The 5 Most Brutal Lies You Tell Your Child
4.“You’re The Most Beautiful, Talented Girl in the Whole World.”
We’ve all seen this one play out on American Idol. It’s like gawking at a bad car wreck — heart-wrenching to see, but you just can’t look away.
Poor misguided souls wander onto the stage convinced they are the next gift to the world. Then it happens. They open their mouths and out falls the truth for all to hear. Their voices should have stayed in the shower.
When the judges administer a dose of reality — often without anesthesia — you can see the pain on the contestant’s face.
It’s a sad sight that makes me wonder, “Oh, honey, who lied to you?”
They set you up to fail. Unfortunately, these people did it on national television.
One of the most wonderful things about being a parent is the ability to first see and then bring out the best in our children. However, it’s not part of the job description to over-inflate your child’s ego. Case in point: I recently heard a father tell his daughter, “You are the prettiest girl in the whole world.”
Not too long after, her big brother echoed the same praise. This is a daily family ritual.
The lie wasn’t in her beauty. Her long, blonde hair hung in soft ringlets around big hazel eyes.
The lie came embedded in her daddy’s attempt to express his love for her. She is the apple of his eye. But that does not make her the most beautiful girl in the entire world.
When she steps outside of the family circle, she will not only find someone that outshines her, but also a big shot willing to point it out. By then she will have developed an over-inflated sense of self-importance.
A loving father, with one simple exaggeration, can set his little girl up for a failure she’s not prepared to handle.
Which, of course, can lead to her own lies of self-preservation…
Encouraging a belief in Santa can also lead to the child’s death.
Witness this story about a deadly fire that started because the children were concerned Santa would get hurt coming down the chimney
http://gothamist.com/2012/01/04/fatal_stamford_fire_embers_were_rem.php
“I’m amazed by the complaints of former children who still resent their parents’ attempts to create a magical Christmas. ”
Really? If you resent being told about Santa Claus, I suspect there’s something larger going on and you’re using Santa as a quick handle.
good for you for saying this……………I agree….. when I was little I believed in Santa Claus…. and for a fact, have never resented anyone telling me that…. My Christmases were wonderful ….
rbj: Isn’t that the point? If your parents will lie to you about something like Santa Claus — particularly if they try to keep up the lie when you start doubting and asking questions about it — then doesn’t that naturally lead a kid to ask, “What else are they lying to me about?”
We tell our kids about Santa Claus. We also tell them it’s a wonderful, make-believe story — and that some families try to let their kids enjoy the make-believe without telling them it’s make-believe until they’re older, so they should be careful what they say in public to avoid ruining the story for other families. At the same time, we tell our children that we’d prefer to tell them the truth all the time — in some cases telling them that we’d rather not answer a question or that we’re giving an incomplete answer if the topic has age-appropriate issues around it — rather than tell them a lie.
It’s ridiculous to say, as some are in the comments, that if you agree with this author about Santa Claus then you’d never read any fiction to your children. Our kids love fiction! But we make sure they understand it *IS* fiction — that Santa Claus won’t come down our chimney, that Lord Voldemort isn’t going to cast a spell on them, and that hobbits don’t really exist. But we can still play with all those stories in our imagination, and enjoy them all the more for knowing they are make-believe.
Santa is on the list? Really?
Once my child figures out the whole Santa thing, I won’t continue to insist he’s real…but I agree with rbj: any adult who feels damaged by Santa Claus has other issues that go way beyond “lies” about mythological elves living at the North Pole.
Santa doesn’t belong on your list of lies. There’s a huge difference between initiating your children into your culture, which includes telling them the traditional or mythical tales told to children, and telling them a falsehood.
Telling children about Santa or the Tooth Fairy opens up to children the unseen world that surrounds us–much of culture is not visible in our material goods. Your classifying mythic entities with material ones denies the difference between the non-material and the material worlds.
Learning that Santa and the Tooth Fairy are not real is important too because it helps children have a personal realization that helps them understand that there is a stage of life called “childhood” and also later stages, such as “adulthood.” The stage called “childhood” is a relatively recent invention in human society–from about the 1700s or so when children began to acquire special rights that they had not had in earlier times.
