GONE!

GONE GONE GONE

I'm Atheist and I'll be celebrating all of those holidays with them. For me, it's not so much about religion and lying to them... it's broadening their imagination. I wasn't heartbroken and enraged when I found out they weren't real. It was fun while it lasted, yanno?

Yes i do and want them to believe in those things i feel like it's a key part of childhood.

<blockquote><b>Quoting *KatteyBug*:</b>" Do you, or will you, allow your children to believe in Santa, the Easter bunny, Tooth Fairy etc.? My ... [snip!] ... opinion on this? Is it "bad" to let your child believe in something that isn't real? Or do you feel that it's okay and why?"</blockquote>




Eh, they believe what they want. If they ask, I tell them the truth...same with religion..

Growing up I celebrated Jewish and Christian holidays. I knew the true scripture stories behind everything. However my parents were big on Santa, the Easter bunny, and the tooth fairy. I guess my opinion is if you are religious and want them to know the biblical story or whatever that's awesome but you can still let them have Santa and what not. I guess I just don't see the harm.

Watching... In a delimma over this for DD. Torn right now and everyone and their mom is telling us their opinions, but I just don't know which way to go.

no, I don't see it as bad. I don't understand why people want to take the fun out of childhood...they're only young for so long. My son is being brought up with Santa Claus even though we're atheist because it's fun and he can say when he's older "one christmas Santa brought me this or that" or "the tooth fairy used to give me x amount of money for my teeth when I was a kid!"..it's just fun little things I think they'll enjoy when they're young and even when they're older.

We kinda just go with the flow. We talk about Santa, the Easter bunny and Jesus. We have an advent calender book that we read to our oldest for Christmas (since our youngest could care less being only 1 lol). We just have fun with all of it. I think our oldest (almost 5) knows we get him his presents but he still goes along with all of it and has fun.

I didn't push anything on my oldest. Just waited til she was old enough and I let her tell me what she thinks..yea she goes to see Santa at Christmas..but she's very skeptical about him..and she jokes about how the tooth fairy gets money from my purse. It's just fun to see her own imagination. I know she doesn't really believe in them but just likes the idea of them

I personally think you should LET them believe in whatever they want to believe in. My dad tries to keep my son from believing in Santa, but Daniel argues with him about it. (I mean, literally, my son will look at him and tell him "No! Santa IS REAL!!" and it's not because anyone tells him he's real) He doesn't really know anything about the Easter Bunny or anything else, but he just KNOWS Santa is real.

my son is 4 and believes in everything.. and can continue to til he figures it out on his own what isnt actually real

I do think it's bad. It's lying. I understand it's a small/harmless lie, but if I want to teach DS that dishonesty is not alright, I have no business lying to him about made up things like Santa Claus.

Quoting kr.r:" I do think it's bad. It's lying. I understand it's a small/harmless lie, but if I want to teach DS that ... [snip!] ... if I want to teach DS that dishonesty is not alright, I have no business lying to him about made up things like Santa Claus."

do you really think when he grows up he would be like well mom you lied to me about santa, so that must mean lying is okay so im going to be dishonest now. its not like when i was younger when i found out the tooth fairy wasnt real, and connected everything else to that i rebelled against my parents and started thinking lying was okay

I love holiday traditions like Santa and the Easter Bunny. I love the excitement in kids eyes when they talk about stuff like that. So yes, my kids will believe in all of the ''fictional'' characters until they figure out otherwise.

I want my kids to believe in Santa, the Easter bunny and tooth fairy but my 4 year old is already skeptical... When he realizes they aren't real I just hope I can convince him to let the younger two believe in them for a while. It's fun leaving cookies and milk, seeing bunny prints in the yard and getting money from a tiny person that likes teeth lol.