"Rapp Snitch Knishes"
MF DOOM ft. Mr. Fantastik
from MM..FOOD
2004
I have no idea whether I'm teaching my kids how to be good human beings. I know that I'm trying, but I guess what I don't know is whether it will be successful or not. I try to model behavior, but there are certain things that I can't model. I can't model not doing something. I can't model not playing with a gun, for instance. The only way they are going to learn to not play with guns is by telling them to not play with a gun. I can show them pictures of guns. I can explain why guns are dangerous. But I can't, like, interrupt dinner to point out the fact that, see girls, I am currently not holding a gun, and you should copy this behavior!
Plus, there are certain ethical complications regarding certain subjects. Not everything is black and white. Some things very much are—don't take after our U.S. President and rape children, for instance—but some things are not. A subject that I am always struggling with is the idea of telling on someone, a.k.a. tattling, a.k.a. snitching. It's not enough to not tell on someone, because that's another one of those things where you can't model the absence of an action. More importantly, there are actually sometimes when you need to tell on someone. The nuance is trying to figure out when it's an appropriate time and when it's not an appropriate time.
There was an incident last summer at a party for one of Willow's friends (pretty sure that it was the same pool party written about in the secret blog post found at the end of this one, but the last year of my life has been a blur and I'm no longer 100% certain) that's weighed heavily on my mind ever since. I had my three girls, and I was supervising them in the basement of this house. There were maybe five or six other kids down there, but I was the only adult. (That's usually how these things end up, the parent of the youngest kid in the room is pulling a supervising shift, since it's not appropriate to ask other adults, especially ones you don't know all that well, to watch your one-year-old infant.) At least one of the kids was a little older; she lived there, she was the older sibling of Willow's friend, probably eight or nine years old.
The host mom did what any host, including me, would do—she told her daughters to turn of the damn YouTube from the TV and play with the other kids who were there at the party. Like, you're not going to spend the party with your eyes glued to some bullshit content creator asshole talking shit about Roblox! These are good rules, and they are rules that I would absolutely impose at my own home. But the thing is, we're not at my home. I'm not in charge. I barely know these other kids and I don't really give a shit what they do. So I didn't bat an eye when older sibling, in defiance of her mother's household rules, put YouTube back on the basement TV.
I didn't even realize what happened next until I pieced it together later on. Willow slipped by me, went upstairs, and told the host mom that the older sibling had broken the rules. Who then flipped out and came downstairs and turned the TV off and yelled at the older sibling. I have no idea who knew that Willow was the snitch in this scenario, or if the older sibling knew and was mad at her little sister's snitch friend. When I myself pieced it together a little while later, I didn't really know how to react. This wasn't a conversation for a pool party. I couldn't yell at her for telling, but I couldn't praise her for telling either. It's more complicated than all that.
The most important thing to think about is my children's safety, and in that regard, there are so many scenarios in which tattling is the right thing to do. Anything ranging from "Mommy, [cousin] knows where Uncle —'s gun is" to "Daddy, Sophie is in the utensil drawer!" to "There was a stranger who was asking me about school at the playground today." These aren't scenarios that will DEFINITELY lead to danger, but there is a potential there that at least needs to be on a parent's radar, and so these are scenarios that need to be reported.
But there are times when risk and impending danger are not a concern at all. And in those scenarios, the tattling rule is reversed. You don't need to tell anyone that your friend's older sister is secretly watching YouTube. You don't need to tell your teacher that two of your classmates cheated on a test. You don't even need to tell me that your sister took her tablet from the cabinet and is hiding in her bedroom with it. Yes, all these scenarios involve rule-breaking, but they are also scenarios that don't involve you at all, and don't involve anyone hurting themselves or others, physically or emotionally. And so they are scenarios that you really just need to shut the fuck up about and mind your own damn business.
You can see how this is way too complicated for even a now-seven-year-old to comprehend fully. It involves assessing situations on a level that maybe young kids aren't quite adequately equipped enough to handle just yet. But it's a surprisingly important subject as well! I'm so fucking tired of these little shits telling on each other for the dumbest reasons, but I would also never forgive myself if someone gets hurt and I had inadvertently trained someone not to speak up in time. And it's so fucking hard to teach both sides of that coin at the same time. It's confusing as hell. I get confused sometimes too!
I think beyond the basic safety stuff, it's just really important for kids to have harmless secrets. It's fun, and important as they grow up, to bond through the act of sharing something private. Again, it's only to their benefit when it's not dangerous or harmful in some way, but assuming it's not, then I think secret-keeping should be encouraged. I'm thinking about the time that me and my friends snuck into a private county swim club after hours and went for a late-night swim. We were breaking the rules, we would've gotten in trouble if someone snitched... but it wasn't harming anyone, and it's a night I'll always remember. I felt so close to my friends after that night, because of that secret we shared.
That's what I want for my kids. I want them to thrive, socially. I want them to live and to thrive physically and emotionally too, obviously, but after locking that down, I want them to have privacy and share secrets and create bonds with peers. And that doesn't happen if your first reaction is to snitch about every little thing.
I have no idea how to convey any of this to my young daughters, but I'll let you know if I ever figure it out.
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