nkrummy

First off, Im sorry if everyone's all Santa Claused out... I am new to the boards, so I missed out on any threads you had about the jolly old guy! :P

Anyway this comes from another thread, where one of the posters was saying that the Santa Claus myth is just a way of *lying* to children and teaching them lying from a very early age.

I was thinking more on the topic and came to the conclusion that maybe the whole charade is a healthy thing for everyone to go through. It allows for you to have that revelation where you realize that even though something seemed real and magical while you believed in it, the belief can still turn out to be false. Feelings can't always be trusted.

In fact coming to that realization can become a sort of rite of passage to adulthood. Even if it's not Santa Claus or the tooth fairy, all people have imaginations, and as children we can let them run wild. It is a time when we can believe in magic and mysterious creatures and fairy tales. As we grow up, we begin to outgrow these types of things.

The Santa Claus myth shows how easily succeptible we are as people (especially the younger or more child-like we are) to accept things that we want to believe in, and to fill in the gaps with our imaginations. It also shows that there is a certain low level of reasoning or convicing that can be used to sustain these sorts of beliefs, even though closer examination would show that the reasoning is not very strong/ logical.

Now don't get me wrong -the ideological framework of a religion is far more complex than the Santa Claus myth. Also, unlike the Santa Claus myth, it is a challenge to "disprove" because many arguments supporting religion are based on concepts and forces that are claimed to exist beyond the realm of what we can examine with the senses.

Nonetheless, I think that possibly the experience that we go through with the Santa Claus myth is something that we can learn from if we actually gave it some thought. It tells us something about they way we form our beliefs and feelings- and can motivate us to use a more trustworthy basis for our beliefs in the future: logical reasoning and anlysis.

greywolf90

lol i wasn't expecting this to actually turn into a thread. i never really looked at it this way. i think this argument would justify the santa tradition, but i still think i pesonally don't want to be part of it.

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"for there is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so."- Hamlet

nkrummy

lol- actually I created this before I saw your response- I just replied to you over there too I'm curious- did you grow up with Santa Claus? If so, did you feel some resentment to your parents when you found out?

greywolf90

yeah i was raised believing in santa and i was never mad when i found out it wasn't true (mabey disappointed?), but i don't know that it would really feel right for me to do the same thing to my kid(s).

__________________
"for there is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so."- Hamlet

Geshtinnanna

What's wrong with myth and imagination and having fun as a kid? No one ever disowned their parents saying OH MY GOD YOU GAVE ME ALL THESE PRESENTS ALL THESE YEARS AND MADE ME HAPPY! HOW DARE YOU. Santa is for fun.

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Vinterland

If something is justifiable, it must be rationally demonstrated to be true.

When you strip down the theology of a religion such as christianity, both 'God' and Santa becomes virtually synonymous. The qualities assigned to God and Santa are arbitrary and are interchangeable.
Well contructed post and I agree that it causes philisophical inquiry.