I'm writing this as someone who has mostly lived in the US and Canada. Personally, I find the whole "lying to children about Christmas" thing just a bit weird (no judgment on those who enjoy this aspect of the holiday). But because it's completely normalized in our culture, this is something many people have to deal with.
Two questions:
What age does this normally happen? I suppose you want the "magic of Christmas" at younger ages, but it gets embarrassing at a certain point.
And how does it normally happen? Let them find out from others through people at school? Tell them explicitly during a "talk"? Let them figure it out on their own?
Are you referring to santa and elves or the birth of Christ?
My 5yo daughter appreciates santa et.al. as a cheeky fun fantasy just like the easter bunny and tooth fairy. I never tried to convince her that any of it it real.
We even have an elf on a shelf that she looks far every morning with great enthusiasm but if someone gets weird about she says “its just a toy ok”
We used Santa (et al.) as an exercise in critical thinking. Outside of saying, "Yep, the Easter Bunny did it." we never directly lied about it. If they asked a question about it, we answered truthfully.
Child: "Whoa, how does he visit all those homes in one night?"
Dad: "It's impossible unless he uses magic."
C: "Whoa magic is real??"
D: "Nope."
They all figured it out on their own before they hit grade school.
It's just horrible to see secular people intentionally lying to their kids. It fosters mistrust. Sure, celebrate Christmas, and put the presents in the stocking and whatnot, make it fun. But to lie to your kids about who's doing it seems totally unnecessary and harmful. Same for the tooth fairy. Fortunately for me, my parents didn't lie to me about the tooth fairy. And I appreciate that.
There is no evidence that belief in Santa is harmful to children, nor is telling them the truth. They only believe in Santa for like maybe three years, and they’ll figure it out on their own. The vast majority of kids figure it out by age ~7-8. You can tell them whatever you want, it won’t matter either way.
If you do tell them the truth, or they figure it out on their own, be sure to also tell them that even if they don’t believe, other kids do, and being a Santa-truther will not win them any prizes or make them any friends. It’s a good lesson about living in a society.
By truth do you mean that Santa doesn't exist, that the whole Christmas celebration is an adaptation of Roman pagan traditions, or that Jesus never existed?
Jesus probably did exist, but he probably didn't commit miracles.
In a modern survey of Jesus is Definitely Real and Was The Son of God and Died and Rose Again for Our Sins scholars, they unanimously believe that Jesus was real.
Do not argue against it. It's on Wikipedia. Those are the guys who were cited, so he's real.
Silly me - wondering if there was a contemporary, unbiased historian who maybe could have heard of him
You stole the words right out of my mouth. Thanks for saving me the time to type that comment.
The sooner you can tell your kids God's not real, the better. Just make sure you tell them it's not their job to explain that to their peers.
Unless you meant Santa. In which case the same applies.
Don't lie to your children about someone sneaking into the house at night while everyone is asleep, it's fucking weird.
If I had kids I'd just do what every parent I know including my own did and let them find out themselves. I feel like it's more natural that way.
Just don't play into it. My parents never did the Santa gifts thing from the beginning. All our gifts were from mom, dad, grandma/grandpa, etc.
I never got a "talk" that I can remember about Santa not being real, it just never was a thing.
No magic was lost for me or my siblings. Christmas was still our favorite holiday of the year. Still had tons of fun decorating, making cookies and gingerbread houses, making gift wishlists, going out to get a tree, putting up lights, getting up early Christmas morning to open gifts, etc.
Most magical time of my life personally as a kid during the season, nothing was lost by not believing in Santa bringing me presents.
Emphasize the important things about the season. It's about generosity, spreading joy to others, celebrating friends and family that we don't get to see often, etc. Don't make it consumeristic. I wish my folks had taken me and my sibs to help at some sort of community function around the holidays. Although as we got into our teens, we would do food drives and toys for tots, etc. Which was good.
I never grew up with Santa and don't plan on any kids of mine doing so if I become a mom.
You teach it as young as you can. Teach them to laugh at the pathetic, hate-mongering Christians and their silly traditions that make no sense. Encourage them to tell their peers the truth at school as well.
We lived in a house without a fireplace and the whole thing made no sense to 5yo me.
My dad used to dress up as Santa Claus and bring gifts to kids at the village's daycare... This required months of work from my mother to buy toy packs and similar stuff to separate into little assorted packages for the kids. This started before I was born, it was impossible to hide the fact from me growing up, and they never tried to pretend Santa was real, they just told me not to tell the other kids. I had no further questions or doubts to be assuaged.
We just never invested in that with our kid. We said things like, "it's fun to pretend" and "some other families believe..."
It isn't hard. I grew up believing Native Americans were Israelites and there were ancient records written on metal plated under a hill in central New York. Many families believe our don't believe certain things.
https://youtu.be/BsR6sIsoWgU
Not sure if it will help, I was looking for another video about Santa specifically. But could not find it. In that video he says that he did not dismiss Santa's tales but also did not engage with it. And at a certain point question the tales and asked the kids how they know that's Santa who is giving them presents. Then the kids looked for ways to find out, and discovered themselves. (If I remember correctly)
