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Yes Virginia on CBS
By Ally Matteodo
Yes, Virginia, a half-hour CBS special that airing December 17th
(8:00 p.m. ET), represents a new holiday classic. This CGI-animated special is
based on a true story that happened in New York City at the brink of the 20th
century. A little girl named Virginia O’ Hanlon begins to doubt that Santa
Claus really exists after a bully named Charlotte taunts her and her friends,
calling them infantile for believing in Santa. Forlorn, Virginia asks her
father, Dr. Philip O’ Hanlon, for answers. While in his workspace, Virginia
notices the New York Sun, a prestigious newspaper of the time, and
remembers her father’s frequently spoken mantra: “If you see it in the Sun,
it’s so.” Virginia decides to write to the editor of the Sun, Francis
Pharcellus Church, on the question of whether Santa Claus is real or not. At
first, Church throws the letter in the trash, refusing to publish such drivel.
The bully Charlotte discovers the letter in the trash outside the news building,
and ads this to her arsenal of attacks against Santa. When Virginia sees that
Charlotte has her letter, she falls into a deep depression and cries herself to
sleep that night. Yet all is not lost: in the spirit of Christmas and Santa,
Virginia had broken open her piggy bank and bought a new coat for the “Scraggly
Santa” that rings his bell outside in the streets trying to earn money for the
poor. While Charlotte derided Virginia and her little friend Ollie, she dropped
the letter, and Scraggly Santa picked it up. Scraggly Santa used to work for
the Sun, and he brings the letter to the editor himself, pleading for the
cynical editor to publish the letter. After hearing these moving convictions,
Church spends a night of soul-searching, staring out his window into the snow.
Then, in a burst of inspiration, he writes his response to Virginia’s letter; an
answer that has become arguably the most famous newspaper editorial of all time,
and from which this special gets its name. Church writes back with certainty
and clarity: “Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as
love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give
to your life its highest beauty and joy.”
More than two
hundred years later, our own age mirrors the turn-of-the-century in which
Virginia lived. The editor Church had previously worked as a correspondent
during the Civil War, a time of much suffering and depravation which in turn
society reflected with a lack of hope and faith. Bullies like Charlotte are
prevalent throughout society, and many of us remember our own beliefs attacked
or criticized due to the lack of cold hard facts or proof. This is a terrible
feeling, and is part of why Virginia’s plight is so moving and elicits so much
compassion from the viewer. The editor’s response is truly inspired when he
tells Virginia that her little friends are wrong to doubt: “They have been
affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they
see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little
minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little.
In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect,
as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence
capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.” Those who feel the need
to crush others’ hopes and beliefs deserve only to be pitied. We quickly see the
reason for Charlotte’s acrimony in Yes, Virginia, as her own mother treats her
coldly and scolds her for biting her nails. My response echoes Church’s at the
end of his moving editorial: “Santa Claus lives, and he lives forever. A
thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now,
he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.”
Parents Television Council,
www.parentstv.org, PTC,
Clean Up TV Now, Because our children are watching, The
nation's most influential advocacy organization, Protecting
children against sex, violence and profanity in
entertainment, Parents Television Council Seal of Approval,
and Family Guide to Prime Time Television
are trademarks of the Parents Television Council.
