You Better Not Lie, I’m Telling You Why… Santa Claus Is Coming
By Dawn Fry

Holiday season brings the perennial return of Santa Claus.
According to traditional lore, St. Nick flies around the world
on his reindeer-powered sleigh. He lavishes gifts upon the good
children of the world, and as for the naughty youngsters…well,
they can expect lumps of fossil fuel in their stockings. This
jovial, rotund old fellow provides a magical experience that
enriches the lives of children. Right? Well, not necessarily.

Parents often recount their childhood stories as cherished
memories and want to recreate the same experiences for their
children. Unfortunately, parents’ good intentions may actually
lead to mixed messages that may be harmful to childrenand there
is no magic in that. After taking a closer look at how the Santa
“fantasy” really affects children, you’ll realize that it’s time
to give the traditional Santa fantasy a modern makeover.

You Better Not Pout…. “He knows when you’ve been bad or good, so
be good for goodness sake.” The song “Santa Claus Is Coming to
Town” provides an example of the mixed messages associated with
the traditional Santa Claus myth. In this song, the take-home
message for many children is: “Santa is watching you, so you
better be good. If you are not good Santa won’t bring you toys.”

Adults, in some cases, take advantage of this message to control
children’s behavior. A department store employee once boasted
that she had the perfect way to keep customers’ children under
control. Whenever children became unruly, she would warn them
that Santa had cameras all over the store, and he could see them
being bad. If they didn’t stop misbehaving, the clerk warned,
they wouldn’t receive any toys on Christmas. She took great
pride in the fact that this trick worked every time.

What a creepy idea: Santa watches and judges you, and worse, he
may even punish you. Youngsters believe that if they don’t
perform in acceptable ways, Santa won’t bring them toys. This
reward/punishment scenario encourages children to be good for
the sake of a reward, and even worse, it instills a sort of “Big
Brother is watching” feeling. So be good to get toys, and be
good because someone’s watching you. What happened to be good
for goodness sake?

He’s Gonna Find Out Who’s Naughty or Nice…. Another harmful
message implicit in the Santa myth is that material objects
reflect quality of character. In this faulty logic, if being
good leads to toys, then receiving toys signify good behavior.
Take, for instance, the following examplea true story.

After the holidays, several children discussed the exciting
gifts Santa had brought them. One child claimed that she had
been so good that Santa brought her the bike she had really
wanted. Another little girl, who had suffered parental abuse and
neglect, listened to the first girl’s story. Later, in a very
meek voice, she asked her caretaker a heartbreaking question:
Since she had been good, when was Santa going to bring her bike?
In this case, and unfortunately in others, the Santa myth sets
children up for disappointment and self-doubt.

I’m Telling You Why…. At about age five children begin to
question the Santa myth by asking such questions as:

Is Santa Claus real? How can he make it to all the houses in
one night? How can he fit down the chimney? We don’t have a
chimney, so how can Santa come to my house? How can this be
Santa when we just saw him at another store? Do reindeer really
fly?

For each of these questions, parents must extend the fantasy
(i.e. generate more lies) to keep the myth alive just a little
longer. While these adults think it’s okay to deceive children
when it is for their own good, it may actually harm them.

Whether they finally figure it out for themselves or their
parents confess the truth about Santa, children experience
sadness, regrets and often, a sense of betrayal. Their
parentsthe adults whom they had trusted the mostlied to them.
What good is a short-term fantasy if it damages a child’s core
sense of trust?

Santa Claus is Coming to Town Parents need not do away with the
Santa experience all together. A fun and emotionally safe
alternative to the traditional myth is the Santa Claus Game. In
the Santa game everyone pretends that Santa is real. This
enables everyone to enjoy all the activities that others enjoy.
The main difference is that your children understand that Santa
is just pretend.

You can introduce the game during the pre-school years. Of
course, at this age children are too young to truly understand
the difference between pretend and real. But you can take them
to visit Santa and do all the Santa related activities children
like to do. From time to time you can say things like, “This
Santa game is fun!” You can even put out milk and cookies for
“Santa,” again explaining that it’s just pretend.

As the children get older and want to know more, explain that in
this pretend game Santa has magic and can do all the amazing
things that people talk about. Talk about Santa in a fairytale,
magical kind of fashion. The fact that it is a game will not
detract any pleasure from the child’s fun.

By the time children are five and six, you can stop the emphasis
on the pretend factor. At that age they will still be excited to
visit Santa and sit on his lap, even though they know it is all
pretend. When the children are ten and eleven years old, they
can still get presents from Santa and many will still want to
put out milk and cookies. The difference now is that they will
have that “special twinkle” in their eyes when they ask, “What
kind of cookies would Santa like this year?”

Eventually you won’t have to talk about it being a game anymore;
you’ll simply have fun. And isn’t that what the holiday spirit
is all about?

Children are excellent at pretend games and enjoy them
immensely. Even though the Santa game is make-believe, it
differs from the traditional myth in a crucial way: All the
players know it is a game. Adults may then tell children that
not all families play the game and that some children don’t know
it is a game. This information explains why Santa doesn’t come
to all families, and why some children think Santa is real. It
also clears up why some children don’t get what they want from
Santa, even when they have been “good.”

Children who learn the Santa game equally enjoy the magic and
excitement that others receive from the traditional Santa
experience. Most important, though, they don’t suffer the
disillusionment and sense of betrayal of discovering that Santa
isn’t real. So keep in mind that when you sing, “You better not
lie, I am telling you why”a child’s trust and happiness is at
stake.

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