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Comment by verisimi | Hacker News Reader

You will inevitably trigger a loss of trust - your kids will know that there are things you will lie to them about, as you are indeed lying to them to support a cultural norm.

I suggest it is better not to lie - why bring deceit into that relationship? - but keep the idea of Santa, if you like.

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No, you won't trigger a loss of trust if you do it the right way. This year, my 7-yr-old, for the first time in his life, asked me clear questions about Santa and all this stuff (we had more of that going on). Having been asked a clear question, I of course gave him a clear answer.

First he was sad - he liked the world of Santa, little gnomes hiding sweets for him in the woods when we were out hiking, things like that. But my clear answers just confirmed the suspicions he already brought home from school.

Then we talked about how this was a nice game adults and older kids play for the younger ones - and he got that immediately, kids inherently understand (and like) role playing games. So now he's in the role of those who know and play the game for the younger kids in our broader family - and he's proud of it :)

Before that happened, I actually was afraid and unsure about how to get out of this storyline without breaching trust. But it all played out smoothly.

Look - I did this too, I breached trust.

But think about it - you set him up for a fall. You lied, then he spotted it and you told him the truth. This is a loss of trust - the child now knows that his parents lie to him. (Great that you admit it, after, of course.)

Perhaps the lying is to some extent useful - such is the nature of this world and all that - but that whole charade could have been avoided without any deceit in the first place.

But I really don't see how you can argue that its ok to lie 'in the right way' to naive, trusting children, for the sake of some cultural convention.

And I'm not even broaching the pros (?) and cons of the cultural convention.... I'm sure no one wants to hear my thoughts on the 'most wonderful time of the year', lol.

I can't imagine a child would develop long-term trust issues based on a parent lying about Santa Claus. If it's a pattern of the parent constantly saying things like "your doggy went to a farm" or "if you swallow gum, it will kill you", then they'll understand that the parent is untrustworthy. Otherwise, a single make-believe story isn't harmless on its own.

I have 1 one year old boy and I often think about how should I behave. While the Santa issue is trivial to me, I decided I will lie, or hide the truth for that matter, about some topics to protect his innocence until he's mature enough to understand.

> your kids will know that there are things you will lie to them about

And that's part of growing up. I now know that the dog I barely remember (when I was almost 3 years old) didn't "went with his mom that came to pick him up one day", and understanding why they lied is part of growing up. Instead of triggering a loss of trust now I can say "I see what you did there, now I understand".

Yes - but I agree with your dog story - kids can't really understand about a death. Its not a lie - its an attempt to explain at the level you were at when you were 3.

Its a different thing to go along with the social convention of tricking the younger generation, and allowing these external conventions to cleave the trust between a parent and child.

FWIW, we tried to explain my grandfather's passing to our then 3.5 year old without lying, and she herself crafted a story that "he's with the ants", and now, after listening to a truckload of astronomy songs, she says he's "in space" and "fell into black hole". We can see she pattern-matches the event to any other concept of "lost and not coming back" she comes across.

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