Many families have holiday traditions and one that has taken off is The Elf on the Shelf, "a special scout elf sent from the North Pole to help Santa Claus manage his naughty and nice lists," according to the website. "When a family adopts a scout elf and gives it a name, the scout elf receives its Christmas magic and can fly to the North Pole each night to tell Santa Claus about all of the day's adventures. Each morning, the scout elf returns to its family and perches in a different place to watch the fun."
Children go about their daily lives while an elf spies on them for Santa. Some think that is pretty creepy, while others think it's downright sinister. Does The Elf on the Shelf teach children that they should expect surveillance and that privacy is not sacred? In a world where cell phones are subject to NSA scans and social media is used for data mining, are we teaching our children that they should only behave because someone is watching?
A paper published by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, "Who's the Boss? 'The Elf on the Shelf' and the Normalization of Surveillance," explores those questions.
A retired schoolteacher, Carol Aebersold, and her daughter, Chanda Bell, self-published a children's book called "The Elf on the Shelf" in 2005. By 2013, over six million copies had been sold, along with the accompanying doll. The Elf on the Shelf was one of Amazon's top toys in 2012, according to "Who's the Boss?"
Children are encouraged to use their imaginations and most games include some kind of role-play, but the authors of "Who's the Boss?" challenge the notion that a game of make-believe should cross over into real life.
"Elf on the Shelf presents a unique (and prescriptive) form of play that blurs the distinction between play time and real life," the authors wrote. "Children who participate in play with The Elf on the Shelf doll have to contend with rules at all times during the day: they may not touch the doll, and they must accept that the doll watches them at all times with the purpose of reporting to Santa Claus."
"This is different from more conventional play with dolls, where children create play-worlds born of their imagination, moving dolls and determining interactions with other people and other dolls. Rather, the hands-off 'play' demanded by the elf is limited to finding (but not touching!) The Elf on the Shelf every morning, and acquiescing to surveillance during waking hours under the elf's watchful eye. The Elf on the Shelf controls all parameters of play, who can do and touch what, and ultimately attempts to dictate the child's behavior outside of time used for play."
The paper cites an 18th century design for a prison, the panopticon, which is described as a circular structure surrounding a tower that is backed by lights, so no one can tell if they are being watched. The panopticon is compared to The Elf on the Shelf as a symbol of always feeling eyes on you.
Instead of learning social norms and proper behavior through play, the report suggests, The Elf on the Shelf teaches children "to accept an external form of non-familial surveillance in the home when the elf becomes the source of power and judgment, based on a set of rules attributable to Santa Claus."
The elf becomes the focus of behavior modification instead of real-life influences, like playmates, parents or cousins.
"What is troubling is what The Elf on the Shelf represents and normalizes: anecdotal evidence reveals that children perform an identity that is not only for caretakers, but for an external authority (The Elf on the Shelf), similar to the dynamic between citizen and authority in the context of the surveillance state," the authors wrote. "Further to this, The Elf on the Shelf website offers teacher resources, integrating into both home and school not only the brand but also tacit acceptance of being monitored and always being on one's best behavior--without question."
The report concluded by asking: "When parents and teachers bring The Elf on the Shelf into homes and classrooms, are they preparing a generation of children to accept, not question, increasingly intrusive (albeit whimsically packaged) modes of surveillance?"