#*hellmo gif*

It’s time for me to get more anti-Semitic hatemail! With a topic very near and dear to my heart: The way so many Non-culturally-Christian (NCC herein) families and tiny little children have to bend themselves in order to carry the lie Culturally Christian families want to maintain about Santa. 

If you are here to tell me “We tell our kids that Santa is a part of MAGIC, and he’s about the SPIRIT of Christmas, and so he IS real for some people, and then we teach about NICE LIES” please rest assured that I do not care. I also do not care for you to tell me how non-religious your Christmas is, if you have Santa, you’re still doing Christian culture. Just, stop. Please, I’m begging you. 

If you do Santa, please listen to me, because this is written for you, in a lot of ways. 

I feel so sad this time of year because all my Jewish groups are full of parents strategizing about how to keep children that are around THREE TO FIVE from “ruining Christmas magic” for others, and how much have we bought into assimilation that we believe this is our JOB? That our very small children with whom I would not expect to keep something a secret between dinner and dessert are meant to carry the burden of this cultural albatross for a culture that already overwhelms their every day? 

My fellow NCC people: If you really want to participate in the Santa Lie, I’m not going to stop you. This is your choice, choose your life, choose your choices. A great many people I respect give their kids some song and dance about it being a “fun pretend game” that Christians play, and while I might quibble that a fun pretend game means both sides know it’s pretend, that’s your choice. 

But I also want you to ask yourselves: Why should we feel like we have to? Because we clearly do! If we didn’t feel like we had to, you wouldn’t be putting so much emotional energy into it, I wouldn’t be writing this knowing I was gonna get some more fun comments about being a kike, and our kids wouldn’t have to worry about telling the goddamn truth. I cannot be the only NCC person who feels this way, and I can’t even be the first one to SHARE these feelings, but I’m telling you, so you know: You do not need to pick this up for your children. 

Christmas runs, in the US, from late October to January. It’s the fucking fourth quarter. Those of you who are culturally Christian cannot possibly understand how aggravating and tiring this entire thing becomes, especially when you have kids and you have to deal with the fact that they are SATURATED with this feeling of otherness. When you get older, it’s easy to deal with, but when you’re tiny? It’s hard enough when supposedly non-religious schools are doing doves and trees and santa crafts, singing “holiday songs” (Christmas carols) and the like. I can’t pull my kids out of school for 6 weeks. 

And then we add them being villainized for telling the truth about Santa. Even though I tell my child the rest of the year that the truth is important. You cannot want diversity among your friends, and for your child to experience diverse friendships, and then hold that you deserve to live in a bubble every final quarter where your kids runs no risk of finding people who believe differently. Culturally Christian parents should not be holding NCC kids accountable for breaking the Santa myth. They’re literal children. It is not their job to construct this for you. 

But Doc, how would you feel if someone told your kids the Tooth Fairy isn’t real, or God? 1) We don’t do the tooth fairy, because I feel not great ways about that! 2) Jewlet will know plenty of people who don’t believe in God. 3) It is fucking HILARIOUS to me that you think Jewlet will not meet with a majority of people who don’t support and share our family’s beliefs. 

I’m asking all culturally Christian parents I know to do better. Please don’t tell me how worried you are that Jewlet will “spoil Christmas” for your kids. Please reconsider making children responsible for something you’ve chosen to set up, and don’t villainize kids who come from NCC families for telling the truth about what they believe. 

me trying to carry all the ideas i had for the sparring scene for this chapter: