Neil deGrasse Tyson Had A Controversial Christmas After Celebrating Isaac Newton’s Birthday

Let’s spend some belated Christmas time with Neil Degrasse Tyson. It seems the astrophysicist spent Christmas morning tweeting some things about the holiday and some things not about the holiday, and now some people are upset with him. Tyson spent the days leading up to the holiday celebrating little boy Alex and Santa’s interplanetary sleigh in the window of Macy’s in New York.

But it was his tweets Christmas morning that resulted in the ~*drama*~:

Some did not take kindly to the light ribbing, accusing him of trolling Christmas and being a bigot against Christianity.

The Isaac Newton tweet quickly became Tyson’s most retweeted tweet ever. The response grew to such that Tyson took to both Twitter and Facebook to respond. The former:

And an excerpt from the latter:

A few facts: My average re-tweet rate falls between 2,500 and 3,500. My fun tweets can go somewhat higher – up to 10,000. My boring tweets barely break 1,000. The Newton Christmas day tweet, as of this writing – a day after posting — is rising through 62,000 re-tweets.

I wonder if you are as astonished by this fact as I am. For example, I’ve made direct reference to Jesus in previous tweets that have not come close to this number. How about:

“Some claim the USA is a Christian nation, compelling me to wonder which assault rifle Jesus would choose: the AR-15 or AK-47.”

Posted September 7, 2014, that one garnered 13,000 re-tweets. So I can honestly say that I don’t understand the breadth and depth of reaction to the Newton tweet, relative to all my other tweets over the years.

What do you all think of all this hooplah?

(via CBS News)

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Alanna Bennett

Alanna is a pop culture writer who works as the Weekend Editor for The Mary Sue, an entertainment writer for Bustle, and a freelancer for everywhere. She has a lot of opinions about Harry Potter and will 100% bully you into watching the shows that she loves. Don't worry, it's a sign of friendship.

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