Santa Claus

[EquALLity]

Hey, hope everyone's enjoying the holiday season!

What do you guys think about Santa Claus (telling kids that there is a Santa Claus)?

My parents have been telling my sister about that stuff, and I question the ethics of it.
Personally, I don't ever remember believing in 'Santa'. I was one of those kids who tried to convince other kids that there was no Santa.
I may have lied about believing in him a bit to get gifts, though... ;D

But I'd be really interested to hear stories from people who did believe in that stuff. I've heard from some people that they were really upset when they found out it was all fake.

How old were you when you found out?
How did you find out?
Were you upset?
Did it damage your trust of your parents?
Do you wish your parents never lied to you about Santa?
Do you think it's ethical to tell kids there is a Santa?

[Red]

I found out he supposedly didn't exist when I was 12.
I kind of found out as time went on.
It was a bit of a let down, but I didn't let it get to me.
It didn't impact my parents trust.
As for the last 2, I really don't care.

[Cirion Spellbinder]

I found out when I was ten years old.
My parents told me he didn't exist so I wouldn't be mocked in middle school.
No, because I got to put the presents under the tree and eat the cookies.
It didn't damage my trust of my parents.
Yes, I would have preffered to be told.
I don't think it's unethical, but I wouldn't do it.

[inator]

I realized the Easter Bunny wasn't real when I was 7. Took me about one more year to make the connection and stop believing in Santa too. But I didn't want to let my parents down (my dad loved dressing up as Santa every year) so I just played along until they decided to tell me when I was 11.
I don't think it affected me negatively at all, but I wouldn't want to lie to my kids. I'd encourage their critical thinking skills instead.

[miniboes]

I don't think anybody in the NL believes in santa, but we do all believe in sinterklaas as kids. I'll answer the questions for Sinterklaas.

I don't know how old I was, but I was probably six. Everything of significance in my childhood seemed to have happened when I was six.
I figured it out rationally, don't know exactly how but it was akin to how I rejected the bible. I was slightly upset. It did not damage my trust of my parents at all. I do not wish they had not lied, since it was great fun believing in sinterklaas and it's totally harmless, plus nobody is going to let you believe it into puberty. I honestly don't think there's anything wrong with it.

[brimstoneSalad]

Believing something false and then reasoning the truth for yourself could be a potentially useful exercise in critical thinking. Remembering how we felt about Santa may also help us relate to other adults under similar delusions about 'god'.

There are potential pros and cons, and I'm not sure which one is more weighty.

[Canastenard]

I wanted to do a thread on this and searched and found this, so let me resurrect this thread rather than creating a new one.

I used to believe that if I ever have children in my future I would not present Santa Claus to them as a reality rather than a fairy tale, with the assumption that it would be incompatible with the values of scientific and critical thinking I would try to teach them. However an article I recently read challenged my assumption, and that rather than imparing their critical thinking, it would actually construct it by giving them an example of a false belief they'd reason to stop believing. Seems sound since I guess plenty of people who have learned about scientific skepticism used to believe in some form of woo that failed them.

My main concern about Santa Claus was, and still is, the risk of backfire effect against evidence against Santa Claus' existence. In other words children who reject the idea that Santa isn't real, instructing them about confirmation bias and magical thinking rather than critical skills (I even compared belief in Santa Claus with belief in flat Earth), before they're being told by a credible authority, most likely one of their parents. I remember I was one of those children and refused to take the possibility of Santa Claus' non-existence seriously, until I was explicitly told by my mother. I was devastated when she told me. And considering my personal experience it comes at no surprise my opinion about Santa made me think of it as a critical thinking-crushing cruel joke, but the discovery of the opposing viewpoint made me consider the possibility that my case might be the exception rather than the rule.

I think that if a parent decides to perpetuate the Santa myth to their children then they also must give them the tools to help them figuring out that it's just a myth, like pointing out inconsistencies, telling them about laws of physics that are not compatible with the myth, and not trying to give magical hand wave answers to questions like "how does Santa go inside the house if there isn't any open door or chimney?". Critical thinking is not innate to the human mind, it's something that's learned, and I think telling kids the Santa tale as a reality rather than a myth and expecting them to figure out themselves is risky.

[Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz]

I say that it is abominable that parents could tell their children such rubbish! It promotes lying and the idea of doing good because you may get rewarded, rather than goodness having its own reward.

[brimstoneSalad]

I think you can get the benefits without the drawbacks by never lying to them, but letting them pick it up culturally and figure it out for themselves (rather than stopping them to correct the mistaken belief).

[sykkelmannen]

I say that it is abominable that parents could tell their children such rubbish! It promotes lying and the idea of doing good because you may get rewarded, rather than goodness having its own reward.

Fully agree. Nothing ethical here about knowingly lying to one's own children.

Don't remember exactly the time I found out, which is crazy when I compare to your exact memories.
A collectively perpetuated lie. Not because parents actually want to uphold this silly idea, but because it floats around. It's as though the other parents will hate you for bursting their kids' bubble by your own kids knowing.