Here's a story from the BBC about psychiatric professionals talking about how lying to your kids about Santa Claus is a great idea.

Writing in this month's Psychiatric Bulletin, she said the Santa myth gives parents an "ace up their sleeve".

Oh, hey. No shit. It's an effective parenting tool, a mythical pretext for a carrot/stick approach. Well, that justifies it.

Eventually children outgrow the belief in Santa Claus, a time Dr Breen said was often tougher on parents than the kids themselves.

"Most of the evidence suggests that children are actually quite positive when they find out the truth and it is actually parents who mourn the loss.

"I suspect my nephews know he doesn't exist but they are pretending he does because of all the associated benefits, such as presents, which go with it."

And this is supposed to be mentally healthy?

Writing in the same issue of the journal, Dr Mark Salter, a consultant psychiatrist from Homerton Hospital in London, considered the fallout of the demise of the Santa legend.

He said the emphasis on rationality in modern society put myths such as these at risk.

"The imagination which created Father Christmas is being destroyed by a society which holds rationality above anything else."

You mean, above the idea of threatening no gifts or rewarding kids with gifts based on the judgement of a fictional, semi-omniscient fat bastard in a red and white suit?