--Should parents ever lie to their children? --Is it healthy to encourage unrealistic expectations (like the notion of a prince charming)? --When should we choose happiness over truth? --Does Santa Clause actually exist?
"Ho ho ho" or "Bah humbug?" It was up to the Roundtable to decide in a session where, perhaps unsurprisingly, a discussion on society's relationship to Kris Kringle and other tales evolved into debates regarding the relative values of truth and ideals, the role and power of myth in society, and the acceptability of certain "noble lies," among other things.
We began with a discussion of the stories told to children. Were tales of Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, fairy tales, and the like only little white lies told for the purpose of entertainment and enchantment? Were they just obvious mistruths, presented to those not yet old enough to know better or comprehend the world in its full complexity? (One would hope that ) all of us in the Roundtable agreed that gifts encountered in years past under Christmas trees or pillows were not in fact delivered by Santa, the Tooth Fairy, Hannukah Harry, or the Holiday Armadillo. Thus a belief in these figures' existence, and the elaborately-crafted stories around such, would be factually incorrect. But was the Kris Kringle question simply one of truth versus falsehood?
The roundtable thus could not help but to ponder for a while the nature of "truth," reality, and myth. Roundtablers considered viewing the stories of Santa Claus much like modern myths due to the elaborate stories surrounding the figure, the cultural and religious origins of the stories and traditions, and their deep and widespread presence in our culture. Along this vein, a roundtabler noted that the concept of myth versus truth perhaps was not simply one to be evaluated with logic alone; another noted that in many ways even adult American culture and society is still in many ways full of myth. In matters like the representation of national history and tradition, perhaps what is "true" could still remain somewhat ambiguous even in adult society; differing values could lead to differently-slanted stories of how things came to be. An example was the portrayal of great historical figures such from George Washington to Martin Luther King, Jr; over time perhaps the stories we have heard of their accomplishments and virtues have mythologized them in our consciousness, such that we could overlook certain less-convenient realities about them, such as alleged extramarital affairs of the latter.
This example shed some more light on the meaning of our Santa Claus storytelling. Perhaps even tales that we could easily identify as fantasy actually sought to convey another meaning beyond factual representation of events. After all, stories of Santa Claus in fact originated from Christian traditions and the underlying messages of rewards for good behavior and a benevolent judge of actions communicate clear moral values. While mythical stories that channel this spirit may be entirely fabricated, a roundtabler suggested that essence speaks to a sort of "human truth" comprised of morals, perhaps even a universal one along the lines of Carl Jung's considerations. More than serving as simply entertaining lies, certain childhood stories might serve as channels for the moral and cultural education of the young generation and reflect very much our own adult society's tendency to mythologize.
While telling childhood myths may have great power, the roundtable found it important to consider what was gained and lost through this practice. Should the possible instructive and cultural value of these stories be weighed against the aspect of distortion and deception that they entail? While childhood stories may seem to be an apt way to either teach lessons or explain complex ideas in an easily-digestible form, do parents really need to lie to their children in order to accomplish these goals? Would children be better off without these stories? The group agreed that an individual for whom credence in Claus remained unchallenged would certainly be ill-served. Yet for most of us our discovery of the "real world" seemed to inevitably occur in time as we (again, hopefully) matured. The group as a whole thus could not agree as to where to draw the line between the sacredness of Santa and any possible alternatives. Who knew Claus was so controversial?
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2 comments:
Can someone clarify for me the nature of "human truths?" What makes them different from regular truths?
Also, would it be fair to say that, at the end of the discussion, the consensus was that the good reasons for telling your kids the Santa Claus story are pragmatic (e.g. you're tired, you're afraid your kids will tell the truth to other kids, etc.).
John, the distinction I was aiming for between types of truth is simply that a myth can lack factual validity while nevertheless expressing moral and cultural values that are "honest" to a tradition of societal convictions. Santa Claus, if he doesn't exist, still serves as an allegory for our Western belief in compensatory justice. Thus by learning the story our children are not learning factual truth but rather ethical truth, which is necessarily relative to its cultural context.
I think that retelling myths like Santa Claus is an essential mechanism for preserving and propagating the wisdom of elders, which in turn reflects an historical aggregation of cultural experience. It's a way to bring tradition and heritage to life for our children, but it's also a way to disseminate those time-tested values which are most central to cultural identity.
The independent moral convictions of a single generation are often dangerous without the tempering of history and experience that myths can provide.
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