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Those third graders already know. Regardless of what their parents fool themselves into believing about their children.
I was disillusioned of the Santa idea when I was in first grade - by all the other kids on the school bus. This would have occurred about 1953, and absolutely none of those kids were a "...typically leftwing hating feminist..."
When I was in Kindergarten, if any kids spoke as though Santa Claus was real, the other kids ridiculed them. "How about the Easter Bunny?", they'd say, "Do you think you're going to meet him, also?".
Parents so often think their kids are very innocent and untainted in their thoughts and know nothing of the real world. They can't imagine that they know anything about sex, until they've had that "talk" with them. More than a few kids today are having sex, at a younger age, than when their grandparents even knew it existed.
This is a quote from Allan Bloom’s Closing of the American Mind. It being Christmas, this thread reminded me of it.
“When I was a young teacher at Cornell, I once had a debate about education with a professor of psychology. He said that it was his function to get rid of prejudices in his students. He knocked them down like tenpins. I began to wonder what he replaced those prejudices with. He did not seem to have much of an idea of what the opposite of a prejudice might be. He reminded me of the little boy who gravely informed me when I was four that there is no Santa Claus, who wanted me to bathe in the brilliant light of truth. Did this professor know what those prejudices meant for the students and what effect being deprived of them would have? Did he believe that there are truths that could guide their lives as did their prejudices? Had he considered how to give students the love of truth necessary to seek unprejudiced beliefs, or would he render them passive, disconsolate, indifferent, and subject to authorities like himself, or the best of contemporary thought? My informant about Santa Claus was just showing off, proving his superiority to me. He had not created the Santa Claus that had to be there in order to be refuted. Think of all we learn about the world from men’s belief in Santa Clauses, and all that we learn about the soul from those who believe in them. By contrast, merely methodological excision from the soul of the imagination that projects Gods and heroes onto the wall of the cave does not promote knowledge of the soul; it only lobotomizes it, cripples its power.”
First, that 3rd grade teacher had no business telling a child there is no Santa Claus. That is one of the few domains of childrens' lives left for parents to patrol.
What was that 3rd grade teacher thinking? Was he like Bloom's psychology professor, unwittingly or otherwise rendering his charges disconsolate and indifferent? Or like Bloom's young friend who enjoyed demonstrating his superiority?
The best that can be said of him is that the teacher was oblivious. Only a little worse, that he was showing off. But I fear his motive is like the psychology professor's: rendering his pupil passive and subject to authorities like himself.
This is a quote from Allan Bloom’s Closing of the American Mind. It being Christmas, this thread reminded me of it.
“When I was a young teacher at Cornell, I once had a debate about education with a professor of psychology. He said that it was his function to get rid of prejudices in his students. He knocked them down like tenpins. I began to wonder what he replaced those prejudices with. He did not seem to have much of an idea of what the opposite of a prejudice might be. He reminded me of the little boy who gravely informed me when I was four that there is no Santa Claus, who wanted me to bathe in the brilliant light of truth. Did this professor know what those prejudices meant for the students and what effect being deprived of them would have? Did he believe that there are truths that could guide their lives as did their prejudices? Had he considered how to give students the love of truth necessary to seek unprejudiced beliefs, or would he render them passive, disconsolate, indifferent, and subject to authorities like himself, or the best of contemporary thought? My informant about Santa Claus was just showing off, proving his superiority to me. He had not created the Santa Claus that had to be there in order to be refuted. Think of all we learn about the world from men’s belief in Santa Clauses, and all that we learn about the soul from those who believe in them. By contrast, merely methodological excision from the soul of the imagination that projects Gods and heroes onto the wall of the cave does not promote knowledge of the soul; it only lobotomizes it, cripples its power.”
First, that 3rd grade teacher had no business telling a child there is no Santa Claus. That is one of the few domains of childrens' lives left for parents to patrol.
What was that 3rd grade teacher thinking? Was he like Bloom's psychology professor, unwittingly or otherwise rendering his charges disconsolate and indifferent? Or like Bloom's young friend who enjoyed demonstrating his superiority?
The best that can be said of him is that the teacher was oblivious. Only a little worse, that he was showing off. But I fear his motive is like the psychology professor's: rendering his pupil passive and subject to authorities like himself.
for all the people so adamantly against santa, i'd like to know about the adults that are permanently psychologically damaged by the fact that they believed in santa when they were young. is this really a problem for that many adults? they have been damaged by this whole santa thing to the point that they are not functioning properly as adults in the real world, at work and in relationships and living their lives in general? santa has destroyed them? trust issues because of santa? not believing another word their parents say anymore? is this really a thing? i have never known of anyone to be damaged by the fact that they believed in santa as a small child. or at least i have never heard of anyone blaming santa for their problems in adulthood.
a few posters here really have a very strong distaste for santa and i'd be interested to know how and why believing in santa as a child has damaged them as an adult.
I have two kids, one is almost 12 & one is 9. My 9 yr old most definitely still believes in Santa and even cried on Christmas Eve because she knew her Elf on the Shelf "Bella" would not be returning the next day. When my older child asked me a few years ago if there was a Santa I asked her what she thought and she said she knew it was me. When the other one asks I will tell her the truth.
There is nothing wrong in a child believing in Santa, the Easter Bunny and the tooth fairy. It's part of childhood imagination. That teacher had no right to take that away from those children!
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