A NYTimes article on telling kids about santa (or not).

[conuly]

What gets me is the pure meanness of some of the comments. Mostly from Santa Story Supporters, which doesn't make any sense to me. I mean, I've been told several times this year that people who don't think the traditional way of handling Santa is dishonest lack Christmas spirit, right? But if they're so chock-full of the spirit of the season, shouldn't they be nicer about it? I mean, it's okay for me to be a scroogy grinch, but they do Santa, so... yeah? Did I miss something?

Some of these comments (on all sides, really) are hysterical though.

I wonder how much CO2 was dumped into the air while this article was being written.

The world has much more serious problems that actually do exist. Kids should be told to stop these problems instead of being told lies about fat, red-suited elves.

There is a huge difference between lying and pretending. Little kids love to pretend and so Santa is fun and helps both parents and kids enjoy the holiday. The simple reason there are so many negative comments about Santa posted on here is because most people that read a lot of news become very cynical about everything.

(I'll note that it's not pretending if the game isn't equal. When you pretend, everybody knows it's not real. When you lie, somebody is deceived. Big difference, and even little children know it.)

Ho, oh, no! The vitriol being directed to Ms Parker-Pope - and indirectly to dear old Saint Nick - is difficult to understand. Here’s an idea: put up your hand (remember: remove your carpal tunnel wrist protectors first) if you’ve EVER heard of a child who even a little bit damaged by the Santa “lie”. Are you people for real? C02? Capitalism? For the grinches on this board, I hope Santa rains fiery coal down upon your houses tonight. No, Virginia, there is no Santa Claus: the boring, self-important, pajamas-clad, parents-basement-living, briar-pipe-smoking NYT readers have killed him. Merry Christmas, all!!

(I have no words for this. None.)



hmmmmm . . . . guess I’ll be crossing most of you off my list this year. Merry Christmas Lynn!

— Posted by St. Nick

My theory, only the scroogiest are spending Christmas eve responding to a blog — come on, people, is it so damaging for a kid to believe in ‘magic’ and generosity and Santa at the holidays?

Yes, this was posted December 24. Using a pseudonym of "Mrs. Claus".

Wow, I too am shocked by all the vitriol. Are you people really saying that pretending is the same as lying? So, pretending that we are different animals with my daughter is lying to her? Pretending that we’re sailing a ship is lying? Pretending that our stuffed animals are friends is lying? I get it. I should be telling my two year old that George Bush is the real world, and that the grown ups have destroyed the earth for her, and that life is really horrible and stressful, and she’ll probably never get into a good college because we haven’t been able to get her into a good preschool, so might as well get a job now kid and start saving for retirement, and oh yeah, don’t bother reading any of those books you love because they’re not real.
Sheesh.

See my comment above about the difference between pretend play and lying.

People keep asking: why lie to your kids in the first place? I think a much more hilarious question is, “why ever tell them the truth?” I’d keep the lie going for as long as possible:

“But Billy in school said that there WAS no Santa Claus…”

“Well sweetheart, Billy and his family are devil-loving heathens! If you don’t believe in Santa Claus, Santa will drop you from his flying sleigh!”

This is unbelieveable. Have we degenerated so much as a human civilisation that we can’t be trusted to grow up through taking hard knocks in life and brutal facts in life? My goodness, we should just keep filling the pockets of child psychologists who would propose new ‘emotionally threatening situations’ and all sorts of ‘emotional/psychological disorder syndromes’ faced by children. Come on, we all grew up through confronting and dealing with hard facts of life when young, and we are all the better for it. You over-protect and shield the child, you destroy his future.

Aw, don’t pay attention to all the vitriol. It *is* a complicated issue for parents, one which reflects many deeper values about truthtelling and maturation. You can tell a lot about a person by how they handle this matter.

Perhaps the preponderance of negative comments simply tells us who has the time to write in this morning. Some of us are busy going through our stockings….

If you're going to say that, you should at least wait until it's no longer 9:01 am on Christmas Day.

“…I told her the truth. Santa is real as long as you believe in him.”