It is amazing that people follow the parents’ practice of teaching the same lies about the Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, Santa Claus, and religion. Some kids can think earlier, better, and achieve wisdom, self reliance, and knowledge while others do not. As long as children are taught lies by their parents, they will not advance to their full potential.
Television programs hype up “dishonesty” for artificial conflict. A common scenario occurs when NOT telling somebody EVERYTHING is thrown back as “a lie”. Earth to Victim: I don’t tell you everything. That doesn’t make me a liar; it makes me someone who doesn’t tell you everything. Full stop. Get over it.
And then there are omissions because a promise to keep a secret is kept, either for personal secrets or National Security secrets. Wannabe victim should take heart that their partner can and does keep legitimate secrets. Including yours as necessary. Maybe you should celebrate his/her integrity.
The title had me expecting great things, and then we open with Santa Claus?
You might, maybe, want to consider replacing Santa with the more harmful lies. The follow your dream, you can be anything you want to be kind. The ones your high school guidance counselor is going to tell you. There are a whole lot of young people out there who listened to that well-intentioned advice. Many of them have student loan debt up to their eyeballs, and little chance of living their dream.
I was a young cynic, but I knew early that I wasn’t going to be the next Mickey Mantle.
“It’s hard enough knowing you’re adopted, that someone who was supposed to love you instead chose to give you away”
As the father of two children through adoption, I’m very sad that you as someone who was adopted continues to feel this way. I tell my children that their birth mothers must have loved them very much to give them to a loving, stable, two-parent home, instead of attempting to raise them by themselves as single mothers. IMHO, that’s selfishness and impracticality, not love. True love is doing what’s right for the child.
Unfortunately, I had those same feelings as a child. Yeah, I knew my adopted parents loved me and I had a good home. But it’s just hard to process at a young age that there are perfectly legitimate reasons to place a child for adoption. All I could understand at 5 was my real mommy didn’t want me. Fortunately, when I was older I was able to meet my birth mother and I not only understand I know she did the right thing. I definitely turned out better than my siblings that weren’t adopted. Still hurt though to know I was the only one.
I can’t even imagine how betrayed I would have felt if my parents had lied about the adoption. Makes it seem like there’s something to be ashamed of.
Thank you, Mr. Grin, for your response about adoption. I, too, am an adoptive mother and I told my daughter, from the first time she could understand, that her bio mom had a tough time giving her up; but we chose her. She, at age 29, considers me her Mom.
I thought this article a crock of Bandini, and not worth my time wasting to read it.
Santa?….I’ve never met anyone in my life who was traumatized by figuring out the truth about Santa.
If I have kids, this is what I plan to tell them about Santa: Santa Claus is a name that people use when they give gifts and don’t want to say who gave it.
I told one of my nieces (after she learned the truth) that “Santa Claus” is really just another name for that feeling you get when you do something nice for someone just for the sake of being nice.
So, yeah, I believe in Santa Claus.
Son, is that you?
We did the Santa thing with our kids, and then as they got old enough to question, I explained that Santa was based on a real person who lived long ago (St. Nicholas). According to legend, he gave gifts anonymously. When someone gives you a gift from “Santa” or “St. Nicholas,” they want you to enjoy the gift without feeling obligated to give them a gift in return.
I can’t see that it traumatized them — but then, my parents did the same thing to me, so maybe I’m in denial about how much suffering it causes.
Any child born and given up for adoption since Roe v. Wade has no business feeling rejected. She should be enormously grateful for being alive at all. And the child was doubtless placed because the birth mother knew she couldn’t care for the child and provide a decent stable upbringing. This was the kindest, most loving thing your birth mother could have done, especially since you could have been done away with entirely and never seen the light of day. I sincerely hope your parents pointed this out to you.
I have a 6 year old daughter, and I have actively tried to teach her that Santa Claus is a fun story that firmly belongs in the realm of other fun fantasy stories. Not real, but fun to imagine.
To my surprise, it didn’t work. In spite of my efforts to give her a firm foundation in reality, she still believes in Santa Claus. And the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy. I once asked her why, and she essentially said, “Why not?”
Well, heck, who am I to deny my child a childhood fantasy? My mom loves to tell the story of how I asked her if the Easter Bunny was real. She answered simply and honestly, No. My response was, “Well then how come I heard him hopping away last night?” I wanted to believe, even when my mom told me it wasn’t real.
