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December 25, 2014 11:13 PM   Subscribe

The Creepy Surveillance of Elf on a Shelf. How does the ubiquitous holiday tattletale work its behavioral magic? By teaching kids to expect that there's always someone watching.
posted by gottabefunky (90 comments total) 15 users marked this as a favorite
 
You know, I'd agree that this was creepy for that reason, except nowadays we ARE ALWAYS CONSTANTLY BEING WATCHED. The only difference here is that the elf is only watching you one month of the year.
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:51 PM on December 25, 2014 [7 favorites]


I thought the second piece was much better than the first. Whilst I think the elf is kinda dumb, and not really a great way to develop and model behaviours in your kids, I also think:

1. As parents, you do a whole lot of stuff that is not a great way to develop and model behaviours in your kids. Your human and flawed. And also so damned tired. The elf is not the greatest crime even good parents would visit upon their kids.

2. The novelty of this is overstated. I mean, the physical presence of the elf is somewhat novel, but the concept of constant monitoring of behaviour in children, with repercussions, is really not new.

3. Because of its revered status, I think we do tend invest childhood things with high levels of significance. Significance not always deserved. Context, cultural and familial is important and can't always be captured by these kind of analyses.

For example this, from the first article: While the elf may be part of a pre-Christmas game and might help manage children’s behaviors in the weeks leading up to the holiday, it also sets children up for dangerous, uncritical acceptance of power structures.

LOL. a frigging elf is 'setting children up for dangerous and uncritical acceptance of power structures' - I draw the jury's attention to: parents; schools; jobs; the media; etc etc. The elf is a product of its culture, and that culture is one where the powerful are constantly pushing for uncritical acceptance of their power at both macro and micro level. It's marxism 101, not even 101.

If you have children in 21st century western culture, the elf should be the least of your worries, I assure you.
posted by smoke at 11:53 PM on December 25, 2014 [47 favorites]


Backlash!
posted by Bruce H. at 12:00 AM on December 26, 2014 [5 favorites]


Almost all of Christian and Jewish belief contains themes of constant surveillance from "above". This is something civilization has used for control for millennia. I'm no religious scholar but I'm sure other religions have the same or similar devices. So why is Elf on the Shelf so creepy?
posted by Zedcaster at 12:01 AM on December 26, 2014 [14 favorites]


There's also the Kitchen God who will "report the activities of every household over the past year to the Jade Emperor."
posted by applesurf at 12:07 AM on December 26, 2014 [5 favorites]


"So why is Elf on the Shelf so creepy?"
Because people are actively & explicitly choosing to use it on children, rather than passively and implicitly accepting it?
posted by Pinback at 12:13 AM on December 26, 2014 [10 favorites]


I know what you mean, applesurf. It reminds me a bit of the Roman lares and penates. Little figurines kept in the home that represent a larger deity aren't new by any means.

EDIT: And statues of saints.
posted by Kevin Street at 12:15 AM on December 26, 2014 [3 favorites]


Backlash!

The consequences of having seen TOO much, perhaps...

"ARE YOU A MEMBER OF ELF QAEDA??"
posted by Greg_Ace at 12:21 AM on December 26, 2014 [13 favorites]


Because people are actively & explicitly choosing to use it on children, rather than passively and implicitly accepting it?

Except isn't religious belief thrust upon children by adults even before they gain understanding, not passively accepted? I'd go so far as to posit that if religious belief wasn't "forced" (and I use that term very loosely) on children that adults wouldn't take it up in the same numbers.
posted by Zedcaster at 12:21 AM on December 26, 2014 [8 favorites]


Zedcaster: "So why is Elf on the Shelf so creepy?"

1.) Because, have you seen the goddamn thing? It's nightmare fuel.

2.) Because everyone deserves to feel like they have a safe haven, even children...and that's what "Home" should mean. Home should be a safe place.

3.) Because dolls coming to life never ends well.

4.) Because HAVE YOU SEEN IT? Jesu onna stick, it's terrifying on the level of clowns in whiteface. See also: 1.
posted by dejah420 at 12:35 AM on December 26, 2014 [67 favorites]


Because, have you seen the goddamn thing? It's nightmare fuel.

I have only seen them from afar, so I don't have an opinion on their looks.

