Thursday, December 4, 2008

Parenting fail.

I overheard possibly one of the greatest conversations ever between a mother and her young son today in Target.

Mom: Watch out, don't step in that.
Son: What is it? Is it dog...sit?
Mom: *grumble grumble stern low voice* Don't say that.
Son: But YOU say it!
Mom: Yes, well, I'm allowed to say it.

My theory: If you don't want your 4-year-old son to swear, it's probably not a good idea to swear in front of him. Especially when you are talking about dogshit. That's not even an expletive; it's just an unnecessarily dirty mouth in front of your young children. Nice job lady.

3 comments:

Molloy said...

Due to the fact that I don't have complete control over my words at all times (which means, of course, that I NEED to have greater control), my wife and I have set up a dichotomy between "grown-up words" and words that anyone can speak.

However, we make it plain to Sage and Vienna that the reason for this has a social basis and that there is nothing wrong in the words themselves.

Once when I failed to use the proper restraint with my words, Sage announced to Katie that I had said a "bad word." She gave me a deserved reproving look and then told Sage sternly, "How many times have I told you, Sage? There are NO bad words!"

Tahleen said...

Haha, well I understand if it's an accident and it just slips out. But when you see dog poop on the ground and call it dog shit around your very young son, I think that is a big difference. In that case it's not an accident. There is no cause to use that word in a sentence unless you don't care what your children hear, and then if that's the case I feel like you'd have no right reproving them. Use the word "poop" when referring to it if you don't want your kid to call it shit.

Molloy said...

To use 'profane' words with impunity in front of your kids but then to get outraged when they start using them ... yeah, that's pretty stoopid.