You must be joking. Maybe it was just a throw-away line, but I worry that the author is blurring the important distinction between what’s real and what’s believed to be real. Very different things, you know. My 10-million-dollar mansion in Beverly Hills won’t be real if I merely believe it to be so. The world has to, in a sense, cooperate. Why would it be any different in the case of Santa? Similarly, in the case of God–another character that’s supposed to be real just in case someone believes. What rubbish!

Okay, it is a silly sentence, but can we say missing the point?

Yes santa is the heathen version of God: what a pathetic excuse for christmas. This is what happens when you reject Jesus Christ. You believe in strong delusions from which you can’t escape.

The heathen will always choose
Barabus” thief and murderer” over Jesus
santa “posessions” over Jesus
easter bunny “chocolate” over Jesus

Thats all they have the ability to comprehend, the pinnacle of their imagination. The proof is thats all they are able to come up with. Thats what they celebrate.

So happy heathen holidays it is truly a christless christmas’where heathens spoil there pathetic children instead of giving to those truly in need,the starving dying and homeless: what hypocites, how shallow can you get.

Gee, a NY Times discussion that centers on hatred of Santa and Christianity. How suprising.

Anyone who becomes damaged for life because they discovered there is no Santa was going to have huge problems in life no matter what. I mean, seriously people, get a grip. In 10 years of social work I’ve never met someone who traced their life’s problems back to discovering santa isn’t real.
This is simply an issue that liberals like to raise so that they can feel morally superior to others. Oh, and it gives them another reason to bash Christians (as does practically any topic).

The idea that Santa is some necessary part of childhood is absurd. The Santa tradition as we know it is really only about 150 to 200 years old anyway. I have a child on the way and have no intention of trying to convince him that there is a Santa. I make no plans to tell him anything about Santa at all, and if he asks me, I’ll just tell him exactly the truth, its a traditional Christmas character that some parents tell there kids is real, but everyone knows that he’s not. The idea that kids are hurt by truth is ridiculous, nor do I think that they are hurt by telling them that Santa is real, indeed I don’t think it matters either way, I just don’t feel like going down the deception route. What I hate are the parents that get angry when someone tells their child that Santa isn’t real, as if other people are obliged collaborate on their lies. If my kid tells your kid that there is no Santa, don’t blame my kid for telling yoru kid the truth.

I agree with this one a lot! Though I'd say it nicer.

What I find most interesting are the adult posters who think that getting children to truly believe in things that aren’t true is somehow an essential part of stimulating “creativity”. It seems that these people are so “uncreative” that they don’t understand the imagination required to comprehend and learn about reality. These people obviously consider “reality” mundane and boring and something to be shunned. It takes much more creativity to understand reality than it does to believe in fantasies. Just ask the ancient Greeks who developed atomic theory(atheists), Albert Einstein, or Isaac Asimov, none of whom believed in Santa Clause (or God for that matter). Understanding how to “fantasize” is quite different from simply believing in things that are not true. The most uncreative people you will ever find are people who believe in superstitions, because they are afraid to think about things that don’t conform to their beliefs.

I don't understand it either. Having them make up their own Christmas stories is imaginative. What's imaginative about a story that's pre-built and nobody ever adds to anyway?

We’ve told our kids from the start that we play “The Santa Game”, and that we pretend that Santa brings presents, comes down the chimney, etc. We also tell them that not everyone knows that it’s a game, and that they shouldn’t tell other kids about it…some kids think Santa is real, and we don’t want to ruin the game for them.

This worked fine with our oldest (now 9) but our 3 year old now wants it to be real, and has told us “it’s not a game, santa is real.” We didn’t push it, but we didn’t tell him it was real either.

Whew! There's more where those came from, and they're only a tiny sampling of the commentary out there. Most people are at least marginally sensible, but some people get really upset on both sides. Right now, I'm a bit irritated that the overlying message in popular culture seems to be, for kids "Disbelieving in Santa is bad". I wouldn't mind "Santa is real", but the mutation I see is... troubling, to say the least.

This year, we all winked a lot. Ana likes winking, and Evangeline doesn't get any of it yet anyway.