My daughter apparently takes after me. So I will play along with her until she finally decides to give credit where credit is due. Then, not only will she thank me for gifts she finds, whether under the pillow in place of a tooth, or under the Christmas tree… but perhaps she will also thank me for playing along with her even when I thought I knew better.
Why is #2 illustrated with a picture of a British convict?
Just wondering…
santa? Wait until they discover the true a bout god
I personally can’t wait until you learn the truth about grammar, and how the lack of it when you are attempting to ridicule someone else’s viewpoint doesn’t exactly make you look like a genius, Einstein.
Anyone who can only think of one way to spell a word obviously lacks imagination.
Uh, excuse me, but the difference between “the true,” and “the truth,” is NOT a spelling difference. It is an error in grammar.
“…someone who was supposed to love you instead chose to give you away.”
That is a repulsive description of adoption. Just repulsive.
Love and possession are not the same thing. Chances are the woman made the painful sacrifice of giving up her baby BECAUSE she loved it so much.
And maybe some women keep the baby because they are too damned selfish, because they don’t love the baby enough to do what is in its bests interests.
I agree with others who have stated Santa does not belong on this list. My children, 26 and 29 still ‘believe’ in Santa. Why? Because he won’t come if they don’t. Family joke. All children have room for fantasy in various forms, in fact even adults engage in fantasy. The beauty of being a child is that the line between fantasy and reality can blur, just for a wink in time. Don’t we look back with wonder and even some yearning for that simple time? Of course we do. And to my Daddy I WAS the most beautiful girl in the world. He had a right to his opinion, the problem you describe is when children aren’t taught to distinguish between OPINION and FACT. Happens all the time in newsrooms all across America…
Other than that.. those three are lies you shouldn’t say. I’d add, don’t tell your kids that it’s somebody else’s fault (like their teachers) when they get a bad grade. Helping kids avoid responsibility through the lie of victimization is how and Obama and party of Obamas is made. That’s a way bigger problem than building their confidence by exaggerated praise.
Mr. Obama is a good man who loves America. You have no reason to fear him – John McCain.
The darkest take on the Santa-izing is that it is an adult power trip: I am the parent, you are the child, and I can make you believe what I choose to. That said, I find it hard to believe that the Santa thing truly traumatizes kid, unless as the article states it is an EXTENDED, even forced fantasy. However, I never could tell my kids that there was a Santa, once they started asking. I did not say that there wasn’t, but because I would not give the flat out, “yes,” they figured it out immediately.
In my extended family I have noticed that is the adults who love pushing the Santa story to their kids. It seems to represent some childhood golden age.
In my youth, Christmas was more about Jesus than about Santa, which takes the mythologizing issue to an even higher level, but in that case, it was not as if my parents were pushing something on me which they knew to be untrue.
Jesus is not a myth; please note I did not say ‘was not a myth’. Jesus is alive today; He is risen from the dead, and He is the best gift given by the greatest Giver of them all – God! I am sorry that you seem to have lost your faith.
When I got a bit older and started questioning the existence of Santa Claus, my mother told me that Santa stops coming when you stop believing in him…so I decided it was in my best interest to keep believing.
I’m glad I’m past all that. I raised three by myself with some Santa and no god. Their mother made it fairly clear that she didn’t care as much about them as herself. I guess they should hate my guts, but for some reason they don’t. They don’t hate their mother either.
I even told them their was a tooth fairy and an Easter bunny.
We celebrated Christmas every year. At some point, we all discovered that Santa was just mom and dad filling stockings. We basically learned that it was good to secretly give gifts to people you love without expecting any recognition in return.
Evil, huh?
As far as the role of Christ in Christmas, it is more and more reduced each year. First, it was due to the endless politics of my preachers. Then the endless crap about gay people being punished by god and how they are an abomination. Another preacher freaking out that we had invitro-fertilization after not being able to get pregnant. (later busted for stealing 20k from church savings) Then I’ve got my crazy cousin constantly picking out random passages from the bible for her political quest of the day, and trying to get my kids to memorize it so they can question me about it.
