To think parents who do this are hypocrites

[Cazzovuoi]

I'm so sad for all the kids who will miss the magic of Santa because parents don't want to lie to their kids.

It's a bizarre concept to me that you think letting your kids believe in a wonderful magical, mythical person is lying yet, if you are religious, you actively teach them to believe in a malevolent, omnipotent, all powerful, cruel being so controlling that he takes attendance on Sunday.

At least Santa was a real person.

The ability to lie is a vital human skill. We could not function as a society without it. So I absolutely tell white lies to my daughter and expect them in return. These are lies to spare someone’s feelings - “thanks for the ornament, I love it” rather than “what the fuck is this hideous thing, take it back”; “no, your bum doesn’t look big in that” etc.

We are honest in an age appropriate way about all important matters in life, including death, what’s going on in the world, why certain people believe certain things and so on.

Santa isn’t a white lie or a fact, so we say that it’s a story some people’s I believe is true, and she’s free to believe or not, as with any other fantasy story. Presents arrive un-labelled and she can believe what she likes about where they came from. Our winter celebration is no less special for it.

Father Christmas not Santa Clause. Christmas is a celebration of the birth of Jesus. Christ Mass.
Easy, let’s not get them confused.

let’s not get them confused

Just what are you drawing a distinction between?

Let them work it out for themselves.

Anyone who can't tell the difference between lies and fun make-believe and stories is massively lacking in imagination. And I notice the 'I hate lies' posters have largely failed to respond to posts about the fact that parents both benignly and kindly lie to their dc and also make things up for fun all the time (unless they are pretty cruel parents).

lie2
/lʌɪ/
noun
noun: lie; plural noun: lies
an intentionally false statement.
"they hint rather than tell outright lies"

Honestly people should stop with the mental gymnastics just to pretend they aren't lying. They should be proud of their lies if they truly feel they're "fun" and it means they're the most "imaginative" people ever.

A lie is simply intentionally saying something that isn't true. That's it.

Feeling judged because posters say you lied doesn't change the simple meaning of the word. I note how the defence states everything else as a lie except this one. It's not mutually exclusive for something to be both a lie and harmless or imaginative. Any lie, by its very nature, is imaginative. So you're not special for this particular lie.

Some lies are fun and harmless, others are harmful and dangerous.

Posters would sound more clever by arguing that this is a harmless lie [and in most cases, it is] than claiming it isn't a lie.

People lie about different things and this is one of them. Good god!🙄

Personally I'm more interested in the deeper metaphorical truths the myth conveys. So 🤷‍♀️

Ive always loved attached explaination

That's lovely 😍

It's a lovely writeup, I like it. Although if Ryan is 5 or any age under 10, this long, diplomatic explanation to his question may not fly.

There is something a bit similar in ‘Little House on the Prairie’ but with added pressure to be ‘unselfish’ and give up asking for presents.
Reading it, I found it incredible that an eight year old could still believe anyway.

An eight year old is a little child. It's peak age for believing!

I couldn’t have been much more than eight when I read it. I like to think I was in touch with what was normal for an eight year old at the time, but perhaps not.
Certainly, my parents brought up in the forties, find it hard to credit anyone not being enlightened by older or more knowledgeable children as soon as they start school.
Perhaps, even in the seventies, children were less tightly under their parents control than they are now.

My mum said that Christmases improved so dramatically when her father came home in 1945, when she was six and her sister eight, they certainly had no doubts who was responsible!

@Embroidery

Ive always loved attached explaination

….blew it with the last word, I’d say.

When I was a child 9/10 was the age when most kids stopped believing. Of course there were outliers. My cousin was 6. My best friend 12.

My son is 7 and it is peak Santa now. I would expect him to believe for another Christmas after this one, then probably not.

Maybe I just assumed everyone was pretending and they weren’t! My brother told me when I was four. It was slightly disappointing, but it didn’t seem such a big thing as I had few Christmases to remember.
I’m pretty sure I never believed in the tooth fairy.

….blew it with the last word, I’d say
It's a spelling mistake, don't be an arse.

I suspect the poster meant the last word of the attachment.

To which I'd say, just leave it out, it still has huge power without it.

@TheKeatingFive

I suspect the poster meant the last word of the attachment.

To which I'd say, just leave it out, it still has huge power without it.

Oh

This is a bit daft. I figured out very early that Santa wasn’t real. Still enjoyed Christmas and going along with the fantasy. A bit like Dr Who, I knew it was just actors playing out a story but enjoyed it and looked forward to it. That’s very different from threatening kids with a malevolent deity, which most religious parents don’t do anyway.

I was brought up in a religious household, not over the top but dad insisted we attended church on Sunday. We still believed in Father Christmas though.
Father Christmas was a saint and the church recognise that so in a religious household children are more likely to believe and know the origin of Father Christmas.
Also it's really not nice to rubbish other people's beliefs. You don't have to believe in God but don't make Him out to be something He isn't.

My DC’s had Sinkerklass and Father Christmas - they thought they were brilliant - treats and presents throughout December They knew other presents came from us so no confusion on who to thank.

@Rosebel

I was brought up in a religious household, not over the top but dad insisted we attended church on Sunday. We still believed in Father Christmas though. Father Christmas was a saint and the church recognise that so in a religious household children are more likely to believe and know the origin of Father Christmas. Also it's really not nice to rubbish other people's beliefs. You don't have to believe in God but don't make Him out to be something He isn't.

Father Christmas wasn’t a saint! Saint Nicholas was a saint, Father Christmas is a fictional character.

Saint Nicholas was patron saint of loads of things and has been fictionalised (because he sometimes gave gifts to people) as a figure who lives at the North Pole, wears a fluffy red suit, rides a magic sleigh, and gives gifts to every child in the world in one night.

And yes I do know Santa Claus is based on Saint Nicholas but the character really bears no resemblance to the Santa we know today and it’s a bit daft to suggest that kids who believe in Father Christmas are celebrating the origins of Saint Nicholas.