Comments

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

Whatever happened to just letting kids figure out the truth for themselves? Most of them do by the time they're eight or so anyway.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

I have a take on it -- many parents that I know who are anti SAnta are very controlling and egotistical, and I think they have trouble letting go and letting their kids imagine even for a while that someone out there loves them THAT MUCH and will actually give them stuff. It's just been my personal observation. I neither encouraged nor discouraged Santa, but the people who are all up in arms over Santa usually fit my description -- at least the ones I've had exposure to.

[conuly]

Whatever happened to being honest to your kids? Why set up things that they have to "figure out"? It's always seemed a bit hypocritical for most people.

[conuly]

My parents had an opposite problem.

My grandmother would send us tons of stuff for Christmas, and insist it all be labelled "Santa". Of course, we had presents from Mommy, presents from Daddy, presents from our other grandparents and each other - the end result was that we would have had no presents from Grand, with the implication that Grand didn't love us as much as the rest of the family.

They just changed the labels on most of the gifts to say Grand anyway. She lived in Texas, what would she know?

I doubt that's what you mean, but the way you say it sounds like you want your kids to believe Santa loves them and gets them stuff, not their parents or grandparents or friends.

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

I don't see the harm in letting kids believe in the fantastic for a few years. I think it's good for their imaginations.

Being honest and letting a kid belive in a fairy tale aren't the same in my book.

[conuly]

First, you missed my edit, so let me add that:

I mean, several times a year there are articles in popular periodicals about how you should Set a Good Example and never, ever, say things like "I can't come in to work, I'm sick" or even "No, that dress isn't the most hideous thing I've ever seen in my life", because it's dishonest. Some go so far as to imply that just not commenting on how atrocious your mother's cassarole is is the same thing as praising it to high heavens.

But the rules are changed at Christmas? And people go so overboard. They don't just tell the lie, they enact it. With props.

Second, I do see a distinction, and I'll say it here.

If your kid happens to want to pretend that Santa is real, or even believes it, that's great. Make-believe is good for the imagination. And children know all about make-believe. They pretend they're Mommy, or a firefighter, or Superman. They know they aren't really, but they pretend.

I don't make them pretend these things. I don't say "Yes, you are Mommy" and expect them to believe it as fact.

But people do present Santa in that way. They say "Yes, Santa is real" and they devise ways to avoid telling their kids the truth, even when their kids start asking questions. There's a big difference there.

[atdelphi.livejournal.com]

I'm not a parent yet, and don't know if I'll ever be, but seeing the whole Santa debate come up in various fora this year made me think on how I would handle it. I'm all for sharing holiday mythology, but I've never liked the idea of telling kids that Santa is real - and like even less the mandatory sense around the lie. You really hit it on the nose for me with the distinction between "Santa is real" and "Disbelieving in Santa is bad." And because none of the adults involved actually believe that Santa is real, it ends up oddly less problematic in some ways to raise a kid who doesn't believe in God than one that doesn't believe in Santa.

[conuly]

*nodnodnod*

Like I said, this year, everybody pretended. And we winked a lot.

Angelique had great fun with that. Evangeline was cheerfully oblivious to all messages pro and con, so I call that a win!

[atdelphi.livejournal.com]

That sounds like a great way to handle it. :-)

[conuly]

I'll also add that I don't want to do "Santa is real" anyway.

But it's bad enough that I get told I'm a horrible person, a scrooge, a grinch for wanting to be honest. It's bad enough I'm the one being told we're all mean if we don't do Santa, that we're removing the "magic of the season" - like being with a family that loves you and getting presents from said family isn't magical enough! But to share that message with impressionable kids is beyond the pale.

I don't like TV shows and books that present Santa as unmitigated Truth, with no ambiguousness. Why not have the book or show end with the kids wondering - was it Santa, or somebody else? And I really don't like it when they do that with no other message than "Santa is real". What about "It's good to share" or "We all get things for those we love" or "Family totally rocks" on top of that? But I'm beyond pissed when the little kids are being told that they must believe, or they're bad kids.

[jedirita.livejournal.com]

I like the "Santa game" idea.

My parents didn't make a big deal of it. If we asked, they would say, "What do you think?" I do remember putting out cookies and milk for Santa, and being excited that the cookies and milk were gone, but my parents didn't make some huge deal out of it. Come to think of it, I don't know where I got the idea of Santa from anyway. From the larger society, I guess.