I don’t know what happened, but the Santa message sometimes seems more rational than actual meaning!
Sorry. Baffled by this sufficiently long article.
How do I get a PJM by-line where I can spout my many semi-interesting opinions on what everybody else should and shouldn’t do?
Truth is beauty; beauty, truth.
http://www.jochnowitz.net/Essays/NoVirgina.html
I think life is a bitch. And then you die. These are cold, hard facts. And the longer we can keep our children innocent and protected from that harsh reality, the better. So yeah, I did tell my kids there was a Santa. And it gave me great joy to see the excitement in their eyes – it was the best part of getting ready for Christmas. And they are telling my grandkids the same thing, now that they’re grown and have their own families. And no one is traumatized or any worse for wear once they did find out the truth.
I also think that every little girl is a princess. What’s the harm in letting them think that. Life will intrude soon enough with it’s ugly realities once the teenage years hit. And certainly not every little girl will grow up to be the Prom Queen, but part of the hurt when they realize that they aren’t will be alleviated by knowing that, in their father’s eyes – they will always be the Prom Queen.
After my dad passed away, my niece told me about not having been asked to her senior prom, and how she felt fat, ugly, unpopular, and alone. Well, her grandpop didn’t see her that way at all, and not only told her so, but came up with the idea of being her escort to the prom. Dad would have been in his 70′s then. They both had a blast, and made a beautiful forever memory. She’s married with her own kids now, with a husband who was never a prom king or football star, but who sees the beauty in her that my dad saw. My opinion? A dad who doesn’t tell his girls they are the most beautiful women in the world is a bumbling boob.
My kids are 25 and 27 and both still believe in Santa. They are both very happy. And I mean the real Santa Claus, not Santa Obama the imposter.
Somehow, Santa remains a social taboo… a form of political correctness intended to ridicule anyone not playing along.
Great training for being a journalist.
What AlQ is to America because of 9/11, Obama and Holder are to Mexico because of their Gun Running Merchant Of Death To Mexicans program. Does Mexico have any Team 6′s? Just curious, that’s all.
Santa Claus? Really? I and everyone I know believed in Santa Claus when we were kids (I left cookies and milk out for him every year and every Christmas morning to my delight I found the cookies gone and the glass empty) and none of us seems traumatized by having learned that he (and the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy) weren’t real. Nor are we angry and resentful that our parents perpetuated these childhood fantasies and all of us who are parents and grandparents perpetuate them still. This is just silly. Think I’ll skip the other four “brutal” lies.
Wait, my dad told me that Santa actually likes beer and cookies, not milk, so that’s what we left out for him every year.
Oh, and the older kids love “being the magic” when they’re old enough to stay up and help wrap presents for the younger ones. One aspect of “the Santa lie is bad” is true though; when an authority figure insists that something is true even though the “subject” has figured things out, the authority person just looks like an idiot and loses credibility: So if you insist that Santa Is Real (without winking) even though they’ve figured it out, then yes, they’ll start to think you don’t know what you’re talking about-no need to hurry that stage along..
I don’r onsider some of the lies she lists innocent lies but, if she was upset about Santa Claus, I think she is emotionally crippled.
I agree with others that it’s a joke that Santa is on the list. And I wasn’t really told this fantasy to start with, since I’m Jewish of course.
Oh yes all those traumatized drug addicts, alcoholics, neurotics and psychotics – as therapists throughout the Western World attest to – they were lied about Santa, that’s where their problems all started!
Fantasy and magical thinking are integral to childhood. Without a sense of magic and whimsy, no matter how a child is taken care of, the child is denied an intrinsic and important element to his childhood, his childhood is impoverished thereby.
Why wasn’t the lie of the Easter Bunny or the tooth fairy on the list? Yeah man I remember the trauma I went through when I discovered that my parents had left coins under the pillow, and not a fairy. Damaged for life. Uh not.
The real damage done in childhood is indoctrination into destructive and ruinous worldviews, something the schools and the wider society are integral in shaping, by either reinforcing it or turning a blind eye to it.
It’s articles like these that are indicative of the worst of PJMedia. I remember some article on the ten or twenty greatest quotes of all time, and there were like two or three Anthony Robbins quotes on the list, and it was on the level too. And the less said about PJMedia film reviews the better. Give us an astrology column instead PJMedia, it won’t lower your standing nearly as much.