Because everyone deserves to feel like they have a safe haven,

Safe from what? Judgment? Again, religions present God's constant overseeing as a comforting thing - he is watching out for you.
Yeah as well as that judging you to determine your eternal fate thing, I guess that's not so comforting.

Maybe I can see that the creepy part may be that the Elf is only judging you to see if you get your rewards. That rat!
posted by Zedcaster at 12:53 AM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


Elf on a plate of beans
posted by hellojed at 12:59 AM on December 26, 2014 [9 favorites]


I encountered the elf this year for the first time - there was one at my brother's house. But on Christmas Eve, my sister-in-law, when the kids were out of the room a moment, muttered to my mother and me that she "hates that fucking thing" - a well-meaning nanny got it for the kids directly the year before, and the kids got ALL up in it. So in that house it's a case of my niece and nephew wanting to be surveiled and my brother and SIL having to go along with the pretense.

However, it also did inspire a moment of some hilarity after the kids had gone to bed on Christmas Eve and the adults had all had a little too much wine and started exacting our revenge on the elf. I now have a posed photo of the elf motorboating my niece's Barbie.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:00 AM on December 26, 2014 [17 favorites]


We got an elf on a shelf, but the store had almost sold out and the only one they had left was Elrond. Fucking hell is he tedious. He just sits up there all day, bemoaning the twilight of the first-born folk and looking longingly to the grey havens. Occasionally he starts singing a tuneless dirge about his dad. Aragorn's always calling, asking to speak to his daughter, but he just makes up ridiculous excuses about her, e.g. "Oh sorry buddy she's brushing her hair right now, maybe call back when you're King of Arnor and Gondor, or something". I should have got the "Dark lord on a skirting board" - at least Sauron's baleful, lidless gaze keeps the orclings in line.
posted by the quidnunc kid at 1:38 AM on December 26, 2014 [177 favorites]


As the article observes, there were always elves, but they were invisible. As we've observed in this thread, religions often have an entity that is all-seeing. This articles ignores these points, so I don't think this analysis of the elf is any good without a discussion about how we embed the idea of surveillance more widely in our human cultures.
posted by alasdair at 2:28 AM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]


Surveillance is certainly a familiar part of many religions, not that that makes it any more attractive. Images like this one were once very commonly seen in Dutch homes. The text goes 'God sees me, one does not curse here'.

I agree with those who find the elves creepy. But then I find the whole Santa thing a bit creepy and I'm glad we don't have it here. For some reason Sint Nicolaas does not give me the same vibe, maybe because he is portraited as dignified and kindly.
That whole jollyness thing that Santa has going on doesn't really work for me, it feels so forced. 'Ho ho ho', who says things like that? And he always looks like he's been drinking.
posted by Too-Ticky at 2:32 AM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]


Sometimes folks way overthink me thinks. We have Noodle..... He is awesome.... My son looks forward to the tricks he plays all year. This year, he duct taped my son's underwear to the walls and we've been singing, "Deck the halls in Wyatt's Undies...." for a week now. Things don't always have to be so serious and negative. Sometimes, you just want to sing about your undies hanging on the wall and eat cookies. That's ok.
posted by pearlybob at 3:33 AM on December 26, 2014 [10 favorites]


In our house, we ask the question "Who watches the watcher?"
This year's answer - The Dark Elf agents of Krampus do.
At least until the Final Battle between Good and Evil on Christmas Eve.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 3:35 AM on December 26, 2014 [10 favorites]


Oh, Elf on a Shelf is even more insidious than as early conditioning to beg for surveillance!

SNOWDEN: ‘Elf On A Shelf’ Actually Hugely Successful NSA Project
posted by MonkeyToes at 3:53 AM on December 26, 2014 [5 favorites]


You know what else looks adorable in a festive little pointy hat?
posted by MonkeyToes at 3:57 AM on December 26, 2014 [10 favorites]


The panelfticon is surely the Yuletide manifestation of the police state
posted by quiet coyote at 4:00 AM on December 26, 2014 [8 favorites]


Santa traditionally had a Naughty or Nice list well before the invention of this Christmas "tradition".
posted by Elementary Penguin at 4:11 AM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]


Just seeing what this little fucker looks like for the first time following these links. Goodness gracious that looks like the shoddiest production value I have seen in a while. Does he really have no feet or hands? POS.
posted by Meatbomb at 4:31 AM on December 26, 2014


It's not overthinking if something immediately strikes you as creepy.
posted by Too-Ticky at 4:36 AM on December 26, 2014 [12 favorites]


In our house, we ask the question "Who watches the watcher?"

