Eat, drink and be merry - and to hell with the food scolds.

Justine Brian will defend the spirit of the Roman Saturnalia festival characterised by eating, drinking, Roman Saturnalia was a December festival characterised by eating, drinking, gift-giving, merriment and - centrally - the temporary inversion of established social hierarchies. The feast was always been an opportunity to suspend the ordinary rules of society, if only for an evening. But for at least two thousand years, people have found reasons to disapprove of what other people eat. This Christmas, I propose we disappoint them. About Justine Brian Justine is director of schools at Civitas. She was formerly the director of the Academy of Ideas Debating Matters sixth-form debating competition and is now an associate fellow. She believes in education and grappling with big ideas – and practised what she preaches by completing a degree in Classical Studies at Birkbeck College, University of London, as a mature student. She loves good food and hates food snobbery, and learned to cook at Westminster College. She is an occasional writer on food issues and has produced a number of debates at the Battle of Ideas festival on food-related topics. Her greatest media claim to fame was being on Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour on the issue of ‘frugal food’, which made her Mum extremely proud. Follow Justine on Twitter @JustineBrian Chair: Don Milligan Don Milligan has been a gay activist, trade unionist, and a member of the communist movement for many decades. He is the author of The Embrace of Capital (Zero Books, 2022), The Politics of Homosexuality (Pluto Press, 1973), Sex Life (Pluto Press, 1993), and co-author of The Truth About the Aids Panic (Junius, 1987). Don writes OffTheCuff columns at www.donmilligan.net Image Credit: Saturnalia Feast (December 2016) by Caroline Raddato from FRANKFURT, Germany - This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.