So telling a kid that santa exists is bad and telling them all about god and the fires of hell is perfectly reasonable? Heh. Whatever. Both are pure fantasy. Santa at least is a benign one… junior isn’t being threatened with the fires of hell if he doesn’t like his present.
Sometimes, not all that often, people reveal themselves early and clearly.
The warped and evil lies surrounding that offensive brute Santa Claus?
Stopped reading right there. Life is too short.
But he doesn’t love us anymore. If he did he would be sitting at the head of the dinner table instead of in another house eating dinner with his new 25 year old girlfriend. Men who love their children do not leave.
Baby Boomers are the most selfish generation, they had the best childhoods, the last innocent times and they screwed it all up for every generation after them. They glorified drugs, they divorced and destroyed families over the stupidest things, they spent all the money, and they will waste all their inheritance from their thrifty greatest generation parents. I won’t lie to my kids: their grandparent’s generation ruined America.
Many boomers are fighting to bring on the death panels yet are too self absorbed to realize it, how apropos.
so according to you, we’re ALL GUILTY of not providing enough to your needs. Whatever they may be!
So, who’s selfish here?
It should be obvious, shouldn’t it, about why you would tell your kids the Santa Claus story, and how it came about with no one worrying about lasting damage–and why there won’t be any if this is the purpose (though the amount of presents given should perhaps be somewhat moderate).
It’s allegory.
The birth mother of my child is a wonderful person who chose to go through pregnancy and birth in order to give her unborn child a life, and us a family. Abortion is an easy decision. Giving a child up for adoption is a difficult one. I am eternally grateful to her and I hope my daughter will be too.
I know there’s no such thing as Santa; The Easter Bunny told me.
I can’t even remember when it was that I stopped believing in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy. If just kinda went away – and I certainly never spoiled it for my baby brother who still believed.
Far more damaging to me was the betrayal and rage I felt when I discovered that everything my liberal teachers taught me was a bit fat lie.
And one more thing, there are four distinct stages in life:
1)You believe in Santa Claus
2)You stop believing in Santa Claus
3)You are Santa Claus
4)You look like Santa Claus
Who says there’s no Santa? Scrooge, that’s who.
Scrooge is fiction too actually. You are are making up both good guys and bad guys to fight for your own purposes.
I think the CIA wants to hire you.
Lord, but the current generation is a bunch of delicately bruised flowers, and over-sensitive, perpetually injured victims! “My parents told me about Santa, boo-hooo, boo-hoooo!”
Pajamas Media used to be a serious website.
Seriously, anybody who follows this woman’s advice has rocks in their head!
(“Daddy still loves us, honey, even though he’s in Acapulco right now, with his new “friend” Trixie! He’s just too busy to visit. Or send us money. Or remember your birthday. But Daddy really, REALLY loves you!” Like a kid’s not going to see through this?)
(And, just cuz I want you to know Daddy loves, and so you won’t have any negative feelings about him, I’m going to let you visit him—even though his new “friend”, Skanky, is a violent junkie, with a history of child abuse! We wouldn’t want you thinking bad things about Daddy, after all, so you must go see him and Skanky, even though they terrify you!)
I mean, WTF?
Santa? What’s next? Parents shouldn’t tell their kids about God? Both stories are myths and unprovable.
Neither God nor Santa can be proved. But it can be shown beyond the shadow of a doubt that Santa does not enter every home on earth on Christmas Eve through the chimney.
we’re betting that you watch every Twilight Episode.
I believed in Santa Claus when I was a child, I was never angry at my parents when I found out none of those childhood figures weren’t real. However I was pissed when they promised that if I didn’t like the private school they sent me to that I could go back to public school with my friends and then went back on that promise.
Its this simple, never make a promise you know you can’t (or don’t intend) to keep, it works well with both children and adults.
It seems to me that a kid is far more likely to be messed up by being told “Daddy still loves you, dear”, when Daddy obviously doesn’t, than he/she is by tales about Santa, or the Easter Bunny.