[conuly]

I did cookies and milk one year. Except that I put out pretzels. For my father. Who liked pretzels.

And no, unlike all the little children in my neighborhood, I did not believe my father was Papa Natali, except in the sense that he did help provide my presents. (The fact that he said Bah Humbug all the time, and was my dad kinda gave that away to me.)

[jedirita.livejournal.com]

We got presents from "Santa", but I noticed that Santa had my mom's handwriting and used our wrapping paper. :D

[atdelphi.livejournal.com]

*nods* I really resent the notion that Christmas is spoiled if you don't lie to children about a mythological figure that no adults actually believe in. And while it can actually be a good early lesson for kids in "Some people believe X" or "Some families practice X tradition," it's really messed up that there are those who regard children as bad for not believing something we all know is a lie.

I had a book as a kid that I wish I'd held on to. It was a compendium of all sorts of Christmas stories - the nativity, a legend about Santa Claus' childhood, The Gift of the Magi, and other stories and poems. We weren't a very religious family, and I don't remember ever sincerely believing in Santa, and I think that book really made an impression on me that it was fun to tell stories and sing songs about the various origins and histories of Christmas, but that it was all just background material for what the holiday really meant in my family.

[leora.livejournal.com]

I only ever got a present from Santa once. And that year I also got a present from Cthulhu. But then, I was raised Jewish, and we didn't celebrate Christmas.

[conuly]

A present from Cthulu? Really? Dare I ask what it was?

[leora.livejournal.com]

A Sandman graphic novel by Gaiman. If you haven't read them, they're great. If you have read them, they're still great.

[sparkofcreation.livejournal.com]

When I was little, my mother actually used to buy four new rolls of wrapping paper each year, and use two different ones with pictures of Santa on them for each of us kids' presents, and then two more without Santa for presents from her and my dad. I still think this is genius. (And yes, she now uses three different rolls for me, my husband, and my sister.)

As for handwriting, my mother is an English teacher, so her handwriting looks suspiciously like the handwriting in those "how to write in cursive" guides. If you didn't know a real person wrote it, you'd think it was done by a machine.

My best friend is Muslim but very into Christmas, and she tried to get her older son (5) into Santa. Their conversations went something like "What would you like Santa to bring you?" "Why would someone I don't know want to get me presents? I don't trust him. Maybe *you* should just get me something instead."

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

So what you're bringing up is really the question of whether or not white lies are okay?

It's a tricky question, but I think that sometimes a white lie or just not bringing up the truth. As an example, as a kid I hated whenever I'd have to give one of my grandma's a kiss on the cheek because she had bad teeth and a big wart on her nose. But I never said anything about it because... well, cleary no good would come of it.

As for Santa, Christmas the time we're all supposed to make exceptions in our behavior and try and be extra good. Kids get so much joy out of Santa it's hard not to want to let them enjoy the myth a little longer. And if that means you have to spin a little story, eh, it's not like it's going to hurt them.

But there comes a point where a parent has to admit that their kid is old enough to fully understand the real world and that they have to be honest with the kid from then on. Sure, it's not easy to honest with kids about some things like drinking, sex, or drugs, but in those situations when parents lie to their kids, even if it is with good intentions, they're ultimately doing wrong by them.

[conuly]

Well, that's part of the question - I certainly think that if, as a rule, you strive to be honest with your kids, Santa customs are a huge deviance for you, and I go a bit wtf? if you do them.

The other question is whether Santa counts as a white lie - is it a necessary part of saving feelings?

Kids get joy out of Santa, but they also get joy out of presents (sans Santa) and out of pretending Santa (which we did this year - everybody knows it's just pretend, but we played the game anyway) and out of eating lots of candy canes. What I really don't understand is why there are supposed to be only two ways to handle it - lie, or don't do it at all.

[wakasplat.livejournal.com]

What confuses me about the "it stimulates the imagination" stuff is it's not exactly imagination you're stimulating if you think it's real. It's imagination if you know it's pretend and you pretend anyway.

[conuly]

That's just what I always say!

