Diminishing the magic of Santa Claus

Christmas is approaching and many Maltese lay folk have already begun to hang those dwarfish Santa Clauses on their balcony as though they were climbing in.

Personally I find them in such bad taste and I wonder at the lack of insight and sensitivity to just how disturbing they actually are.

Those small Santas were designed to hang on the upper floors of larger buildings to make them look like they are far up, not for most of our two-storey houses where we can clearly see their miniature size. As far as I am concerned there ought to be but one Santa Claus, one big warm and magical Father Christmas who flies around on his sleigh and who goes from one house to another at a time, not scattered numbers of little creepy gnome-like ones climbing like spiders into our balconies all over our towns and villages. I am pointing this out on behalf of the kids.