Have you already forgotten Ceiling Cat? Our cat would be dragging that elf around by the neck, tossing him in the air, and leaving him on the stairs.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 4:37 AM on December 26, 2014 [5 favorites]


Yeah, I don't like the idea of normalizing the panopticon, and using its threat as a tool to make my kid obey when I'm not looking.

Also, lots of parents get too cute with the idea, and are found out by even really young kids when messing with the damn elf (happened to a set of inlaws and some friends of the family). I mean, if you want Santa to be done with before the kid turns six, by all means complicate the situation with some bizarre elf obligation.
posted by Slap*Happy at 4:42 AM on December 26, 2014 [13 favorites]


I didn't know about this and feel somewhat left out. Then again there's no way I would ever get this for my kids - I like my kids and this thing gives bad vibes. You can feel it, it's not nurturing, it's an oppressive little fucker.

Though, we went to a end-of-winter party once where the kids got to burn dolls made of paper: basically symbols of winter. Maybe if you torched the elf at the end, like on the 26th, I could maybe get behind that.
posted by From Bklyn at 4:53 AM on December 26, 2014 [5 favorites]


Perhaps the period of time when people didn't believe they were being watched and judged was an anomaly? In the age when Christianity was taken seriously (i.e., when "hell" was a curse word with heft), people believed that God was watching them and gathering evidence for the final judgment. Then came along secularism, and that went away. Now we know that, between them, the NSA and Google are watching everything you do, and can determine everything from how much of a terrorism risk you pose to whether you're about to break up with your partner.

What if an internalised awareness of totalitarian surveillance (albeit with deferred consequences, i.e., the final judgment or the opaque machinations of the NSA) is a normal part of what we call civilisation?
posted by acb at 4:55 AM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]


This is like all those awful German fairytales where horrible things befall children who stray or misbehave.

There are better, more positive ways of teaching children than vague threats and creepy supernatural creatures. Let's move beyond the mumbo-jumbo & teach our children kindness by setting a good damn example.
posted by Devils Rancher at 5:04 AM on December 26, 2014 [14 favorites]


What if an internalised awareness of totalitarian surveillance (albeit with deferred consequences, i.e., the final judgment or the opaque machinations of the NSA) is a normal part of what we call civilisation?

Do you want to be the face of that for your own children, or do you want to teach them to resist it?
posted by Devils Rancher at 5:07 AM on December 26, 2014 [7 favorites]


Almost all of Christian and Jewish belief contains themes of constant surveillance from "above". This is something civilization has used for control for millennia. I'm no religious scholar but I'm sure other religions have the same or similar devices. So why is Elf on the Shelf so creepy?

I think you just answered your own question.
posted by escape from the potato planet at 5:07 AM on December 26, 2014 [6 favorites]


He kind of looks like Michael Hayden.
posted by newdaddy at 5:08 AM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


Surely somebody must have a Chucky customization kit for these.
posted by flabdablet at 5:12 AM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]


Do you want to be the face of that for your own children, or do you want to teach them to resist it?

What I really want is for my 5 year old not to hide tomatoes under his bed and under couches, to be found only when they rot enough that we can find them by following the smell.

If an elf on the shelf gets us there.....
posted by jpe at 5:19 AM on December 26, 2014 [8 favorites]


We got an elf on a shelf, but the store had almost sold out and the only one they had left was Elrond.

or is it really Agent Smith???
posted by ennui.bz at 5:26 AM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]


What if an internalised awareness of totalitarian surveillance (albeit with deferred consequences, i.e., the final judgment or the opaque machinations of the NSA) is a normal part of what we call civilisation?

What if we're just built with morality or something like a conscience, and if we don't acknowledge it one way we're bound to acknowledge it by some other?

Agreed that EOAS is not a good way to go about it...
posted by randomkeystrike at 5:28 AM on December 26, 2014


If an elf on the shelf gets us there.....

If he's anything like my nephew...

