They do not know what they are doing (But they are doing it)

I.

As we all know, there is no Santa Claus but we continue the illusion because, well, we are not really sure why. Something about the children and then tradition and before you know it, we are angry and need a drink.

II.

So you tell your children there is a Santa though you do not believe it. You want them to believe it but not really. A child who really believes in Santa is considered kinda slow. The child that suspects this is a lie but conceals this is considered smart. And why not, as they be imitating us. The child who refuses to STOP believing in Santa as a teen is called an american. Wait, what?

Most children do not believe in Santa but want to. They also want the parent to think they believe so they pretend to not notice presents in mommies closet and late night wrapping and hushed discussions over credit card bills with daddy or the person we call daddy now.

As the facade breaks down with age the disappointment grows but everyone involved is pretending and never quite sure why. They do not know what they are doing but they are doing it.

III.

Real, true believers, in anything, are always suspect. 

Consider the true believer of say, the soon end-of-the-world by rapture Jesus. Even the christians who buy the novels of this theology do not believe it. They still make long term plans and worry about long term problems. But when someone quits there job, moves the family to a hilltop and waits, why that man is considered looney by even christians. He must be crazy because your not supposed to believe that as REALITY. 

The belief in rapture Jesus, in Santa, in the invisible hand of market capitalism is proxy for something else. It serves as ideology. A belief construct (usually belonging to some other person like the oft quoted but never found “They”) to explain something else, namely-- what I am doing at any given moment. It is illusion.

“The experience that we have of our lives from within, the story we tell ourselves about ourselves in order to account for what we are doing, is fundamentally a lie—the truth lies outside, in what we do.” - Zizek

IV. 

But If you believe the illusion is reality, you cannot function continues Zizek. The ancient Greeks were not idiots. They didn’t think if you climbed Mount Olympus that you would find Zeus naked, laying divine pipe to a lovely Nymph. To ACTUALLY believe in Santa is to be unable to fully function in the world. To actually believe ideology is to be so busy climbing your very own olympus that you cease to be any worldly good. We call those that actually believe, insane. 

This is how advertising works. We know damn well that the juicy burger on TV will NOT look anything like the drab, flat, shitty burger we get in the restaurant. We don’t even complain when it happens. We know damn well that name brand clothes don’t change our character or convey status. Yet! Still we allow the belief to continue though we claim not to believe it ourselves. We don’t have to. The others belief will do. 

I do it because the kids think its true. 

Yea. Sure. What-ever. Always the other. Believe me, I know. A ton of books I bought sit just waiting to be read. Still somehow just owning them tempts one to feel as if the knowledge is imparted. I can act as if I read them because to read them ALL, why, thats, insane.

V.

It is not necessary for anyone to literally, subjectively believe that eating or not eating at Chick-fil-A conveys status for it to function as a status symbol, it is enough that everyone presumes that someone else believes in it. 

Even if I “know very well” that Chick-fil-A is just an ordinary eatery run by teens that has been suffused with signifying power through advertising (positive and negative), it still produces its desired result for me if I believe that everyone else is naive. It doesn’t matter if you hate Chick-fil-A at this point or love them. That isn’t the point. But alas you are so busy climbing olympus (to prove or disprove it) that you don’t see it. 

But you will continue to act as if the owner really does have higher status – Whether as a racist fundamentalist or a faithful, servant of God. You will go there to kiss your same sex partner or show solidarity with the purchase of the #2 meal deal. Because you do not know what you are doing, but by golly, your gonna fucking do it! 

Despite no-one really believing the idea of Santa Claus, rapture jesus, or commodity branding-- it has its effects. So long as someone else might think it true we allow ourselves to buy into ideology without then becoming idiots. Or so we like to think. Even though, ironically, it was ideology that killed jesus, santa and my fly, no shoe laces Adidas sneakers, circa 1986. 

Oh, You bastards.

N.

“Everyone is deceived by our marketing. Buy our product or don’t, and everyone will think that you really are what we say you are.” - Lucy4