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Comment by giorgioz | Hacker News Reader

What did your parents told you about Santa Claus or other children mythical creatures when you were a child?

Not op, but a parent. When my kid was young we left that question deliberately vague. I didn't want him to be the kid who goes around and says in Kindergarten "my dad says Santa Clause doesn't exist", at the same time deliberately encouraging a belief into something I know is not true felt morally wrong, so when he asked if Santa is real I woulf typically answer along the lines of "I'm not sure, what do you think?"

I don't remember ever believing in Santa when I was a kid, but I also didn't grow up in anglo sphere where that question seems quite important the growing up process.

Similar here. When they were two we explained that Santa was as real as Mickey Mouse. They got it immediately. They know the mouse stands for something, and so does Santa. We have fun with it all.

Christmas season is so much easier when you don't have to compete with a fictional, fat, jolly, magic man. The spirit behind it has value, and we celebrate that, along with other traditions.

I rarely lie to my children. I always encouraged my children not to go around saying "there is no Santy/Santa". But at the same time, I really resent the omnipresent peer pressure from other adults to actively maintain the lie for their precious one's benefit. They would never expect their Muslim/Hindu friends to so this, but as an atheist, all you get is disapproving looks.

It's a game, one I don't play, but if you ruin kid fun of course you'll get eyerolls... regardless of your background.

My recovery is just to own it, and say that I may not believe anymore, but "I'm proud of you sweety for believing". Kids won't take that as condescending cause the notion of Santa disbelievers is built-in.

I think my kid flat out told their friends at pre-school that Santa Clause died. Which lead to some very interesting conversations. We watched the cartoon film Klaus on Netflix (would recommend) and that's how they internalized it. =)

> I didn't want him to be the kid who goes around and says in Kindergarten "my dad says Santa Clause doesn't exist",

My eldest actually did that in kindergarten (barnehage) except that he apparently didn't justify it as being my opinion but a simple fact. When my wife went to pick him up one day she was very politely asked to explain to him that this caused some distress to some of the other children. She did that, he understood and kept his opinions on the subject to himself.

> I don't remember ever believing in Santa when I was a kid, but I also didn't grow up in anglo sphere where that question seems quite important the growing up process.

Not Anglosphere, more specifically US I think. I'm 66 and from England, I don't recall any of my childhood friends ever behaving as though they believed in Father Christmas and I'm even more confident that they would not have later claimed to their children that he existed. As far as I can remember I always knew that Christmas presents came from parents and relatives; after all most of the packages had cards on them saying things like 'Love to .. from auntie ..'.

When my daughter is old enough to ask I'm just going to tell her it's a story just like Frozen that we like to play pretend around. I don't see why she has to be misled into thinking Santa is real in order to celebrate Christmas like any other kids.

Kids are incredible at pretending!

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