Before I'd ever heard of Elf on a Shelf, years ago, my sister printed out an illustration she'd found somewhere. It was a 50s-era illustration of a goofy-looking elf, just the head. She put it on the top shelf of a tall bookcase, y'know, watching. My nephew was 3 or 4 years old at the time.

She came home one day and the picture was missing and the adjacent picture frames were all knocked over. He'd thrown pillows at it until it fell down, then he hid it under the couch.
posted by TWinbrook8 at 5:32 AM on December 26, 2014 [19 favorites]


Though, we went to a end-of-winter party once where the kids got to burn dolls made of paper: basically symbols of winter. Maybe if you torched the elf at the end, like on the 26th, I could maybe get behind that.

I got to hear the whole story at breathless length this year - the elf "magically" appears the day after Thanksgiving, and every day is in a different place so you know he's alive and watching, and then on Christmas Eve he returns to the North Pole with Santa. If a mortal human touches him, though, the "magic is gone" and only an apologetic kiss will restore things.

Then I heard my brother and SIL's perspective on that - how last year they'd half-assed packing it away, and my SIL had totally forgotten where she'd put it and so when they were on the way home from Thanksgiving and the kids were speculating about the elf, she was thinking "I'm SO fucked," but my brother saved the day with a vague recollection and a trip to the attic. And the "touch it and the magic is gone" thing was jeopardized when one of our cousins and his kid visited them las week and our cousin saw the elf and picked it up and started playing with it like a puppet, and my brother freaked out ("holy shit dude put that back seriously") and they all scrambled to put the thing back exactly right. It is a HUGE deal for the kids, but the parents in that house feel shackled. Although my brother did confess to the elf having helped with bedtime once or twice....
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 5:38 AM on December 26, 2014 [4 favorites]


The elf emerged from The Elf on the Shelf: A Christmas Tradition co-authored by mother and daughter, Carol Aebersold and Chanda Bell. The book alone has sold over six million copies since it was released in 2005.

Did anyone partake of this supposed "Christmas Tradition" before this goddamn book came out? I'd never, ever heard of such a thing until long after 2005.

Based on this...
For $29.95, parents can purchase the book and toy to start a new tradition.
I'd say the actual "Christmas Tradition" the book celebrates is retail profiting.
posted by Thorzdad at 5:40 AM on December 26, 2014 [47 favorites]


Surveillance issues aside, Elf on a Shelf is a crappy doll with lots of must-have accessories (sold separately) that's been hastily packaged up as a new "tradition" and marketed in a way to virally exploit children's naiveté for fun and profit. Isn't that enough reason to despise it?
posted by RonButNotStupid at 5:41 AM on December 26, 2014 [37 favorites]


They should at least make shoes while the kids sleep.
posted by Repack Rider at 5:49 AM on December 26, 2014 [7 favorites]


It's nothing new - just a change in degree. "He sees when you are sleeping / He knows when you're awake."

I think the thing that has people a bit up in arms is that kids aren't just willing participants - they actively seek out the Elf. It's something they want.

Yeah: if you have an XBox Kinect - or hell, a cellphone - you're constantly being watched. But the Shelf Elf indoctrinates at such a young age, and the kids are so willing and excited about it. It's definitely something to consider. I sure wouldn't want my kid begging to be surveilled. What a strange world we live in.
posted by sockermom at 6:02 AM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


So all y'all anti-surveillers, what is your stance on (I'm Watching You With) The Eyes on the Back of My HeadTM?
posted by drlith at 6:05 AM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


Well, from the child's viewpoint, parents/God/Santa are kind of all nebulous The Ones with Power/Authority, so the urgency with which the children want to be "surveilled" can be read more as "I can prove how good I am to my Authority Figures!" Kids generally want to be good and have the approval of their parents, and the elf lets them "know" that their desire to please will be noted and given appropriate weight.

Still not doing it with my son, though. Am not planning to push Santa terribly hard, either, though I accept the inevitability of sideways transfer of folklore from his eventual classmates.
posted by Scattercat at 6:22 AM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


The real horror is the life the elves are forced to live. It's probably like being trapped as a judge rating behaviour in an Everybody Loves Raymond episode without the sweet sweet relief of commercial breaks.
posted by srboisvert at 6:27 AM on December 26, 2014 [4 favorites]


My child will only be watched by dolls designed to provoke terrifying nightmares.

