Character comtradictions

[Magpie]

I don't find that particularly inconsistent.

Santa and the Easter Bunny exist pretty much to give you stuff. Santa brings presents; the Bunny brings chocolate. Without that element, those two beings really wouldn't exist. (I know that St. Nicholas and the legend and all that are real, but Santa as we know him today was created as a marketing campaign.)

Mickey Mouse, on the other hand, is a fairytale character come to life. He doesn't give you stuff; he's not associated with a particular holiday or event. He's like any other character in a book or in a movie. "Believing" in him doesn't mean you get stuff. It just means you think he's real. It's like how grown-ups meet their favorite soap or TV stars and assume they have the same personality as their characters. Deep down, we know that the actor and the character are different. But we kinda wanna hope that they're the same.

Ah, having grown up poor I made sure my children never thought of Santa as just someone who gives you stuff. I just couldn't risk having them believe that and then find myself in the position of not being able to provide.

I told them the real Spirit of Christmas is like the spirit of Christmas Present in A Christmas Carol. The "gifts" he gives are gifts of the spirit and soul. I also shared the history of the real Saint Nicholas with them.

They always got one "Santa" gift (something handmade) and then all the rest of the presents were from their dad and me. It made Christmas more about decorating and celebrating than about the stuff under the tree.

As for believing in characters... as a professional writer, I've got little interest in that. Characters are creations of the mind, and as such are wonderful to play with. But they're certainly not real!

 

[WDSearcher]

Ah, having grown up poor I made sure my children never thought of Santa as just someone who gives you stuff. I just couldn't risk having them believe that and then find myself in the position of not being able to provide.

I told them the real Spirit of Christmas is like the spirit of Christmas Present in A Christmas Carol. The "gifts" he gives are gifts of the spirit and soul. I also shared the history of the real Saint Nicholas with them.

They always got one "Santa" gift (something handmade) and then all the rest of the presents were from their dad and me. It made Christmas more about decorating and celebrating than about the stuff under the tree.

As for believing in characters... as a professional writer, I've got little interest in that. Characters are creations of the mind, and as such are wonderful to play with. But they're certainly not real!

Interesting. I'd think that as a writer, you'd be very interested in that. Aren't you kind of hoping that your readers believe your characters are real? That feeling of "this person is a real person" is part of what keeps people invested in stories and coming back, and it is very much what creates things like fan clubs, role-playing, fanfic, and all of those other things that keep your characters, stories and books in the public consciousness.

 

[Hoosier37]

The only fictional character who gave my kids any trouble at all was Harry Potter, and that was only because my daughter was really, really hoping that the story was secretly real and she'd get a letter on her 11th birthday.

I started reading HP in my late 20s and I also secretly hoped it was all real and I'd get a letter saying it was a mistake I hadn't gotten my letter years before .

 

[pbrim]

Once I suggested to DS that we should go meet Tigger. He knew that I really liked Tigger so he kind of gently asked me if I knew that Tigger was someone in a costume. I loved how he thought that I might not know!

Last time I was there, there was a kid announcing loudly to all and sundry that it was just "People in suits! They're all just PEOPLE IN SUITS!"

His mom bent down and quietly said "We talked about this. Your father still believes so for his sake we are all going to pretend and no-one is going to talk about people in suits!" The kid shut up, dad grinned, and surrounding parents looked relieved.

 

[niffer5150]

i got lucky and never had to field this question. my kiddo(7) just assumed it was people in costumes but she was excited anyways about meeting chip and dale. she did however sob hysterically when it started storming in the tiki room, which was our first attraction ever with her, because "it's storming and it's going to ruin the whole vacation!". she was completely inconsolable till we shoved her out the doors into the sunshine. she also thought we actually went into space on star tours. we had to tell the truth(after her father and i got up from rolling on the ground, laughing) because she was so pale and quiet i was worried we'd have to treat her for shock.