In fact, if you were to follow this pundit’s “Logic”, you could never read fairy tales to kids, or “Wizard of Oz”, or “Chronicles of Narnia” or “Harry Potter”, because these are about places, and characters, who don’t exist—and, hence, are “lies” will traumatize the little kiddies, when they discover they aren’t true. Read “Cinderella” to your kid, you’re cruelly brutalizing him!
The same “Former children” (isn’t the correct term ADULTS?) who are fuming about their parents trying to give them a magical Christmas (how brutal of them!) are the same people who’d be complaining that their parents didn’t care about them, if they hadn’t done much about Christmas.
In our victim-centric society, some people will tell their shrinks anything, to make themselves look abused.
And be sure to constantly point out your kid’s faults! Tell him, or her, that they’re unattractive; they aren’t as pretty as their Cousin Mimi, they can’t play football as well as their older brother Bungie; if they make mistakes (and they will), harp on these mistakes constantly. Discourage them from ever competing at anything, because they’re just not good enough. Always let them know your love is conditional on them being high achievers, and on what they accomplish—not on who they are. This will keep them from getting a swelled head, and save them from the sin of pride—though it’ll give them a lot of other problems! Seriously, I’ve seen more kids messed up by parents who gave their kids the impression they were worthless than I have kids ruined by parents who loved them too much, and told them they were the apple of their eye.
(And, c’mon—most of us “Former kids” are able to figure out that our parents are biased when it comes to us; we learn to take their enthusiasm for us with a grain of salt, and we figure out our own strengths and weaknesses.)
Talk about your cognitive dissonance—on one hand, you’re not supposed to tell kids during a divorce that “Daddy doesn’t love us anymore”, because it might make kiddies think badly of Daddy—but you’re supposed to tell them Daddy’s in jail? Isn’t that going to make them think badly of Daddy? I mean, how do you put a good spin on this? “Daddy still loves us, dear—he just has this bad habit of shooting people, is all.” I mean, yes—it’s good to tell kids the truth about this, but how does the author reconcile this with her position that kids must think well of Dad, no matter what?
(By the way, if Daddy has a bad habit of winding up in prison, shouldn’t Mommy be considering a separation, or divorce? Or would that be bad, because it might make the kids think badly of Daddy?)
Taanstafl, #41, not to joke;
I’m sure telling kids about God will soon be considered a “Brutal lie” that parents should never tell their kids—because Baby Jesus makes Dan Savage weep. Or something.
Sorry, to take so long to get back to you Betty. I think we can all agree that a belief in Santa Claus is much safer than a belief in Dan Savage.
I read a story once in which the government had decided to protect its people against untruths in books. Only books saying true things would be allowed to exist.
The title of this story is “Fahrenheit 451″.
How about this lie:
“Yes, Virginia, there is a God?”
You start out with Santa Claus?
That made me not read whatever else you had to say.
Should we never read fairy tales to children or tell them fictional stories?
Ridiculous. You lost your credibility right there.
Fascinating how many people think it is alright to lie to their kids. Especially about Santa Claus.
And then they complain because their POTUS gets caught lying.
One of the worst is Jack who steals a mans livilihood and then kills the man when he tries to recover his property. Man happens to be a bit different and is from a different country so I guess that makes it alright.
Anytime anyone TELLS me what to think and how to think I get wary of what that person is saying. What is their agenda that they feel the need to tell me what to think or how to act. There are plenty of laws that give me plenty to think about on how I act plus all the customs and traditions of being raised in a country where we prize individual thinking but there is also the idea that someone KNOWS better than I do about what my child needs or doesn’t need. Are you Dr. Seuss? My opinion is that most of what you said might be OK but the way you tell it does not give me the choice, you just say this is best. For you maybe. I am sure it worked for you at least after the first few times when you made a mistake or two. Give the people (the people that read you newsletter at least) a chance to think for themselves. My impression is that what you touted as the whole idea of America? Or maybe I’m wrong as I am regularly (told to me by my wife who could do a much better job of writing this response than me).
“When she steps outside of the family circle, she will not only find someone that outshines her, but also a big shot willing to point it out. By then she will have developed an over-inflated sense of self-importance.”
Oh nickers. She will not. She’ll know that her father loves hers, which is what she values. She’s not stupid enough to take the remark at face value. Idiot.