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

Whatever happened to just letting kids figure out the truth for themselves? Most of them do by the time they're eight or so anyway.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

I have a take on it -- many parents that I know who are anti SAnta are very controlling and egotistical, and I think they have trouble letting go and letting their kids imagine even for a while that someone out there loves them THAT MUCH and will actually give them stuff. It's just been my personal observation. I neither encouraged nor discouraged Santa, but the people who are all up in arms over Santa usually fit my description -- at least the ones I've had exposure to.

[conuly]

Whatever happened to being honest to your kids? Why set up things that they have to "figure out"? It's always seemed a bit hypocritical for most people.

[conuly]

My parents had an opposite problem.

My grandmother would send us tons of stuff for Christmas, and insist it all be labelled "Santa". Of course, we had presents from Mommy, presents from Daddy, presents from our other grandparents and each other - the end result was that we would have had no presents from Grand, with the implication that Grand didn't love us as much as the rest of the family.

They just changed the labels on most of the gifts to say Grand anyway. She lived in Texas, what would she know?

I doubt that's what you mean, but the way you say it sounds like you want your kids to believe Santa loves them and gets them stuff, not their parents or grandparents or friends.

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

I don't see the harm in letting kids believe in the fantastic for a few years. I think it's good for their imaginations.

Being honest and letting a kid belive in a fairy tale aren't the same in my book.

[conuly]

First, you missed my edit, so let me add that:

I mean, several times a year there are articles in popular periodicals about how you should Set a Good Example and never, ever, say things like "I can't come in to work, I'm sick" or even "No, that dress isn't the most hideous thing I've ever seen in my life", because it's dishonest. Some go so far as to imply that just not commenting on how atrocious your mother's cassarole is is the same thing as praising it to high heavens.

But the rules are changed at Christmas? And people go so overboard. They don't just tell the lie, they enact it. With props.

Second, I do see a distinction, and I'll say it here.

If your kid happens to want to pretend that Santa is real, or even believes it, that's great. Make-believe is good for the imagination. And children know all about make-believe. They pretend they're Mommy, or a firefighter, or Superman. They know they aren't really, but they pretend.

I don't make them pretend these things. I don't say "Yes, you are Mommy" and expect them to believe it as fact.

But people do present Santa in that way. They say "Yes, Santa is real" and they devise ways to avoid telling their kids the truth, even when their kids start asking questions. There's a big difference there.

[atdelphi.livejournal.com]

I'm not a parent yet, and don't know if I'll ever be, but seeing the whole Santa debate come up in various fora this year made me think on how I would handle it. I'm all for sharing holiday mythology, but I've never liked the idea of telling kids that Santa is real - and like even less the mandatory sense around the lie. You really hit it on the nose for me with the distinction between "Santa is real" and "Disbelieving in Santa is bad." And because none of the adults involved actually believe that Santa is real, it ends up oddly less problematic in some ways to raise a kid who doesn't believe in God than one that doesn't believe in Santa.

[conuly]

*nodnodnod*

Like I said, this year, everybody pretended. And we winked a lot.

Angelique had great fun with that. Evangeline was cheerfully oblivious to all messages pro and con, so I call that a win!

[atdelphi.livejournal.com]

That sounds like a great way to handle it. :-)

[conuly]

I'll also add that I don't want to do "Santa is real" anyway.

But it's bad enough that I get told I'm a horrible person, a scrooge, a grinch for wanting to be honest. It's bad enough I'm the one being told we're all mean if we don't do Santa, that we're removing the "magic of the season" - like being with a family that loves you and getting presents from said family isn't magical enough! But to share that message with impressionable kids is beyond the pale.

I don't like TV shows and books that present Santa as unmitigated Truth, with no ambiguousness. Why not have the book or show end with the kids wondering - was it Santa, or somebody else? And I really don't like it when they do that with no other message than "Santa is real". What about "It's good to share" or "We all get things for those we love" or "Family totally rocks" on top of that? But I'm beyond pissed when the little kids are being told that they must believe, or they're bad kids.

[jedirita.livejournal.com]

I like the "Santa game" idea.

My parents didn't make a big deal of it. If we asked, they would say, "What do you think?" I do remember putting out cookies and milk for Santa, and being excited that the cookies and milk were gone, but my parents didn't make some huge deal out of it. Come to think of it, I don't know where I got the idea of Santa from anyway. From the larger society, I guess.

[conuly]

I did cookies and milk one year. Except that I put out pretzels. For my father. Who liked pretzels.

And no, unlike all the little children in my neighborhood, I did not believe my father was Papa Natali, except in the sense that he did help provide my presents. (The fact that he said Bah Humbug all the time, and was my dad kinda gave that away to me.)

[jedirita.livejournal.com]

We got presents from "Santa", but I noticed that Santa had my mom's handwriting and used our wrapping paper. :D

[atdelphi.livejournal.com]

*nods* I really resent the notion that Christmas is spoiled if you don't lie to children about a mythological figure that no adults actually believe in. And while it can actually be a good early lesson for kids in "Some people believe X" or "Some families practice X tradition," it's really messed up that there are those who regard children as bad for not believing something we all know is a lie.

I had a book as a kid that I wish I'd held on to. It was a compendium of all sorts of Christmas stories - the nativity, a legend about Santa Claus' childhood, The Gift of the Magi, and other stories and poems. We weren't a very religious family, and I don't remember ever sincerely believing in Santa, and I think that book really made an impression on me that it was fun to tell stories and sing songs about the various origins and histories of Christmas, but that it was all just background material for what the holiday really meant in my family.

[leora.livejournal.com]

I only ever got a present from Santa once. And that year I also got a present from Cthulhu. But then, I was raised Jewish, and we didn't celebrate Christmas.

[conuly]

A present from Cthulu? Really? Dare I ask what it was?

[leora.livejournal.com]

A Sandman graphic novel by Gaiman. If you haven't read them, they're great. If you have read them, they're still great.

[sparkofcreation.livejournal.com]

When I was little, my mother actually used to buy four new rolls of wrapping paper each year, and use two different ones with pictures of Santa on them for each of us kids' presents, and then two more without Santa for presents from her and my dad. I still think this is genius. (And yes, she now uses three different rolls for me, my husband, and my sister.)

As for handwriting, my mother is an English teacher, so her handwriting looks suspiciously like the handwriting in those "how to write in cursive" guides. If you didn't know a real person wrote it, you'd think it was done by a machine.

My best friend is Muslim but very into Christmas, and she tried to get her older son (5) into Santa. Their conversations went something like "What would you like Santa to bring you?" "Why would someone I don't know want to get me presents? I don't trust him. Maybe *you* should just get me something instead."

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

So what you're bringing up is really the question of whether or not white lies are okay?

It's a tricky question, but I think that sometimes a white lie or just not bringing up the truth. As an example, as a kid I hated whenever I'd have to give one of my grandma's a kiss on the cheek because she had bad teeth and a big wart on her nose. But I never said anything about it because... well, cleary no good would come of it.

As for Santa, Christmas the time we're all supposed to make exceptions in our behavior and try and be extra good. Kids get so much joy out of Santa it's hard not to want to let them enjoy the myth a little longer. And if that means you have to spin a little story, eh, it's not like it's going to hurt them.

But there comes a point where a parent has to admit that their kid is old enough to fully understand the real world and that they have to be honest with the kid from then on. Sure, it's not easy to honest with kids about some things like drinking, sex, or drugs, but in those situations when parents lie to their kids, even if it is with good intentions, they're ultimately doing wrong by them.

[conuly]

Well, that's part of the question - I certainly think that if, as a rule, you strive to be honest with your kids, Santa customs are a huge deviance for you, and I go a bit wtf? if you do them.

The other question is whether Santa counts as a white lie - is it a necessary part of saving feelings?

Kids get joy out of Santa, but they also get joy out of presents (sans Santa) and out of pretending Santa (which we did this year - everybody knows it's just pretend, but we played the game anyway) and out of eating lots of candy canes. What I really don't understand is why there are supposed to be only two ways to handle it - lie, or don't do it at all.

[wakasplat.livejournal.com]

What confuses me about the "it stimulates the imagination" stuff is it's not exactly imagination you're stimulating if you think it's real. It's imagination if you know it's pretend and you pretend anyway.

[conuly]

That's just what I always say!