The Ghoul on the Stool
The Dead Under the Bed
The Squamous, Sanity-Blasting Abomination in the Fridge
posted by Parasite Unseen at 6:36 AM on December 26, 2014 [31 favorites]


The Mensch on a Bench
posted by Curious Artificer at 6:41 AM on December 26, 2014 [7 favorites]


The Squamous, Sanity-Blasting Abomination in the Fridge

Hey, I get one of those when my roommates forget to clean out their leftovers. I didn't realize this was a marketing opportunity.
posted by Hactar at 6:42 AM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


Who stole all my naked selfies?
the Drow in the Cloud
posted by Potomac Avenue at 6:45 AM on December 26, 2014


I have a plush dragon who kinda does something similar. He sits around the house in various places, just watching.

He doesn't report to anyone. He just... watches. This is an important job, as nothing exists without a dragon watching it. This is very comforting when I am far too stoned and getting paranoid that this is all a simulation or something.

Right now he is in my bed along with other plushies. This is because he is on a well-deserved vacation.
posted by egypturnash at 6:59 AM on December 26, 2014 [5 favorites]


ceiling cat is taking notes
posted by flabdablet at 7:07 AM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


Yes, the elf is fucking creepy, and a huge parenting fail if you think it will result in more well adjusted children.

But any discussion about surveillance needs to discuss how study after study shows most of us learn to ignore pervasive surveillance within minutes.

So, the creep factor here is how normal people feel about the naughty/nice dichotomy and how ridiculous it is, and not surveillance. The latter is a much deeper pattern we learn from nearly birth, and largely ignore by the time we enter a partial panopticon.

By our own passiveness in the face of the panopticon we teach our children about the surveillance state. At most, a creepy elf created by misguided outdated negative reinforcement fans just amplifies this to a new level.
posted by clvrmnky at 7:28 AM on December 26, 2014


Did anyone partake of this supposed "Christmas Tradition" before this goddamn book came out? I'd never, ever heard of such a thing until long after 2005.

Actually, I got very confused when I realized other people were doing this now and that it was a new trendy thing--my mother did something very similar with an Annalee elf when I was a kid in the 1990s. I was terrified of that fucking elf doll. It kept moving when I wasn't looking and it was really creepy looking and it would just appear in high places to stare down at me. I remember feeling really weird about it because it never moved but my parents insisted it was alive and watching me.

As a child who actually grew up with this "tradition", I can assure you that I am never ever ever fucking inflicting it on any kids I have. Brrrrr.
posted by sciatrix at 7:35 AM on December 26, 2014 [14 favorites]


I don't even know what to make of these parents, such is my cellular-level loathing of horror for showing their kids that the elf messes with them WHILE THEY'RE SLEEPING.
posted by kinetic at 7:37 AM on December 26, 2014 [5 favorites]


Last night I had a chat with a lady who went to pre-Vatican II Catholic school. She'd gone to see Late Night Catechism and, while she'd found it hilarious, she said it was fascinating to watch as people well over the age of 60 snapped back into guilty-child body language the minute the "sister" pointed the finger at them from the stage for whatever they Must Have Done Wrong. As a Catholic school kid in decades gone by, you learned quickly that you should always be ready to feel guilty. I don't know how it is today.

I can't help but think that having the actual physical panopticon present in the house is small potatoes in terms of social control compared to Catholic school conditioning. It's just that, well, the number of people who Know When You Are Sleeping could be much larger than before. And as organized religion fades in influence, technology that enables snooping, interestingly, becomes omnipresent.
posted by Sheydem-tants at 7:42 AM on December 26, 2014 [3 favorites]


Can't sleep: Elf will eat me.
posted by dirigibleman at 7:42 AM on December 26, 2014 [9 favorites]


Update: Just actually read the Pinto/Nemorin article (second link above) and came back to say that the world of the elf is definitely creepier than Catholic school (in most cases). At least you got to go home from school at the end of the day, years ago.
posted by Sheydem-tants at 7:49 AM on December 26, 2014


This post got me to thinking and I found this youtube that a guy home made about buying a fake owl to try and discourage pigeons from crapping on his balcony and he finds out pigeons are not as stupid as the fake owl marketers would like you to believe.
posted by bukvich at 8:03 AM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]


Nothing beats over-thinking and sophistry for creepiness.