MORALITY 101:
All crimes are forms of theft: offensive attacks that deny the attacker’s victim something they, not the attacker, are entitled to; basic robbery is theft of one’s stuff (and so is arson); kidnapping, assault, and rape are all thefts of one’s bodily autonomy, murder is theft of one’s life, and lying (fraud) is only the most basic form of theft – it’s the theft of the Truth.
And even all threats are psychological attacks (aka: coercion, duress, extortion, “terrorism”) and all non-defensive attacks are already classified as crimes.
After all, when you attack the Others first, then, by definition, you are the predatory criminal aggressor, and they are your innocent victims – there’s no two ways about it!
(Attacking second, in defense of one’s self and/or of innocent others, is always OK, and is in fact a mandatory requirement for having any sort of deterring justice in the world at all, ever! Without counter-attacks criminals have no reason to be deterred into ceasing theirs)!
Thus, we have developed a natural law, which rationally depends on these cause-and-effect facts, known as The Golden Rule of Law, which, by defining situational morality as “Do Not Attack First!” enables trust, progress, and Civilization. It is often abstracted as “THOU SHALT NOT KILL!”
It’s opposite might be called ‘the brazen rule of chaos,’ which defines immorality as “only we have the holy right to always attack all ‘The Others’ first, so there, nyah!” and so inflicts distrust, stagnation, and Barbarism. It has been abstracted as “THOU SHALT KILL!” (and is known today as “islam”)!
Even the ‘Ten’ Commandments are really only a bunch of listed symptoms, illustrating this simple binary; the first five are all cautions to “Fear and Obey!” while the second five are all admonishments not to steal! Thus, they, too, can be summed up as “Greed NOT; Be Fearful!” (or: don’t attack first)! – while islam embodies the exact opposite (“Fear NOT; Be Greedy”) – or: “Always attack first!”
And of course the victim-blaming rationale for evil is always that one was somehow only “defending” one’s self, by pre-emptively attacking the others first, by adding insult to injury with the slanderous implication that “well, they were going to attack me, anyway” and “so it’s for their own good for them to Submit to me attacking them, first)!
Keith in B.C.—you’re joking, yes?
(And now, kiddies, let’s all close our eyes, and listen to the bestest, truest fairy tale of all—about the wonderful President O, and how he deeply cares about us all, and wants only what is best for us! And if you dare complain about his lies, you’re just a mean ol’ meany-face, who thinks it’s okay to lie to kids!)
/Sarc. off.
PS: Even small children instinctively know the Golden Rule of Law as the:
“But, Mom! THEY STARTED IT!” Rule.
It was first coined by Confucius in the negative (as “Do NOT Do Unto Others…!”) and then allegedly by Jesus in the (false) positive, and since then it’s been used in the UN’s founding Charter (where it describes the #1 War-Crime as “to be the aggressor in war”). It’s the physician’s Hippocratic Oath (“First, Do No Harm!”) and is even used by social engineers as the “Precautionary Principle.”
It’s opposite creed, which I’ve termed the ‘Brazen Rule of Chaos’ has been attributed by John Milton in Paradise Lost, to Satan, as: “Who Dares, Wins!”
Backwards criminals always conflate their own “might-makes-right” jungle-law creed with the Old Testament’s “An Eye for An Eye” doctrine of proportional deterrence and justice, when in fact they are exact opposites! They also pretend the (after-the-fact) “ends justify the means!” when, in fact, the means only ever really define the end results:
After all, when you decide to lie, kill, and otherwise steal to get ahead, in the end, you’re not really a “great success,” you’re still really only a lying, murdering thief!
When Jesus said “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,” he was rewording this verse from Leviticus;
Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.
The sage Hillel said, “That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn.”
Hah! That’s funny. Yeah, look up truth. Look up the sad truth behind the mention of the year 1389 in recent history. The short version is, it was the rallying cry used by Slobodan Milosevic in his 1989 Gazimestan speech to avenge and undo the effects of the Battle of Kosovo 600 years before by ethnically cleansing Muslims. 1389AD is no uncertain code: it means Muslim hatred. Islam is a sad religion but concentration camps? No thanks.
(American Idol)It’s a sad sight that makes me wonder, “Oh, honey, who lied to you?”
