A question which faces many atheists is whether or not they should avoid prevalent religious holidays and instead adopt their own holidays. One method would be to develop new, uniquely atheist or humanist holidays - for example a celebration of historical developments in freethought. Another method is to adopt a holiday which is used by some but which might also have significance beyond religion, for example Winter Solstice.
I cannot answer whether one or both of those will have any value, much less effect, in the long run - but I doubt it. Celebrations of freethought and historical freethinkers is certainly important, but I doubt that this will be able to serve the same broad social functions which older, traditional holidays do. Thus they may be a fine addition to the list of holidays, but no substitution for what we already have.
The question of celebrating something like a Winter or Spring Solstice instead of a Christmas or an Easter is perhaps a bit more difficult - but nevertheless I am still skeptical of them. In particular, it appears to me to be replacing one religious holiday with another. Just because the numbers of people who celebrate a solstice for religious reasons are vastly fewer than those who celebrate Christmas for religious reasons doesn't make the day any less religious.
Some argue, though, that there is an "objective" character to Winter Solstice because this is, objectively, a special time of the year with regards to the length of the day and the distance to the sun. Nevertheless, there is no "objective" meaning in that - there is only meaning in this if and when someone chooses to invest it with meaning.
Thus, if people can find a secular meaning to a solstice, then there is nothing except perhaps prejudice stopping them from finding secular meaning to Christmas. Of course, there may be good reasons for that prejudice - if a person has suffered greatly from Christianity, then perhaps they are better off avoiding anything connected to Christianity.
However, it is worth noting that while people try to make a big deal out of Winter Solstice, there is much less - if any - effort invested with other solstices through the year. Because of that, the impression given really is that atheists are trying to re-create the Christmas holiday without using the Christmas label. That, to me, seems to be a waste of time - a poor attempt to find something to latch on to in order to create some non-existent "atheist" identity.
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