People will post bragging selfies of them eating cheap pasta at some overpriced restaurant for the world to see but then howl when people watch them and are not interpreting it according to their sick and pathetic fantasies.

And what is this about picking apart everything in some bid to make their sophistry sound smart and normal? We have normalized finding fault with unimportant nonsense and throw a fit when someone puts a doll on their shelf.

If you don't get that "elves" represent other children/siblings who are going to tattle on you to your parents/the real Santas of your life, get off the Internet, get out of the house, stop thinking you know what you are talking about, and find a real issue to tackle like poverty and child abuse that is happening right under of your nose, but you are too blind with arrogance and too in love with your stupidity to see it.

Elf on a shelf, indeed.

The only thing that doll teaches kids aside from the fact that adults get worked up for nothing while letting their future crumble is that you should unquestionably make your life choices based on some inanimate object placed on your shelf...
posted by Alexandra Kitty at 8:16 AM on December 26, 2014


The women who created this are fundamentalist Christians.

My favorite elf sabotages are the ones of it taking chocolate drop shits.
posted by brujita at 8:28 AM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


DATELINE: WASHINGTON, 2015

Well over a month after their initial release, the so-called Snowball leaks continue to plague the North Pole. The leaks appeared when a 4,000 foot scroll of un-redacted data was released to the website Wikileaks, purporting to be from a disgruntled worker in Santa's Workshop. The claims of the leak, released in full on the non-profit's website (READ MORE: CONTROVERSY OVER UNCENSORED NAUGHTY LIST INFO), were confirmed in pieces by independent news organizations over the past few weeks. Last Friday the North Pole command center released a press brief indicating that "although we believe its release to be extremely naughty, we must acknowledge that some elements of the Snowball leak are from our data stores." The command center would not comment further on the veracity of the more than 40,000 individual reports which comprise the scroll.

The most recent independent investigation to come from the leak, compiled by The Guardian's Glenn Greenwald, reveals that the "Bedwetting" section of the naughty list was often passed around the Elf Express (which serves as an internal communication system among the many departments of the North Pole) for the amusement of the workers and higher-ups within the organization. Greenwald writes,

"One Elf, Slippy, reportedly formed an office pool regarding when regular bed wetters would transition from the nice to naughty list throughout a year of micturations. This revelation obtained from the leak plays at direct odds with previous information that all information collected from shelf-elfs was completely censored and used only at the discretion of the Naughtiness Selection Assessment agency with appropriate Clausian mandates."

As of the publishing of this article neither Santa Claus, the NSA, nor any other official within the Pole Command Center was available for comment. However, within the past hour there was a brief press release stating: "The North Pole is dedicated to the ethical surveillance of children to promote good behavior and to maintain the integrity of the Holiday Season. We are currently investigating any claims made in the Snowball leaks, and are confident in saying that any truth to these matters is the result of individual bad actors within the system. We are also actively pursuing our hunt for the source of the leaks, and will punish them with the full force of the Coal Assignment Team and international law. We would like to remind journalists and citizens that distribution and discussion of this leak plays directly into the hands of those who are waging the War on Christmas."
posted by codacorolla at 8:33 AM on December 26, 2014 [12 favorites]


Elf on the Shelf is a tool of bourgeois oppression that functions to increase the unpaid, female labor of parenting (with invisible, ever-rising standards, of course), while simultaneously acculturating children to the omnipresent surveillance state, all while aiding and abetting the ownership class in the appropriation of religious and cultural traditions to serve their capitalist interests. That you have to pay for the damn thing AND pretend to have fun is just ICING ON THE OPPRESSION CAKE.

What I'm saying is, Elf on the Shelf will be first up against the wall when the revolution comes.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:49 AM on December 26, 2014 [30 favorites]


As a Catholic school kid in decades gone by, you learned quickly that you should always be ready to feel guilty. I don't know how it is today.

My wife only went to Catholic school for a few years, and mainly because her mom thought it was a better school than the secular school in her neighbourhood. She hasn't been to church in probably almost 30 years and couldn't be less religious...and yet she still feels guilty about *everything*. I don't know what the hell Catholics put in the water, but that shit works.

