The Big Fib: Should the holiday deception continue?

As we round the corner toward the Christmas holiday, I find myself revisiting an old conundrum presented by our seasonal symbols. I’m thinking specifically of the gift-giving bearded guy and the equally benevolent bunny. My children are grown now, but at one time, I seriously entertained the idea of not promoting those legends in my household. Ultimately, I decided that the awkward moments with peers might be more damaging than my personal lack of candor. I took the easy route. I rationalized that the big fib is a well-entrenched societal norm, and as I recall, my wife wasn’t too fond of my radical notions either.

It’s not that it wasn’t fun for me to play the role. I enjoyed hiding toys and staying up late to put them together, but I was always concerned about the precedent that it set. I remembered feeling betrayed when I figured things out for myself.

Back in the 1960s, in Wichita Falls, Texas, I noticed that some department store Santas wore horn-rimmed glasses and some didn’t. I recall asking my first-grade teacher about this disparity and was told that those were actually Santa’s helpers. Lousy answer. That’s when I started to do the math.

As it turns out, at precisely the same time that I was dissecting the past several years of being played for a sucker, I was also being saturated daily with detailed religious doctrine carefully delivered in perfect received English. I’m afraid that some of that skepticism borne from the holiday experience bled over to suspicions about supernatural events and the afterlife. To this day, I’m not the spiritual soul that I would like to be.

I have absolutely no motivation to dampen any holiday. Nor do I wish to tear down our cultural icons (though I suppose I’m doing a good job of it). In fact, there is plenty of evidence to suggest that we need our stories; our legends; our myths.

I am a fan of Joseph Campbell’s writings. I understand that he is considered a heretic by anyone who believes that their religion is the one, true religion. To those people, I can only offer my respect for their beliefs. What attracted me to Joseph Campbell was his ability to look at all religions, across all cultures, and illustrate the similarities. He would examine traditional religions, ancient tribal rituals, then reach into Greek and Roman mythology, and even astrology. The multitude of parallels are not accidental.

There is a universal set of questions, Campbell argued, that begged to be answered including the origin of the planet, the origins of us as people, life, death, adulthood, marriage, procreation, and a host of other universal mysteries. Why then wouldn’t we have gift-giving rituals, based in legends, however untrue or unprovable?

The problem, of course, is that it’s based on a fib. It’s a harmless fib; a white lie, but it’s perpetrated by our parents; the people we should be able to trust the most. If we recall our study of Erikson from High School Psych class, trauma experienced during a given developmental stage can result in a fixation on that particular stage. What effects do the holiday myths have on our ability to question? Our ability to believe? Are our critical thinking skills affected by emotion?

It seems to me that the big revelation would be a pivotal if not traumatic moment in many lives. The outcomes would understandably influence where we lie on the continuum between believer and skeptic. I am trying my best to write about something other than politics and viruses, but can you think of any better examples of the broad range of critical thinking? Pick your topic. Whether it’s the use of masks and an economic lockdown, or universal ballots and ballot harvesting, one way or another, we seem to be split between believers and non-believers; skeptics and followers.

I’m not drawing any hard conclusions about the big fib today, but I hope you won’t hate me for asking the question. Is this a good practice for us?

If it worked OK for us in the last century, is it right for the next?

Enjoy the run-up to the big holiday and try to shop local when you can. Ho Ho.