Learn and b taught

Proselytizing and teaching the young that God is the explanation for the world sets people up for a lifetime of acceptance of supernatural things and predisposes people to accept religious ideas. Sure did for me. Not until I saw that the Bible was false did I question the existence of God and find the truth. Sure wish I had not been indoctrinated. That would have saved years of pain trying to appease the supernatural forces that I lived to please.

Never underestimate the power of wishful thinking. That said, I'm not particularly fond of the idea of lying to children for any reason. It sets a bad example. Unfortunately, since most parents do it, everyone tends to get caught in the game as a sort of peer pressure. Gawd forbid you be the one parent spoiling the fairy tale adventure.

I believe that children figure it out about Jesus also. The problem is that due to conditioning they keep on playing that same old game. They know it but still play it. Part of this is because there is no Church of Santa where they refresh it all week to week.

Religion: insane people convincing the sane people sanity is an mental illness.

Santy is once a year, zeus is every sunday and sometimes daily.
If I recall correctly the aztecs believed their god would return dressed in black, when the conquistadors landed they fit the legends. Simply put if you teach a civilisation a fable it creates its own reality, echoing from all quarters, a belief that will be clung to even unto death.We want to believe in magic

You sound like Lenin. Like overly zealous religious fundamentalists, he believe that if one indoctrinates children early with a total system ideology, they will likely become permanent captives of that ideology.

Beats me

I have always contended that the religious indoctrination of children
should be classified as felony child abuse.

Adults are free to believe whatever bullshit they please, but children
should never be subjected to the religious delusions of adults.

I hate to play in opposition, but since this is such a rational and thinking group, it must be obvious to all those here that children can and often do shed what is taught. The proof is that most of here were raised with some sort of faith which we have all shaken off. I don't think kids should be taught that nonsense, but parents must maintain the autonomy to teach their kids what they see as right. Otherwise, someone else may decide what your children will be taught.

My question was, "Should we be treated this way?" I contend we shouldn't be. I think solid education on the subject is pertinent to proper parenting. If we end using old out dated fear control tatics and bring the fear factor down a few notches, it seems to me reasonable.

Because when you don’t believe in Santa he does not send you to to the special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish where you will live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever till the end of time .

It is a known scientific fact that the human brain is more malleable impressionable and capable of learning at a younger age. This fact has been exploited for countless generations.

In and of itself, this fact is not necessarily a bad thing. It becomes an issue, as mentioned earlier, when this fact is not used with the young persons best interest in heart or to a lesser fact, when incorrect beliefs are passed on to the young person by a well meaning but wrongly informed authority figure.

The latter has caused many adults to sit on countless therapist chair. The positive thing is that scientists have come to the realization that the brain of an adult is still malleable and we can come to change our beliefs well into old age and beyond.

As kids, we are not able to actively choose our beliefs, most of it, we learn from our parents and society as a whole. However as we grow older and we experience new people, new experiences and new knowledge, we shake off some of those old establish beliefs. This can indeed be a lifelong endeavor, but it is possible to get rid of the beliefs that we learn early in life that no longer serve us in our adult life.

Because their parents tell them so. Most young religious people are unquestioning until they start associating with people of different beliefs.
This usually happens at college, but now there's the internet and TV, if they have free access to it.

Some kids grow up to understand that they have been deceived...we are called atheists! Happy winter solstice all!

Kids continue to believe largely because all the adults around them believe. It is usually only when they are on their own...college, in the workforce, etc that they begin to really think about what they've been taught.