue has become “How can I endure a future with a woman who does not know how to properly load a dishwasher?”

Six hundred years ago Chaucer wrote “familiarity breeds contempt.” Boy, did he nail it.

There is not a Christmas song — no matter how lofty its lyrics or well-intentioned its message — that will not make bitter a person who has suffered from such over-exposure.

Some songs are naturally vulnerable to critical analysis — George Michael’s “Last Christmas,” for instance. Laying aside the fact that nothing says “Christmas” like bitterly taunting your former lover, the song invites suspicion from the very first line. It goes: “Last Christmas, I gave you my heart.”

That line certainly warrants inspection since there are always two sides to a break-up story.

Here’s what I suspect really happened. Girlfriend starts thinking about what she wants to give her man for Christmas as early as September. She agonizes over her choices. When the day arrives, she presents him with a new wrist watch, a cardigan sweater like the one he casually complimented in April, a scrapbook full of photos of the couple covering their whole year together and some homemade cookies made from her dear grandmother’s recipe. The gifts are beautifully wrapped, each featuring gift cards with tender proclamations of undying affection. She took a three-month calligraphy class just so she could write those gift-card messages in a beautiful script.

For months, she has also been thinking about what her boyfriend will give her and she has been very deliberate in dropping hints. Three times, she’s commented on a certain pair of boots she thinks are cute. She’s happened to mention a certain style of jewelry she prefers on more than one occasion. She’s told him the name of her favorite perfume. But she’s good with surprises, too. It makes her happy to think about what he might choose for her.

At last Christmas morning arrives. He tears through her thoughtfully selected, very personal gifts. Now it’s her turn and she’s tingling with anticipation.

He leans in close. “This Christmas, I give you my heart,” he says.

Silence ensues. She can feel the blood coursing to her head. Her cheeks flash red.

“Your heart?” she cries. “No boots? No jewelry? No perfume? No….anything? You’re giving me your heart? Fine. Rip it out. Put it on this platter.”

Predictably, as the song goes, “the very next day” she kicks his selfish, cheap butt to the curb, and I’m surprised she waited even that long.

You might argue some songs can’t be picked apart like that. Yet any song you’ve heard 25 or 30 times in as many days will produce a similar reaction.

Just try it.

“Santa Claus is Coming to Town?” Oh, yeah, well what about all those kids in unincorporated rural areas? Why are you dissing the fly-over places, fat man?

“Feliz Navidad?” Hey, This is America! Speak American! This sort of thing is precisely why we have to build that wall!

“Twelve Days of Christmas?” On Day Six, I’m thinking, “Oh, goodie! I hope the gift is a fully-loaded revolver, followed by a game of Russian Roulette and at this point, it really doesn’t matter to me which of us gets first turn.”

Even the silly songs can make the blood run cold. “I Want a Hippopotamus For Christmas?” Fine. I hope you get one, little annoying girl with the brassy voice. Fact: Hippos kill hundreds of humans every year — more than lions or tigers, but not quite as many as Second Amendment patriots. Go for it, I say.

Do you see what I’m getting at here? Continuous Christmas Music is a scourge, transforming otherwise happy, well-adjusted people into a bitter, cynical, empty shells of humanity at what’s supposed to be a joyous time of year.

You know you are beyond redemption when you hear “Silent Night” and immediately think, “Well, it would be a silent night if you could somehow desist from your ceaseless caterwauling, wouldn’t it?”

So for all of you who love Christmas and the songs that go with it, consider this a warning.

It’s too late for me, but you can still avoid this awful fate.

Save Christmas.

Kill your radio.

Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].