I am all for the merciless assassination of ridiculous trends. And so is my best friend, our great poet laureate and statesman Jay-Z. In his seminal work of rapsmanship, "D.O.A. (Death of Auto-Tune)," he decries the use of the voice modulation software that is destroying hip-hop. Preach on, Hova:

"I know we facing a recession/ But the music y'all making going to make it the Great Depression" 

Can I get an Amen up in here?:

"You niggas singing too much/ Get back to rap, you T-Paining to much"

But what does this have to do with ugly Christmas sweater parties? you might be wondering. Or not. Anyway, both are trends that have been played out to within an inch of their existence. And like my pal Jigga says, "Put your skirt back down, grow a set, man." Which I think means ugly Christmas sweater parties need to go.

I don't want to sound like a younger, better-looking Ebeneezer Scrooge, but I just can't deal with the cheesy holiday sweater trend anymore. It was funny the first time some guy raided his grandmother's closet and stole one of her reindeer-and-snowflake-bedecked sweaters to wear to a party. I'm sure his friends got a good laugh and he clearly earned some irony points for the evening. I respect that.

But now, ugly holiday sweater parties are as ubiquitous as white people quoting rap songs. But not nearly as funny.

Unsurprisingly, there are even a number of websites dedicated to the fad. You can find these here and here.

I propose an end to these gatherings, pronto-like. That hand-knit number with the jingly bells and the oversized bows hanging at the back of your closet needs to be retired, and how.

Now, I know how much we all love theme parties — naughty and nice, heroes and villains, priests and altar boys. It's part of our white people DNA. I'm not suggesting we ditch fancy-dress parties entirely. I just say we get a little more creative with our costumery.

How about a holiday pants party? Festive pants are funny, and open to interpretation. Or maybe a Christmas underwear fete? I could outfit all the female guests singlehandedly with the snowmen, candy cane and Christmas tree underwear my mother sends me every year. Or perhaps a soiree where guests dress as their favorite Jewish carpenter, or just their favorite Jew.

It's time to exercise our collective creativity, friends. We don't need to succumb to the ovine machinations of our Christmas sweater party-throwing brethren. We need to move beyond the baubly wool get-ups. To paraphrase my bestie S-Dot: "This is death of ugly Christmas sweater parties, moment of silence."

(If you need to see more examples of what an ugly Christmas sweater looks like, the Burlington Free Press has a photo gallery up on its website with 18 sparkly sweater gems.)