Children Lie

I wrote this at a time when Penn State University was going through a period of revelations some of which may have been either totally false or based on circumstantial situations. While it is hardly my position that every accusation made by a child is false, what I believe is that the public too quickly and easily accepts the sayings of a cute little moppet as unvarnished truth. Hence the title.

Children Lie. It's not a speculation, it's a fact. And, more recently, children have learned how to use the ability to lie to their advantage. Given the recent allegations at colleges and universities, we need to look at what really goes on in the world of children and their motivations.

I'm appalled at adults' tacit acceptance that a child is innocent and cannot possibly tell anything but the truth; Horse Hockey. Children lie from the moment they discover the real meaning of the word “penalty” as in, if you don't (fill in your own personal blank) you'll get a (fill in another blank). Strangely some of this “fibbing” arises from a child's desire to please. We cannot tell a child in advance all the things we don't want them to do, so when they do something we as adults don't think was a good idea, they're puzzled. And the lie starts there. Who hasn't seen a tape of an adorable child trying to figure out what the right answers is to explain why the cat-or dog-has been doused with molasses? They don't have a world view on this sort of thing but are picking their way through the land mines of possible censure. (The child of a friend of mine took lighter fluid and burned up her toilet seat trying to emulate “Mommy” floating votive lights in a bowl. Someone pointed out to “Mommy” that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery; “Mommy” pointed out the cost of a new toilet seat. But….in the litany of things the child had been emphatically told not to do, dumping lighter fluid in a toilet then setting it ablaze wasn’t on it.)

Psychologists say that we're born with an innate sense of right and wrong...that well may be true but if we accept that, then we completely understand why anyone lies. (Your check is in the mail, the market was out of milk, I thought you were going to put gas in the car...ad nausea) And, pleasant as well as non-destructive as most of this is, there's a tipping point when it becomes important, has serious consequences for the child as well as those around them. A good starting point is, “I didn't do it.” to which needs to be added, “But I know who did” or, more directly, “Jimmy did it”.

Of course there's revenge. Sometimes referred to as a dish best eaten cold or something that is sweet, we all discover at some point that a created lie has values to us while adversely effecting others. The lies that are told in the furtherance of whatever your cause might be are damaging, hurtful and can have massive consequences to another person, consequences that are known to the liar in advance. Children are a whiz at this. But they really excel when they find that a lie told about an adult goes a lot further than one told about someone their own age. Which is why a friend of mine, who's an attorney, said that she could have a practice just defending adults accused by children of a surprising variety of things. We tend to think of the main lie children tell about adults as being sexual in nature; Counselor would disagree. Theft, drinking, drugs or adults telling lies about other adults are her top four categories. She also adds that adults not infrequently program their child to lie about another adult knowing full well what might happen. (Remember? Most adults think children can't lie?)

We already live in a suspicious age (“Trust but verify”, Ronald Reagan) and, unfortunately, we expect to be lied to. Advertising relies on that when they make rather preposterous claims about their product. I would sooner buy something that's called “Okay” or “really works pretty good” to something that is “supercalifragilisticexpealidocious”. (Spell Check just committed suicide.) But my point is still that we're accustomed to not always expecting the truth and this slops over in to our private lives.

I am, I’ll admit it, am very skeptical of anything a child tells me that I cannot see for myself; There’s a good reason. Some years ago the child of a friend was having trouble with math so her mother asked me if I'd do a little al fresco tutoring on a late Spring Saturday. Happy to oblige I hadn't dealt with the fact that this kid didn't want to be tutored and found-she thought-a way out. On about our third attack on how to add and subtract she told me if I didn't stop her having to do this she'd “tell mommy something about me”. I did what few adults will not, called her “mommy” right then. “Mommy” knew her little brat quite well so that was the end of that. But many adults go into Defcon 5 in terms of panic. For one thing, children have an unerring ability to find the one item that will chill the adult they wish to dispatch. Remember the story, widely repeated by the damn media, about the child who turned in her father for having a beer in the car? Turns out it wasn't true but by the time this was revealed, the father had practically moved to Vladivostok under the name of Rasputin. Children who are disgruntled (Is there such a word as “gruntled”?) or wish to avoid something are the most likely to spin some lies but, equally, a bored child is almost as likely to think up something outrageous to perk up their day. Whatever the outcome, lies produce attention which children crave.

And so we reach the very hallowed and, currently, very troubled halls of ivy at an increasing number of schools. I am no apologist, please let me make that clear, but I reserve all sorts of judgment until I have more facts and sheer number of complaints, while persuasive, is not an absolute proof of truth. Unfortunately, absolute truth is not a finite thing, what's true to me may be questionable to you. (Conspiracy theories thrive on this concept.)

When we get the formerly young coming forward after years, sometimes decades, to tell us their unhappy memories we have a responsibility to carefully examine what we're told, what we're shown and, the most troublesome, what is alluded to. What I do think is that there's an untapped reservoir of bad experiences visited on children by adults that may, in dribs and drabs, come out. These will be hurtful, often damaging revelations, the sort of thing that makes one think, “If only I'd known, been there, done something.” But we weren't so now we're going to hear the unfortunate details. Children who were physically damaged-and still carry the scars to prove it-the more subtle anguish of mental torture, hard to explain but undeniable. The sad thing is that in many of these instances, the facts weren't revealed as the child was afraid of being accused of lying. Adults mentally strangle children between two concepts: Always tell the truth and keep it to yourself. The later arising from adults being pestered by children who report, in tedious detail, every damn detail of their boring existence. (But neglect to mention they’ve just put the cat in the clothes dryer….)

With all the allegations-and, I've no doubt, more to come-we need to be very careful about differentiating between what we choose to believe and what we can prove to believe. What troubles me plus, I suspect, most adults, is that we know that what is alluded to can and has happened another place, another time; It’s been proved. This isn't a child's version of Martians who visit them nightly bringing candy, this is what damage has been done to a child. There is no denying that it's essential we listen to the accusations, give them the gravity and respect they deserve but it's equally important that we apply whatever litmus tests we can to the whole skein of both accusers and the accused. The final sadness is that we can never really know what is truth. In the weeks and years to come as the current messes are revealed, we need to be very carefully about what and who we believe. There is, unfortunately in the United States-and most other countries as well-a certain herd mentality. Say it enough times, see it often enough then the public will believe it. What we are seeing now is exposure of what may have happened but is unproved fact.

The ability to accuse others of sexual impropriety is probably the most potent lie a child-or anyone-can tell that is almost instantly accepted...if not completely believed. In this very idea friendly times, children have learned the virtue of accusation so to apply a sexual context just makes it….that much better. Frighteningly, no matter how patently false it is, some will continue to believe whatever the calumny no matter the accuracy of truth. Men are particularly easy targets as those organs that are too easily envisioned, can also be seen doing violating as well as violence; Homosexual men, a group not wholly accepted and about which there are lingering fears, are high up on the list of those susceptible to be accused. Also, a sexual accusation by a child carries not only more weight in the mind of adults but is more quickly believed. On occasion just being a single male over the age at which most men marry is enough to start whisperings that, “Well, you know, he’s not married, got that ‘room mate’ with which he seems real cozy...put one and one together, you got yourself two gay guys….Anybody think I’m wrong?” The horror is that….once whatever the lie may be is told, even completely disproved, the taint of it lingers in the minds of those who want to believe anything ill of another person. So the lie of a child has cost many Gay Men their careers, their stability and, sadly, in too many cases, their lives.

Adults lie as easily as children; We need to remember that.