 

[1stvisit0909]

My kids know the movies arent real and the characters area costumes, but they dont care. Its all fun!

HOWEVER, we doubted the true reality when we were there. We meet Belle in her yellow dress in Norway at an ADR, then we left and went walking around the WS, and ran into Belle in the France in the blue dress. It was the same woman. I have no idea how Disney pulled it off, pure magic. She even said to my DD - oh did you enjoy your breakfast with me??! And both of my girls said: :O

So to us, we are now believers in the magic

 

[missesdisney]

We went so many times when our son now 11 was little he thought they were 'real' but not the face peeps - he saw those inconsistencies right away at about 5 and was fine with that. He used to tell me that he thought that Mickey had helpers like Santa (the mall ones) but the REAL Mickey lived in the house in Toontown. He always has been very magical with characters since his first trip at 9 months old.

A few years ago after our trip he asked me and said when he hugged Meeko, the skin was smushy and 'went in'. Needless to say we had a discussion and he was upset for a while until he remembered his crazy mother's (yours truly) reaction to Belle when he was about 7 years old....

I am a big B&B fan...and Belle was always in what we called the stupid Blue dress. So my son wanted every autograph in the park so we went to wait for princesses, since after all we'd convinced them they were pretty girls and it was fine. Line was 10 min so we waited....and waited....and waited. Those ladies needed a Prince break you know So we walk first into the room and they open the door and Belle is there (third one over) in her...YELLOW GOWN! I quite literally jumped up and down and squealed like a two year old. I could not get past Cinderella and Snow White fast enough to get a picture with her. My son, realizing at this time the face peeps are peeps, was looking at me like I was nuts and when we walked out of the room and the spell broke I was laughing hysterically at the fool I made of myself. But that....is Disney magic. My brain knew who was in the room but my heart saw Belle in her ballgown!

 

[AmanduhAnn]

His mom bent down and quietly said "We talked about this. Your father still believes so for his sake we are all going to pretend and no-one is going to talk about people in suits!" The kid shut up, dad grinned, and surrounding parents looked relieved.

That is GREAT!!!

 

[hollygolitely93]

Okay, so I guess I'm the meanest mommy in the land, but I have told my four year old that all the characters are not real. Only when she asks, but I just can't bear to fib to her.

I told her that we are at Disney, it is a wonderful place of fantasy and story telling. That the people there are real people that dress up like the characters in the movies and that we never mention that they are not real. We go along with the story because it is so much FUN!

I don't think there is anything wrong with telling your kids whatever works for you, but I just wanted to throw it out there that you can still enjoy the parks and tell them how things actually work and why.

My son is very observant. We took him at 2.75 and he was looking into every costumed characters mouth to see their mesh cages. He examined their costumes for zippers and such. It was funny and also a bit of a handful as each character interacation required me to be on complete alert to distract his wandering hands and eyes. When we went home he told me one night "I know they are people in costumes, but what about the ones with faces like Peter Pan....is he real?" when I asked what he thought he said, "yes" so that is what we went with.

 

[hollygolitely93]

That is GREAT!!!

This is genius! Love it!

 

[hollygolitely93]

I don't find that particularly inconsistent.

Santa and the Easter Bunny exist pretty much to give you stuff. Santa brings presents; the Bunny brings chocolate. Without that element, those two beings really wouldn't exist. (I know that St. Nicholas and the legend and all that are real, but Santa as we know him today was created as a marketing campaign.)

Mickey Mouse, on the other hand, is a fairytale character come to life. He doesn't give you stuff; he's not associated with a particular holiday or event. He's like any other character in a book or in a movie. "Believing" in him doesn't mean you get stuff. It just means you think he's real. It's like how grown-ups meet their favorite soap or TV stars and assume they have the same personality as their characters. Deep down, we know that the actor and the character are different. But we kinda wanna hope that they're the same.

Santa as we know him today was created as a tool for a poem (Night Before Christmas) and Mickey too is a marketing campaign