THE PEOPLE RUNNING THE SHOW, YOU DOPE.
This has been known for YEARS. DO THE RESEARCH. They run these “talent” contests all the same way: the initial reviewers deliberately let through a set number of bad performers for the judges on the show to razz. They tell them “you’re great, you’re wonderful, you’re moving to the next level!” They do this through three or four screenings— then throw them onstage for the snarky man-bitch behind the buzzer to tear them apart so the couch potatoes back home can squeal with glee.
I am an adopted son.
When I had the crisis of identity, my father offered to support me financially for a year while a searched for my ‘birth’ parents. He gave me 24 hours to take his offer.
When 24 hours had passed, he said, “Well?”
I said, “I know who my father is.”
He spoke not a word but spent the rest of the evening watching TV, his arm around my shoulders, his other hand wiping the tears from his eyes.
Why do we tell our children little lies — Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny? Methinks I shall read again Terry Pratchett, The Hogfather, to remind myself of the reason. Methinks Ms Robinson should read that book, too.
Santa Claus vs. the Tooth Fairy. Really? I can see no perceived difference between the two: One is to motivate children to be good, the other to motivate children to practice good dental hygiene.
The underlying difference in all these areas the author is presenting has everything to do with the strength of the relationships AND TRUST between the parents first, and then the children second! Security is a child’s greatest need, and the only way to see that demonstrated is a loving and trusting relationship between the parents who also demonstrate that love to their children.
The other part has to do with the empty promises many parents give their kids. Daddy, or Mommy, has to work but I PROMISE we’ll __________ (go to the park, go to Disneyland, watch Elmo together, etc.), and then go on their happy way as though the child has been placated and the parents repeat this pattern constantly. If your children aren’t the most important thing in the world to you, believe me they’ll know it! And when that happens a lifetime of disasters and heart break will occur.
Oh my! If people were to tell the truth about Santa and the Easter Bunny think of all the jobs lost! Consumers would go nuts and businesses would suffer.
I don’t know if this expresses an opinion or not, but here is my Santa story and I’ll leave it to you to form an opinion about it. I was the middle child of 5 children and my father was a truck driver. We were not wealthy. There was absolutely no way that I could ever hope to get a Chatty Cathy, the most amazing doll ever created, the most amazing Christmas gift I ever received. That Christmas morning I would know beyond a doubt that there was really a Santa Claus because there was no way my father could have afforded a Chatty Cathy. Santa had given me an insight into two of the most important spritual TRUTHs I would ever need to know. Grace is a gift that can never been earned, a measure given beyond what is deserved. It was impossible for me to have ever earned a Chatty Cathy. The second truth was not revealed until a couple of years later when my older sister, lecturing me to grow up and stop being such a stupid baby, told me that there was no Santa and Daddy had bought my stupid doll! I cried so hard! At first because I had been lied to and then even harder when I realized that my father had sacrificed in order to buy the doll for me, even though Santa got all the praise. Daddy had sacrificed only because he wanted my happiness. He knew my heart’s desire and the gift was given with out any means or strings to take it back with and without being earned. Unconditional love and Grace are real.
As a matter of fact, there was a St. Nicholas, and his spirit lives on to this day. Except, of course, in those individuals who prefer to think of the Christmas Spirit as a lie, and those who want to hold grudges against people who tell this “lie”. I’m surprised you used New York Sun editorial in the article, since it’s very obvious you missed the point of it entirely.
I was not scarred by the realization that Santa Claus did not exist. At least, the idea he did not exist as described to me. I did not know about Saint Nilolai.
Tho’ the realization that I had effectively screwed myself out af an additional Christnmas gift when I declared to my lower income parents that I did indeed know who Santa actually was, did have a sort of “D’oh” feeing attached to it.
However, I have never, either, been able to understand the value of lying to ones child about the existence of Santa.
I even had the experience of being totally verbally and personally assaulted by the other commenters of a certain blog, which I will not name (I own the World)for suggesting that the second grade teacher, who told her students that Santa Claus did not exist, was not the responsible party for the childrens’ confusion and despair and that the responsibiilty for that rested squarely on the shoulders of the parents who lied to the children in the first place.
The true story of St. Nicholas is filled with value. Santa Claus? Not so much.