Santa story a lie, but a nice lie

Now that Christmas is over, let us get down to brass tacks. Did you, as a parent, tell your young children stories about Santa Claus, that jolly fat man in the red suit who flies through the air in his sleigh filled with goodies and pulled by reindeer with red noses, and who squeezes down chimneys (although Filipino homes have no chimneys) to leave gifts for children who are not naughty but nice?

And when you told your children that story, did you realize that you were lying to them?

My parents told me that story when I was a child, and I wrote letters to Santa Claus asking for gifts I particularly wanted. I did not get all of them (some may have been difficult even for Santa to procure), but their replacements were just as good.

When I grew up and learned that there is no Santa Claus, I nevertheless bought gifts for all my siblings with the prize money I won in a literary contest. And I signed them all thus: “From Santa Claus.”

But do you know that the Santa story is a big lie, that you were telling a lie to your children when you retold the Santa story to them? And that you yourself were being naughty when you told them that lie?

Is that good or bad for the children?

Some eminent psychologists say it is. I came across an interesting and timely magazine article written by Dennis V. Gargantiel that dwelt on just the subject, and from which I will quote extensively. These learned men, Gargantiel wrote, believe that the Santa lie “stunts the mental growth of children.”

According to Gargantiel, two scholars—philosophy professor Kyle Johnson of King’s College (Pennsylvania in the United States) and neuropsychologist Clifford Lazarus of The Lazarus Institute (New Jersey in the United States)—said recent discoveries showed that “cognitive development starts earlier in children and is far more complex than earlier believed.”

Gargantiel wrote: “The two scholars warn that promoting the Santa ‘con’ and waiting to tell the truth about Santa until our kids are ‘old enough’ may influence their psychological development in ways that are unknown and potentially harmful.

“Both argue that kids are, for example, taught reading and arithmetic at an earlier age today than before because waiting until they are aged five or six to teach them these skills is tantamount to stunting development.”

Gargantiel noted “that exposing toddlers to correct English even before they can talk have a positive effect on their language skills later on, in the same way that a ‘yaya’s’ bad English would have a negative one.”

However, these scientists do not have the figures to back their conclusions.

Other Santa knockers claim that the myth “leads to the practice later on in adulthood of what men of science call ‘magical thinking’ as opposed to logical, rational, or scientific thinking,” Gargantiel continued. Examples of magical thinking include belief in spells, rituals, superstitions and old wives’ tales that, in one way or another, affect human behavior.

“Arguably, promoting the belief in Santa, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, ‘tikbalang,’ and magical amulets in childhood can shape how we believe and think later in life,” he wrote. Even now, many adults, and supposedly learned Filipinos, believe in superstition and mythical monsters such as the “aswang,” “mangkukulam” and “manananggal,” and amulets. This has led outlaws like “Nardong Putik” to believe that they are invincible because they are protected by their amulets, which leads them to commit acts of violence.

Still other Santa detractors point out that “perpetuating a fantasy only to admit at a later time that it was all just a sham undermines parental authority.”

But don’t be dismayed by this “scientific” beliefs. There are as many Santa defenders as there are detractors. The Santa story “may be a lie, but it’s a good lie,” the Santa defenders say. Parents don’t have to feel guilty.

Psychologists explain, Gargantiel wrote, that children eventually learn to differentiate between what is bad and what is good—except, perhaps, those who grow up to become politicians.

Children also learn on their own that Santa Claus is really just a beautiful story, without any adult confessing to them that they themselves were lied to by their parents. Children do not take that against their parents, too.

I and many other adults who were told the Santa lie when we were kids did not grow up to become serial murderers. And there’s no proof that politicians who became greedy and stole public funds became that way because they did not get the gifts they asked from Santa when they were kids.

Think how billions of children would be disappointed if they are all told that Santa Claus is a fraud perpetuated through the ages.

And think how sad Christmas would be without the beautiful story of Santa, his reindeer, and the little elves who make the toys under the watchful eyes of Mrs. Santa Claus in the North Pole.