A couple nights ago, while I was out of town, my partner had her niece sleep overnight. The girl had just found out that there was, in fact, no Santa Claus. Her mother had evidently come to the conclusion that she was old enough to know that particular truth. Or perhaps she was just tired of the charade herself.
Naturally, the revelation caused the girl to question some of the other well-established icons of childhood. And she discovered that there was no Easter Bunny. No Tooth Fairy, either. Deflated, she said to my partner that she just guessed there weren't very many things you could really believe in.
What could she believe in? "God and His world," she said.
I smiled as I heard this. The destruction of the Santa Claus myth is a seed that eventually can grow into a questioning of God's existence, in those of us with truly questioning minds. Perhaps in another decade, this child would be a freethinker, too.
But the story wasn't over. This delightful little girl then told my partner, "I hate scientists! They don't believe in God, some of them."
Not wanting to be accused of trying to raise her brother's kid, but still not able to let that comment go by, the girl's aunt told her flatly that it was okay. It's all right for some people to believe in God and others not to. Certainly it's not a transgression that warrants hatred.
The conversation didn't go any further than that. But it left my partner with a very bad taste in her mouth, one that I can certainly understand. Where did a kid whose life revolves around The Spice Girls acquire such an attitude? Did she come up with it on her own? I personally find that hard to believe. Did she hear one of her parents say such a thing? I don't want to believe that either of them could have that attitude, nor be foolish enough to voice it around a child, but I have to concede that possibility.
To teach a child that it's okay to hate someone because of their belief system is revolting. Yet obviously, such things are learned by people all over the world, young and old alike. I never expected to encounter such sentiments so close to home, though.
The things we learn in childhood become so firmly rooted in our minds that they are often very hard to pull out. They don't require much in the way of fact or reason to support them, either. Often, it's simply enough that we heard them from mom or dad. I'm not referring to things like Santa Claus, however. I'm talking about things like prejudice.
Our children are our future. And if we all really want a future that is a world full of loving, happy people, we need to make sure this kind of ignorance isn't passed along.
