ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, December 19, 1996 TAG: 9612190015
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DAN CASEY STAFF WRITER
Do you fess up? Or bluff? Sometimes, truth isn't the easiest defense when parents are faced with this annual conundrum
Standing in line at Santa Claus' regal Styrofoam outpost at Valley View Mall, Darlene Kennedy of Roanoke made a vow.
Under no circumstances, the mother of two said, would she ever tell her son, James, 5, or her daughter, Rachel, 3, where their Christmas presents really come from.
Even when they're older, "I'm not going to do that," Kennedy said. "I just think that's part of the fun. There's a lot of excitement - that mystical belief."
Ditto for Frances Hostetter of Glasgow, who watched as her 19-month-old great grandson, Richie Tomlin Jr., tugged on Santa's beard.
And for Dan Whitmore of Wythe County, who videotaped his two young daughters baring their Christmas desires to the jolly old guy.
All three said they're going to let their kids or grandkids figure it out for themselves - learn it at school perhaps, or from siblings or playmates in the neighborhood.
They may not have realized it, but Kennedy, Hostetter and Whitmore had stepped squarely into a seasonal conundrum that most parents are confronted with sooner or later.
It happens like this: Your 7-or 8-or 9-year-old comes home from school, announces a classmate has labeled Santa Claus a complete crock, and hits you with the question:
"Mom [or Dad], is Santa real, or fake?"
Ahem.
What do you say?
Do you 'fess up and admit you've been fibbing to him for all these years? That Santa is a flabby, ridiculously dressed trick you've been playing on him since birth? (You're next, Easter Bunny).
Or do you bluff him, straight-faced, warning that his playmate is naughty instead of nice? And that when Santa Claus comes to town, that little myth-slayer can expect a big lump of coal in his stocking?
These are questions that have raised more than a few holiday hackles across the nation. They date back at least to 1897, when 8-year-old Virginia O'Hanlon wrote a now-famous letter to the New York Sun that concluded: "Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?"
Last year, a fundamentalist minister in Fort Worth ignited a Texas-size furor by putting up a huge sign in front of his church that said: "Why not tell your children the truth? There is no Santa Claus. Jesus is the reason for the season."
This year, "to tell, or not to tell," is the subject of an article in December's Homelife, a magazine for Baptist Sunday school teachers.
Not to be outdone, secular therapists have weighed in. One Los Angeles-based child psychologist recently argued for telling the truth to children older than 7. Parental reluctance to gently break the news, Robert Butterworth warned, puts children at risk of being ostracized by their nonbelieving peers. And if they discover it from friends, children may feel betrayed by their parents, he added.
Of course, the pollsters have got involved, too. A survey of parents conducted last year by Maritz AmeriPoll found that roughly 73 percent of children already know the truth by the time they reach their eighth Christmas.
And if the Santa believers are cyber-savvy, they may soon independently discover the answer in a widely circulated Internet spoof "proof."
The author of the spoof figures the weight of the toys (353,430 tons), the necessary speed to deliver gifts at 91 million homes in a single night (650 miles per second) and decides that Santa and his reindeer would have to travel at roughly the velocity of a comet. In this case, Santa, his sleigh, Rudolph and the other reindeer would turn to jolly cinders the instant they entered Earth's atmosphere.
The author concludes: "If Santa Claus ever DID deliver presents on Christmas Eve he's dead now."
Which brings us back to the question at hand. What do you do when your kid pops the question?
First off, the parents and grandparents in The Roanoke Times' informal and completely unscientific survey think that child psychologist Butterworth probably ought to worry about more pressing things, like that God-awful TV show "Baywatch," which is filmed in his home state.
"I've never seen any of my kids or grandkids upset [at learning the truth about Santa on their own]," said Sissy Tomlin, a veteran child-rearer and little Richie Tomlin's grandmother. "We were more upset than they were."
"It's all a fantasy-type deal," Whitmore added. "It's good for kids. It gives them something to believe in. It's really neat to watch their faces light up."
"There are a lot of things in this world that aren't tangible or real," Kennedy said. Anyway, "I think it's a lot of fun for the parents, too. they can use [Santa] as a bribing tool."
Secondly, said Roanoke child psychologist Stephanie Pratola, let's not forget that holidays are supposed to be fun. There are plenty of ways parents can handle the question without getting mucked up in moral dilemmas about a fat guy in a red velvet suit.
"There's lot of parenting things to worry about it, but I don't sweat that one a whole lot," said Pratola, a mother of two. (Her children, both former believers, are 12 and 14.)
The right answer, Pratola notes, probably varies from family to family. One family, for instance, may place a high value on absolute and literal truths (in which case, the children probably don't believe anyway), while in others "everyone pretends there's a Santa Claus until it's absolutely ridiculous."
"It's whatever fits in with the family and the kids. You can try telling a kid who wants to believe in Santa Claus that there isn't one, and they'll look for all the evidence that he exists. It's the monster under the bed thing: You can't talk some kids out of the fact that there's no Santa Claus."
For curious kids, Pratola advises approaching the answer playfully, in a way that mirrors the pretending children do every day. For the ones who ask the question directly, you tell them the truth, she adds.
Mark Hughes, the pastor of Eagle Rock Baptist Church in northern Botetourt County, agrees. This is Hughes first Christmas as a parent, and it's a question he's been doing a little bit of thinking about.
"You don't want to encourage lying to a child by lying outright to them," even about Santa Claus, he said.
On the other hand, Hughes has come up with a few ways to tell the truth, keep Santa Claus alive, and keep the emphasis of Christmas on Jesus Christ - all at the same time.
"A good response I've heard over the years is that Santa Claus is not a person, but a feeling," Hughes said. "Santa Claus is in your heart. He is the spirit of giving. If that spirit of giving is in your heart, then Santa Claus is still alive."
He advises that when children are old enough to understand, parents tell them: "The stuff that we give you is from us. But the spirit of Christmas is bigger than us, and comes from the heart of God."
In other words, you begin with the famous answer given to Virginia O'Hanlon that has resonated through Christmases in America for nearly a century:
"Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus."
But ....
LENGTH: Long : 130 lines ILLUSTRATION: GRAPHIC: Robert Lunsford. color.by CNB