The Myth of Santa Claus

Once again, this time of year, the sleigh of mystification flies in the dusk of reason.

The most powerful myth in the arsenal of consumerism dons its white beard and red costume to enter your hearth, your home, and your heart. Santa Claus is coming to town. Where does Santa come from?

Why is he so powerful and appealing? Why does each generation perpetuate this myth?

What are its origins, and what function does it serve?

This lively, interactive presentation will peek beneath Santa's jovial costume, to reveal the ideological skeleton that props up his corpulent body. We will look at Santa's pagan and Christian roots, his racist and colonial upbringing, and his adoption by Coca-Cola and Corporate Capitalism. We will survey his relationship to his ideological kissing cousins, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy. In doing so we will also develop an analysis of myth, ideology and propaganda as seen through the work of Edward Bernays, Roland Barthes, Claude Levi-Strauss, Louis Althusser and Terry Eagleton.

We will show the deep structural relationship of the Santa Myth to other contemporary myths and control memes, such as "efficient
markets," "productive capital," "individual freedom," "white supremacy," and "the war on terror."
Everyone is welcome, naughty or nice, and we hope to offer to everyone who attends, the true gift of Christmas: a radical and penetrating awareness of the world, the true flight of the spirit that a clear consciousness can attain.