As for Elf on the Shelf, I think it's kind of creepy and if I had kids I wouldn't do it, but my nephew for one has already figured out that he always gets presents no matter what he does and that EOTS is just another one of those weird hoops grown ups make you jump through for some reason.
posted by The Card Cheat at 8:52 AM on December 26, 2014


We got an elf on a shelf, but the store had almost sold out and the only one they had left was Elrond.

or is it really Agent Smith???


First of all, you are a filthy heathen for necessarily only visualizing Elrond based on a movie actor. 20 lashes with a wet noodle, you faux-nerd.

Second, you do not need to go to the store to get an Agent Smith doll. You just need to do something subversive and detectable and one of your existing dolls becomes a Smith doll.
posted by phearlez at 8:53 AM on December 26, 2014 [9 favorites]


i dunno about elf on the shelf, but watching my sister in law check my nephew's attendance and cumulative grade progress in each of his high school classes on her iphone in front of him and the family at the dinner table sure did drive home the point about what sort of world we're leaving him.
posted by mwhybark at 9:03 AM on December 26, 2014 [5 favorites]


Also, lots of parents get too cute with the idea, and are found out by even really young kids when messing with the damn elf

So, they made a fool of them elves?
posted by GenjiandProust at 9:05 AM on December 26, 2014 [3 favorites]


I was thinking about this the other day since my sister has been setting it up around the house for my niece, who is three years old. My niece is at the stage where she's constantly pushing boundaries and seeing what she can get away with, and how she can manipulate my sister and her husband into letting her get what she wants (she almost has her fake cry perfected).

So if she actually believes that she is getting monitored the whole time she is at home, yet still does something she isn't supposed to, and doesn't get punished because my sister never found out, does my niece think that what she did was acceptable? As opposed to thinking she didn't get punished only because nobody knew?
posted by C'est la D.C. at 9:13 AM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]


Relevant Calving & Hobbes
posted by Going To Maine at 9:13 AM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]


That you have to pay for the damn thing AND pretend to have fun is just ICING ON THE OPPRESSION CAKE.

Cannot favorite this observation hard enough. I tried to explain that Christmas magic-making is beyond my abilities, but my family wasn't buying it. "COOKIES!" they said. "GINGERBREAD HOUSES!" they cried. "WORK YOUR MAGIC, MAMA, WE WANT AN OLD-FASHIONED CHRISTMAS TO ENJOY!"

So I decorated with elk on a shelf.

They're not going to ask me to smile and make things pretty next year. Merry Christmas and f**k the patriarchy!
posted by MonkeyToes at 9:19 AM on December 26, 2014 [15 favorites]


Re: Religious "watching from above"/omniscience...

If you want indoctrination into the all-seeing eye of Jeebus, look at Jack Chick's "This Was Your Life" tract.

Yes, your entire life will be witnessed by every single living human that ever existed, every masturbatory moment, every swear word, every curse of God, every life... It's all their to be judged, but not just by god, oh no... by all humans ever!
posted by symbioid at 10:44 AM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]


I wonder if it ever occurred to Chick that the story works a different way for an exhibitionist masochist reader?
posted by phearlez at 10:53 AM on December 26, 2014 [6 favorites]


Mrs. Wintermind and I, after watching several friends discover what a pain in the neck that stupid elf is for the parents, decided to forgo it. So far our children could care less. I think that if it works for a family -- it's fun for the parents and the kids -- then fine. But my anecdata tell me that it's Yet Another Thing for parents to worry about at the holidays, and that some kids love it and others could care less. I understand where the anti-panopticon folks are coming from, but I do kind of think it's overthinking things just a little.
posted by wintermind at 11:00 AM on December 26, 2014


So, they made a fool of them elves?

I was wondering where I'd get my weekly allocation of awful puns with most of my co-workers on vacation for the holidays, but apparently yuletide me over.
posted by Slap*Happy at 11:08 AM on December 26, 2014 [8 favorites]


Metafilter: That you have to pay for the damn thing AND pretend to have fun is just ICING ON THE OPPRESSION CAKE.
posted by sfkiddo at 11:23 AM on December 26, 2014 [13 favorites]


I am basically 100% certain that we're not putting elves on shelves in preparation for Christmas.

