Answering the question: "Is the Easter Bunny real?"
by Simon Longstaff
One of my enduring memories of childhood is of being taken on an Easter outing to visit ‘Puffing Billy’. Part of the day was also spent traipsing through bushland in the Dandenong Ranges – a place of some magic when compared with suburban Ashburton. At one point, our path was blocked by a fallen log. My father (I think it was him) proposed that this would be a good place to leave something tasty for the Easter Bunny – who was rumoured to be close at hand. Thinking this to be an excellent idea, we placed, in a hollow, a liberal supply of goodies that a large, magical rabbit might enjoy. On returning along the same path, I was not at all surprised to find the food was gone. It was just further proof that the EB was “really real”; out and about – as he usually is at Easter time.
In later years, I participated fully in the Easter Bunny story. In fact, I once spent a few hours hiding in long grass, dressed and masked [convincingly] as a giant, white rabbit; later emerging, with my basket laden with chocolates, to the delight of a group of young children. Like countless others, I have emerged bleary-eyed at the crack of dawn, on Easter Sunday, to ensure that chocolate eggs would be found by young searchers in various hiding spots around the house and garden.
One year the question came, as it was bound to do, “Is the Easter Bunny real?”
From an ethical perspective, how ought one respond?
The easy option is to go for the literal truth. A bias in favour of truth telling is a practical necessity for any well-functioning society. If everyone felt at liberty to lie whenever possible, then it would not take long before human relations were strained beyond tolerable limits, with most (and probably all) of our institutions breaking down. I suspect that even the most undeveloped ‘moral imagination’ can conjure up a picture of the dire consequences that would follow any decision to set aside a general commitment to the truth (convenient or otherwise).
However, a preference for truth-telling need not be based exclusively on practical considerations, such as avoiding bad consequences. One can also base a commitment to the truth on the principle of respect for persons. That is, you might recognise, in your child, a fellow human being whose intrinsic dignity can only be respected with a truthful answer. Thinking in these terms has noting to do with consequences. Recognising that your child is a ‘person’ may be all that is needed in order to require a truthful response.
On the other hand, how can one be certain that the questioning child really wants an answer? What if you blurted out your response only to be rebuked with the challenge, “Why did you have to tell me that?”. It sometimes happens that people ask questions without really wanting an answer at all. Rather, the need to ask is part of a ritual designed to reassure and not a sincere enquiry at all. This can make life a little tricky. For example, you could try to check to see if the question is a serious one. However, merely asking, “Do you REALLY want to know?” is a bit of a give away – likely to cause the very harm trying to be avoided.
Some readers might be appalled at the idea of allowing the idea of the Easter Bunny to have formed in the first place. After all, the problem of what to say in response to the question only arises because of the initial ‘mistake’ of colluding with the Bunny in maintaining his identity.
This is, of course, a fair comment. Yet, even so, we might wonder what might be lost in childhood if all of the myth and magic were to be excised and replaced with entirely rational belief. While I cannot speak for all former children – I can truly say that I really value the time I had imagining into existence the kind of world in which an Easter Bunny could exist (the basket was like Dr Who’s TARDIS – with plenty of room for eggs on the inside). The experience of believing in the Easter Bunny did not do irreparable damage to me; nor was my relationship of trust in my parents undermined when my understanding matured.
Which brings us back to the child’s question – and how to respond. In my experience, a child will only ask the sincere question (the one they really want you to answer) when they already know the answer. The point of the question is not so much to seek new knowledge. Nor is it about testing the parent’s honesty.
Rather, it is a useful device for signalling arrival at a point of common understanding about at least this aspect of the world. It is at this point we can start to explore the deeper reality of Easter – a reality that the rabbit and his eggs were originally meant to symbolise.
discuss this articleDr Simon Longstaff is Executive Director of St James Ethics Centre.
This article was first published in The Sunday Age on 8 April 2007.
© St James Ethics Centre