Holiday mystery #229.3

[starlady]

Maybe someday I will have a consequential post again. Actually, I just remembered one I meant to make, but in the meantime, an extremely consequential poll.

Okay, so. Have you ever heard that song "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus"? I always used to think that the song is a joke on its child narrator who doesn't get that his/her father is Santa Claus, but in light of other versions of the song, which feature a (male) child saying that he's going to tell his dad about his mom kissing Santa Claus, now I'm starting to wonder if the song isn'tin fact an expression of patriarchal norms keeping women oppressed in the home (in the 50s, when the song was written).

[Poll #1494145]

Comments

[spaiku.livejournal.com]

you know the little boy telling on his mom to his dad would just make it an even bigger joke on the kid, right? he's telling his dad something his dad already knows? the dad kissed the mom, but he thought it was someone else kissing his mom.

[starlady38.livejournal.com]

Yeah, if Santa is his dad. BUT WHAT IF SANTA ISN'T HIS DAD. WHAT IF SANTA IS REAL, OR A STRANGE MAN FROM DOWN THE BLOCK.

[spaiku.livejournal.com]

IT IS STILL A NATURAL REACTION FOR A KID OF ANY GENDER, THE WORLD IS NOT OUT TO GET YOU AND ENSLAVE YOU.

little kids love to tattle. think of yourself. or think of me, if you were too strange a child.

[starlady38.livejournal.com]

Wait, what? How did I become the strange one?

Have I ever told you the reuben story? I remember myself as being the one told upon, though of course I'm sure that I also did the telling equally often. Children love secrets, I think.

[spaiku.livejournal.com]

was i a strange child...?! i thought you were the one who would only read and was afraid of strangers. i think children are more malicious than adults want to believe.

[starlady38.livejournal.com]

Strangers are scary!

...Definitely adults tend to look back on childhood with rose-colored glasses, I think. Though also I think that most adults simply don't remember their childhoods that well (because most people have such poor memories).

[atthis.livejournal.com]

I'm really disturbed by that song too but not quite for that reason. I just think how devastated I would have been if as a young child I believed one of my parents was having an affair and I now had to make the choice whether to tell the other one or not. The loss of trust would have been enormous and I would have felt guilty either way. Even a little kid knows that by not telling she'd be keeping someone else's secret but by telling she might destroy her family. I'm baffled that the situation is presented so lightheartedly. So yes, I think about these things too much too. ;)

[maakur.livejournal.com]

For the record, I simply hate almost all Christmas songs.