Well, not exactly elves. Mensch on a Bench.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 11:55 AM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]


I thought it was just another excuse to post stoopid pics on facebook. Our fifth born felt slightly left out when his first grade classmates talked so much about it this year. Yesterday, we made sure to tell him that we had to wrap some of the presents ourselves because there were too many elves sitting on shelves! All the kids in the fam got the joke on some level.
posted by Emor at 12:03 PM on December 26, 2014 [2 favorites]






Buddy, don't eat the gum, it is not free candy.
posted by clavdivs at 1:09 PM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


Elf on the Shelf would be a lot more useful if it also came with an answer to the perennial debate: whether to open gifts on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. This has torn apart more families than any malign North Pole Peeping Tom could ever dream of.
posted by lesbiassparrow at 1:35 PM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


Hi my name is p. bull octorok and I would like to tell you about the exciting new holiday tradition beloved by children and families everywhere, Mi-go on the Mantle

Place this adorable fungoid horror in a new spot in your house every day and remind your children that it will carry them off to strange moonscapes in the forbidden outer reaches of space if they are naughty

Fund my Kickstarter, thank you
posted by prize bull octorok at 1:51 PM on December 26, 2014 [9 favorites]


Mi-go on the Mantle

Does it play this song?
posted by homunculus at 2:25 PM on December 26, 2014


I've lucked out in the elves on shelves department. There is one in my kids first grade classroom at school. I guess Santa Claus is allowed in school? Earlier this year, my kid asked if maybe we shouldn't get one for the house so that Santa would know what he wanted for Christmas. I told him not to worry. Elf on the Shelf is strictly a surveillance elf and that he could just write a letter to Santa. That seemed to satisfy him. I refuse to play that game.
posted by Roger Dodger at 2:31 PM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


When I first read 1984 (long before 1984), I thought it imagined one of the most depressing futures possible.

I think now that it's somewhat more depressing to realize that others read the same book and exclaimed, "Wow! There are some real marketing possibilities here!"
posted by fredludd at 2:53 PM on December 26, 2014 [5 favorites]


kinetic: "I don't even know what to make of these parents, such is my cellular-level loathing of horror for showing their kids that the elf messes with them WHILE THEY'RE SLEEPING."

Yeah, that's taking it way too far. The poor kids have to accept that: a) Weird shit happens all around them at night or b) everything is fake. And given those choices you're most likely going to produce two little skeptics, instead of confirming their childhood belief in magic.

So maybe not a bad end result. But getting there by showing the kids that their own parents are willing to pull crazy pranks on them may not be the optimum path to maturity.
posted by Kevin Street at 3:00 PM on December 26, 2014 [1 favorite]


My parents are actually kinda bummed that we didn't have the Elf on the Shelf when we were kids. Not because we were unholy terrors or anything, just because they feel they missed out on making ridiculous scenarios with the Elf while we were asleep. My mom was all gung-ho about strewing mini marshmallows around the Elf and, I dunno, a stuffed animal, and then telling us they had had a snowball fight.

I'm pretty sure if I ever have kids, my parents will do this until the grandkids are 18, even if we never Elf our own house.
posted by chainsofreedom at 6:25 PM on December 26, 2014


I have two school-age children who are still Santa believers. We have never used Santa as a threat to leverage behavior, so I imagine we may have some approval from the author of the first article. A few years ago, my sister gave me an Elf on the Shelf for the kids and we have been using it every year. Again, he never gets used to scare the kids into good behavior. Mostly, the kids just like waking up and finding the elf and what he has been doing. Sometimes they'll leave him a cookie and check to see the next morning if it has been eaten.

I wish I could be surprised at the hand-wringing over the fake surveillance of a doll as opposed to real surveillance by the government, and I more especially wonder if the two article authors endorse government surveillance of a cash transaction over $10,000, for example. With the exception of slapping a heretic, St. Nicholas never committed violence against anyone. I wish the same could be said for government - any government.
posted by Tanizaki at 8:50 PM on December 26, 2014


slapping a heretic

For which he got three Hail Marys from the confessor in the dresser.
posted by flabdablet at 8:48 AM on December 27, 2014 [3 favorites]


Ish is creepy af yall
posted by aydeejones at 11:31 AM on December 27, 2014




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