The Ultimate Argument for School Choice

Warning: Don't click here if you're a fan of Santa Claus.

[Link courtesy of Jim Romenesko's Obscure Store and Reading Room]

Comments

[Steve]

What! No Santa!

Damn!

[Madog]

I wonder why the teacher felt the need to tell a bunch of 5 year olds the truth about Santa? Even my childhood friend's parents, who were very religous and hated things like Santa, the Easter Bunny, etc, let him believe in them just so he wouldn't stand out among his peers.

Santa's an odd thing to tell kids when you think about it - lie to them for years then pretend like it's no big deal, but having a teacher tell kids that their parents lie to them really underminds parental authority.

Still, the news story is probably overreacting. When I realized Santa wasn't real, I did my best to convince my younger friends their parents were lying and they just wouldn't belive me.

[Jim]

I agree with the notion that it was probably a bad judgement for the teacher in question to tell these children that Santa doesn't exist, especially since there appear to be so many strong feelings from parents on this issue. I also agree that it may be necessary to insulate children from certain 'truths' until they reach an appropriate age. However I'm not sure I would agree that it's necessary or even sensible to encourage belief in fictional entities.

It's not as if kids at kindergarten age don't know the difference. They are capable of understanding that other story book characters and cartoon and TV characters are just make believe. I understand the putative value of the incentive to good behavior, but wouldn't the notion of receiving or not receiving gifts from Mom & Dad be equally effective?

I used to think, somewhat cynically, that encouraging a belief in Santa Claus was some sort of preparation for indoctrination in relious beliefs later in life, but if anything by telling a kid a known lie and then having to reveal its falsehood later just undermines your credibility as a parent when telling them anything else about people or things that can't be easily seen or are hard to believe (like anything contained in the beliefs of most of the world's religions).

I suppose the real reason so many parents want to tell the Santa Clause story to their children is to vicariously recapture the lost innocence of youth. Or they just want them to have the same experience they had. These aren't bad reasons, I'm just not sure whether it's good or bad for the kids...