Camian Academy

Why is it okay for an adult to accuse a child of lying, but it is not okay for a child to accuse an adult of lying?

Yesterday, a very angry woman banged on our door and accused my kids of vandalizing her truck on Saturday. She said someone (she did not see anyone do it) wrote on her car in purple marker. There was a (washable) purple marker on the steps of the house next door. Ani said she did use it to write in a notebook, but insisted she did not use it to write on a truck. I had to believe my kids over this woman since she had no proof.

My kids said they did not know who did it and that it could have been the girl next door but they didn’t see anyone do it. The woman then banged on the door of our neighbor and accused their daughter of vandalizing her truck. She told them my kids said their daughter did it! My kids had not said that. I heard what my kids had said. The woman lied to the people next door.

After about 15 minutes of ranting and cussing at my kids (and saying they needed their “butts” whipped - she didn’t use the word butt) they said they saw Ani walk between her truck and the car next to it with the purple marker and so Ani definitely did it. First of all, if that is true, why didn’t they say that to begin with? Second of all, if that is true, why did they say it was one of my kids and then accuse the next door girl if they knew all along that Ani did it because of that “evidence”? Personally, I think they made that up.

Ani said that was not true and that she had not been in the parking lot. I believe her. We have a rule that the kids cannot go in the parking lot. Occasionally Ani will step in the corner of a parking space on the way to the mailbox for the thrill of it. Every time she barely puts a foot on the parking lot Cameron is inside tattling (and she hasn’t in quite some time ever since she got grounded from getting the mail for a week). He said she didn’t go in the parking lot.

I asked Ani if she was saying the woman was lying when she said Ani was in the parking lot and Ani said yes, the woman was telling a lie. At this the woman got completely livid. I was informed that Ani was lying (and the woman’s grown daughter knows this for a fact apparently because she’s taken child psychology). For some reason it is okay for them to accuse my daughter of lying and I should accept that, but it is absolutely not okay for my daughter to accuse them of lying. Why is that? I had just seen the woman lie to the people next door after all.

The more I think about it, the more I am convinced my children are innocent. But I am left wondering. Just why is it okay for an adult to accuse a child of lying, but it is not okay for a child to accuse an adult of lying? Personally, I don’t think it is.