Santa: harmless fun/dangerous illusion/pernicious cult? (fwd)

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>Forwarded with permission...
>
>From:     Mark Harrison <marknear@COIL.COM>
>Date:     Thu, 7 Dec 1995 09:37:52 -0500
>Subject:  Santa: harmless fun/dangerous illusion/pernicious cult?
>
>Santa: harmless Christmas fun, dangerous childhood illusion, or
>pernicious cult?
>3) Being taught a lie sets a child up to distrust his parents. The
>illuminati at school love to tell younger kids "There ain't no Santa".
>The parents say, "Yes there is. He is the spirit of Christmas".
>Eventually the parents are shown to be liars. Whom should the kid trust
>for information on truth, purity, safe sex, religion, morals, and
>political philosophy? Not those parents. They lie.
>
>

I agree with you.  I was saved when my children were small, and I was never
able to bring myself to "pretend" that Santa was real with my children.  I
always felt this would be telling them a lie.

I spoke with a brother in church a few years ago that said the same thing
about distrusting his parents.  He was very upset and felt that his parents
had lied to him after he found out Santa wasn't real.   I wonder how
widespread this feeling is.  Some of it may have to do with the temperment
of the person, and the extent to which the parents emphasized the "Santa
story".

One thing I did do was "play" the tooth fairy, but I always made sure my
children knew it was really me.  They would always say the next morning
(after finding a quarter under their pillow) "I know you are the tooth
fairy" and I would smile and say "You found me out".   I think we can find
ways to have fun with our children without deceiving them.





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