It depends on your view on Christianity. If you’re an authentic christian following the principles of Jesus, i would say lying is evil (except as a last measure to avoid injustice, such as lying to cops) and the Santa myth is bad for a few reasons:
- it’s focused on material goods as synonym for happiness: it doesn’t help people become happy, but it certainly helps the industry to keep destroying the environment and exploiting workers
- it erases questions of social justice: everyone is just supposed to be happy and share for a few days… but according to Jesus we should multiply bread for every one every single day instead of doing feel-good charity for special occasions
- the Christian god is supposedly a forgiving one who does not get involved in human affairs (contrary to the vengeful old testament god)… the myth of an all-powerful force that will judge Good and Evil from above does not help us to develop critical thinking and ethical reflection in our day-to-day lives and in our communities… We need freedom and justice here and now not just in the afterlife
Now, if you’re a catholic who swore allegiance to the biggest worldwide colonial enterprise and child-abuse network (Vatican) then i guess celebrating Santa exploiting Christmas elves and breaking into children’s home to spread capitalism is pretty much aligned with the rest of the doctrine ;-)
I’m curious about anarchist/socialist priests. Do they celebrate christmas? if so, in what kind of setting? If some people have reading on the topic…
except as a last measure to avoid injustice, such as lying to cops
In case this actually comes up for anyone in the US, absolutely do not do this. They’ll just slap a charge on for lying to police. You can even get charged for that alone! Clam up and tell them you won’t talk to them without a lawyer present. But absolutely, positively, do not lie.
It varies greatly with the situation. Of course if there’s a way for you to get caught, never lie to police. But when you know for sure with 100% certainty there’s no proof against you, coming up with a credible lie is often a good strategy. In many circumstances, refusing to talk to the police is what’s gonna get you arrested and/or charged under any kind of pretense. At least it is so in France.
Practical example: when cracking a squat, you have to reside in a place for more than 48h without having broken in illegally (this includes stepping over a wall). The only legal excuse you can come up with is “the door was open and i found the key”: anything else would incriminate you. If you make sure there is literally no way for cops to verify whether that was true, many lawyers would recommend actually saying this even if every body (cops included) know it’s a lie. Two things to consider:
- the judicial system relies heavily on declarations you make to police: having a strong story/alibi helps a lot to evade legal trouble even when cops know you’re lying (and let you know they know)
- having a consistent storyline helps to not incriminate oneself: in a group, if you don’t have a consistent story to tell, there are greater chances that somebody will “break” and incriminate themself (or the entire group)
Of course this is not legal advice and it all depends on the circumstances.
Ah, this was with regards to US law, which has protections around self-incrimination baked into our Constitution. Specifically, the Fifth Amendment (“I plead the fifth”), which guarantees that people cannot be coerced into self-incrimination. By extension, lack of self-incrimination cannot be included as evidence, since that would essentially moot the right.
Yeah i know about the law and how it’s depicted in TV series, but in reality cops will definitely get false confessions out of you. See also this video on police interrogations which agrees with you we should shut the hell up in most situations. I don’t know much about US law, but at least around here in France cops will get your fingerprints and DNA by force and it’s a criminal offense to refuse it (before they do it by force) if (and only if) you’re condemned for something else… but refusing to give fingerprints/DNA is itself an excuse used by cops to keep you in detention when you have committed no crime, just like refusing to talk to them (unless you are a very fancy person in a suit) has great chances of taking you to pre-trial detention even if you committed no crime at all.
I’m not aware of Christianities’ rules on sins but I don’t think that matters. It’s literally lying to a vulnerable person who trusts you. Why would you do that?
Of course not! Why would it be?
What are you saying, Santa’s not real?
But seriously, children will find out eventually. It’s actually harder to make them believe than to not believe
It is a lie, so it is a sin
A religious person questioning teaching children to believe in fictitious characters? I feel you may be missing the big picture.
