Today I want to briefly discuss gift-giving through Santa Claus. You know the drill. It’s Christmas time. That means breakable ornaments, questionable music, and Santa. Also Jesus, but we’ll get to that in the next post. This post is about Santa.
You to want to make Christmas special for your children, so you get them to believe in a made-up character that they’ll inevitably credit for all your hard work and sacrifice. Christmas just wouldn’t be the same if we didn’t include a magical old man who provided the presents in the dead of night then flew off to a house twenty miles away instead of the one next door. Kids love science.
Then—once our little dummies really get used to the idea of supernatural forces entering the house and giving them free shit—we patiently wait for their own reason and logic to unceremoniously rip the bandaid of belief off. This double-whammy simultaneously destroys the magic of Christmas and gets them to question the honesty of their parents in one jaw-dropping moment of clarity. It’s a really beautiful tradition.
Ha! Sorry kid, you’re right. Santa isn’t real. I can’t believe you fell for that story. A supernatural old man who cares if you’re naughty or nice and can see everything you do? We just used that story to get you to behave all year. Kids are so gullible. Now get in the car, we’re going to church to learn about God.
Listen, I get the allure of teaching kids about Santa.
I never got to believe in Santa and I feel like I missed out. My cousins would excitedly try to stay awake hoping to catch a glimpse of the omniscient intruder. I knew better. I did my best to stay awake too, just in case my parents were wrong, but I never fully believed.
It’s a fun belief to have though.
Hey kid, deadbolt locks and general security mean absolutely nothing, but he’s giving you a present so just shut up about it. Yes, he’s an old man who f*cking loves keeping tabs on the comings and goings of children, but he seems harmless enough, so we’re going to let him into our house while we sleep. I’m sure you’ll be fine. Look, if you behave yourself all year you’ll get a wooden train.
I don’t know. Santa is kind of a weird character. There’s a lot of similarities between him and God and sometimes I feel like I’m the only one who was more than a little creeped out by the whole thing. But none of that is what I want to talk about today. What I really want to talk about is the very serious issue of which gifts should be from you, and which gifts should be from Santa.
My two cents are as follows:
If your child receives gifts from Santa, a real humanitarian thing to do is to limit the overall cost of those gifts. This isn’t a cry for frugality, it’s a cry for compassion. If you want to give your child something expensive, please give it under your name, or my name, or Abraham Lincon’s name. Any name besides Santa will do.
The reason for this is simple: you’re protecting the hearts of the kids whose parents can’t afford to give their kid an expensive present from Santa.
Many families simply don’t have the money to spend a great deal on Christmas presents for their children.
Kids by nature are going to talk obnoxiously brag to each other about what they received.
When you give your kid a gift from Santa imagine the poor kid in class standing right next to him getting close to nothing. Your kid is going to talk about what he got. It’s part of being a kid.
If you’re a low-income kid the deck can already feel stacked against you.
It can be downright soul-crushing to return to school from Christmas and hear the rich kids brag about how Santa got them a Playstation 4, a new iMac, AND a new snowboard. Santa only gave you a pair of Fred Meyer socks. You’ve been nice all year. The rich kid is a dick.
You might be able to rationalize why the rich kid got better presents from his parents—after all, his parents make a great deal more money than your parents—but it’s much harder to rationalize why impartial Santa gave so much to the kid who already has everything.
I’m sure your kid is going to be really kind about the whole thing but the unintended consequence of showering your kids with gifts from Santa is leaving low-income kids out in the cold.
If you’re worried that your kid will feel left out by Santa just lie to them more. Tell them you talked with Santa and since you were already giving them a goddamn helicopter, or whatever, Santa decided to give them something more reasonable.
The last thing any of us want is to make a kid feel like they are somehow less important—even in Santa’s eyes—than the other kids in their class.
If you want to do more, here is a charity where you can adopt a low-income child or family for the Holidays.
Anyway. Those are my thoughts on Santa.
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.
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Here are a few more articles you might like since this one was so short.
The Spectrum of Belief and the Circle of Influence.
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