On 2005-03-26, Nevermind wrote:
I have an almost-7-YO who still believes in the Easter Bunny. I'm
half-inclined to let the truth slip out. her older brother stopped
believing in the EB when he was in preschool and asked about Santa (not
just those early questions, but real questions to which he definitely
wanted real answers) in kindergarten.

It's very inconvenient to have a kid this old still believing (all the
hiding etc) and also, it just seems a bit strange that someone this age
could be this credulous.

What do you think? Would you tell?

Certainly. We never lied to our son about Santa Claus, the Easter
Bunny, or the Tooth Fairy. We told him that these were made-up
characters, but that play-acting them was fun. We still enjoy the
customs without the trouble of having to disillusion him.

I've never understood why some people choose to lie to their kids
about popular myths---what is the advantage (tot he child or the
parent) in having a child really believe in Santa Claus or the Easter
Bunny? Yes, it is easy to fool little children, but why??

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Kevin Karplus http://www.soe.ucsc.edu/~karplus
Professor of Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz
Undergraduate and Graduate Director, Bioinformatics
(Senior member, IEEE) (Board of Directors, ISCB)
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