Relive the heartwarming Christmas ad where Santa makes out with a hot salt-and-pepper zaddy

As holiday season approaches, it’s time to wrap gifts, trim your tree, and relive the heart-warming and thirst-inducing joy of that 2021 TV ad where a gay Santa hooks up with a sexy salt-and-pepper zaddy.

The ad — released around this time last year by Posten, Norway’s postal service — went viral because it’s essentially a beautifully shot short film about a sweet but somewhat lonely older bachelor who, over the course of several years, falls into a strained romance with Papa Noel (or Julenissen, as the Norwegians call Santa).

The ad is more sweet than sexy, but Santa has long been a polar bear icon with his snowy beard, big belly, leather boots, and list of naughty boys. (Just check out Big Freedia’s “Santa Is a Gay Man” if you need proof.) As such, the ad resolves the daddy issues that gay guys have long had for Father Christmas.

The lonely bachelor seems like a nice quiet gentleman who spends quality time with his friends and family. But over the course four-minute commercial, he and Santa straight up seduce each other… and it. IS. HOT.

How about we take this to the next level?

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First, zaddy greets Santa half-nekkid and hairy-chested when Saint Nick first comes down his chimney. The next year, zaddy sprays cologne, dresses up all nice, and sleeps on the couch so he can catch Santa sneaking around his stockings. Then, another year, the two men ply each other with bon-bons, tea, and hot goss before exchanging pinecone ornaments made to look like one another. Ka-yute!!

Saddened by the fact that he only gets special Santa-time once a year, zaddy writes Kris Kringle a very special note: “All I want for Christmas is you.”

It might seem lowbrow to rip-off a Mariah Carey lyric to catch a Christmas fling, but old tricks apparently work the best because the very next Christmas, Santa has all his gifts delivered by the postal service so that he and zaddy have more time to swap spit instead of pinecones. Yaaaaassssss!

We’re poking some fun, but by the time the kiss finally comes around the three-minute mark, it is sensuous AF. Remember: They have been literally waiting for years to finally share this kiss. The two gaze longingly into each other’s eyes before slowly bringing their open lips close to one another.

When they kiss, a choir literally starts singing, and zaddy gently caresses Santa’s white beard in his hands, running his fingers through Santa’s hair, and then planting several small kisses on Santa’s lips before planting yet another nice long kiss on Papa Noel.

It’s super intimate and sweet and suggests that the two nice men may very well end up on each other’s very naughty lists once their presents are unwrapped. It’s also somewhat radical, queering a Christmas icon who has traditionally been married to Mrs. Claus, considering how rarely media shows two older men falling in love and sharing physical intimacy.

But the ad is more than just heartwarming fodder for the Christmas gays and Santa subs. It’s also a reminder of the importance of LGBTQ rights in Norway. A caption at the end of the ad reads, “In 2022, it will be 50 years since it became legal to love whomever you want in Norway.” The statement is a nod to the fact that in 1972, Norway legalized same-sex sexual activity.

In fact, Norway has been at the forefront of many LGBTQ-inclusive policies and legal protections. It allowed gay people to serve in the military in 1979. It also passed nationwide anti-discrimination laws explicitly including sexual orientation in public accommodations and employment in 1981 and 1998, respectively. It legalized same-sex marriage and gay adoption in 2009, and passed additional legal protections for transgender people in 2013 and 2016. The nation also banned so-called conversion therapy just this year.

That being said, Norway also isn’t perfect. It doesn’t protect the right of same-sex couples to have children through surrogate pregnancies, and men who have sex with men must abstain from sex for a one full year before being allowed to donate blood — so hands off, Santa!

But the country and its geographic neighbors have ranked among the top 10 nations with the highest LGBT Global Acceptance Index for nearly the last two decades.

It could be that legal rights, combined with positive media depictions, have made LGBTQ acceptance in Norway a blessed gift for the entire community that keeps giving year-round.

Watch.

And while you’re here, here’s that Big Freedia video too…