Yes, Virginia . . .

We believe what we’re told we’re supposed to believe,

We believe what we want, or we believe what we see.

                        –from my song, King of the Classroom

Christmas is right around the corner, and many parents are wrestling with the dilemma of what to tell their inquisitive children who are beginning to doubt the existence of Santa Claus. In 1897, an 8-year old girl named Virginia O’Hanlon wrote a letter to the New York Sun seeking a definitive answer to her question, “Is there a Santa Claus?” A reporter named Francis P. Church responded with a famous, uncredited editorial by saying, “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy.” It was a great seasonal sentiment, typical of the Victorian Age, and his response became the most reprinted editorial in history. 

Our grandson Lucas, also 8 years old, is a sweet boy who will undoubtedly cling to his childhood beliefs for as long as possible. Last week, as he eagerly helped us hang ornaments on our tree, we explained that we bought each of the decorated items during our various travels, and each ornament carries special memories of a place we had visited together. He nodded and said sagely, “Yes; Christmas is the time for memories.” In contrast to Luke’s enthusiasm, his older sister Abigail, is reluctant to partake in anything that smacks of sentimentality. She developed a pronounced eye-roll about the time she started pre-school and probably gave up her belief in Santa, the tooth-fairy, and the Easter bunny around the same time. Abigail is 11, and already a strong skeptic on pretty much everything. I feel sorry for her Catholic-school teachers when they get to religion classes.

Meanwhile, a new conspiracy theory has taken hold in America. Since 2017, the “Birds Aren’t Real” movement has spread across the country. The essence of the theory is that all birds have been replaced by government-controlled drones for the purpose of spying on Americans. This spying, purportedly, all began as a CIA plot back in the 1970s, and the mechanical birds recharge themselves by resting on powerlines. In attempt to make people aware of this menace, information and the slogan “Birds Aren’t Real” have appeared on T-shirts, billboards in major cities, and on social media outlets such as Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. The group has held well-attended protests when they burned a Cardinal flag beneath the St. Louis Arch and when they demanded that Twitter stop using a bird as their logo.

Before you start shouting, “I knew it!” and asking where you can learn more, I should tell you that it’s all an elaborate hoax. The movement is a parody of the various other theories into which people have bought over the past few years. The whole idea, begun by a disillusioned college drop-out named Peter McIndoe, is to poke fun at the numerous “Big Lies” currently circulating and see how many people will go for the bait. The “Big Lie” is a tactic used effectively by Adolf Hitler and Joe McCarthy, even before the spate of lies that proliferated over the past few years. Like those luminaries, the Birds Aren’t Real perpetrators made up a lie so preposterous that people laughed the first time they heard it. They told it so often, and with such conviction, however, that many people who lack the ability to think critically began to believe it. McIndoe came up with and elaborated on the idea after watching helplessly as people bought into incredible lies such as: Hillary Clinton controlled a child-sex ring, Barack Obama is not an actual American, vaccines of all sorts are dangerous, Biden stole the election from Trump (the latest polls show that 60% of Republicans actually believe this one), the January 6^th terrorists who tried to kill Mike Pence and end democracy were actually just tourists enjoying a stroll through the Capital, and Covid isn’t a serious problem, despite 800,000 deaths. If people will believe those things, he thought, they might even believe that birds aren’t real. It was, as a BAR organizer explained, “fighting lunacy with lunacy.”

Birds Aren’t Real today has many thousands of followers across the country. How many of those are true believers and how many are “in” on the joke is impossible to say, but McIndoe was always conscious of not going too far, lest the naïve minds who accepted those other lies actually buy into his. “Dealing in the world of misinformation for the past few years, we’ve been really conscious of the line we walk,” he said. “The idea is meant to be preposterous, but we make sure nothing we’re saying is too realistic.” Ultimately, he hoped that it would cause people to examine the conspiracy theories and beliefs to which they adhere.

This all reminds me of the old fable, The Emperor’s New Clothes. This folktale, which dates back to the 1300s, has a vain emperor falling for a scam presented by two con men. They sell him a magical suit of clothes that are supposed to be made of the most magnificent cloth in the world, but, they say, the cloth is invisible to those who are stupid. No one, including the emperor, wants to admit their lack of intelligence, so they all go along with the scam, pretending to see the wonderful cloth and even praising it. Finally, as the emperor marches in a grand parade to display his new clothes, a child yells out “He’s naked!” and they all realize what fools they’ve been. (The child was probably Abigail.) All, that is, except the arrogant emperor, who continues to walk proudly, head held high.

I guess McIndoe is hoping for the same sort of result. “Yes, we have been intentionally spreading misinformation for the past four years,” he said, “but it’s with a purpose. It’s about holding up a mirror to America in the internet age.” The ultimate message of Birds Aren’t Real is: If it sounds crazy, it probably is.

Eight-year-old Virginia, as all children eventually do, probably grew up, started to think critically about things, and gave up her belief in Santa Claus. Even the Bible (King James version, 1 Corinthians 13:11) says, “When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.” The “Yes, Virginia” editorial was perfect for its day and for a long time after that. Today, however, perhaps we need a new editorial, one with a little more truth, to combat the farcical nonsense in which many people believe. Today’s editorial should read something like, “Yes, Virginia, Trump lost the election by a wide margin, Barack Obama was born in the U.S., and vaccines will save your life and that of many others.”