One thing about kids is a universal truth—there’s never a dull moment with them. And whether they’re known to be on their best behavior at all times or act more like Dennis the Menace, some situations can call for any of them to engage in something their parents would likely not approve of.
But sometimes the seemingly “wrong” thing to do becomes something to be applauded. Members of the ‘Ask Women’ community recently discussed such instances when the user ‘VisibleCoat995’ asked them about the technically “wrong” things their children have done that actually made their parent proud. Scroll down to find the redditors' answers on the list below and see for yourself how eventful life with children typically is and how surprisingly wholesome some “wrongdoings” can be.
Bored Panda has reached out to u/VisibleCoat995 and they were kind enough to answer a few of our questions. You will find their thoughts in the text below.
#1
My daughter (6 at the time of the incident) was at school during swimming class. She was sat on the side of the pool as instructed by the teacher, who needed to assist a visually impaired student. An older boy (9 at the time) stood over my daughter, making extremely rude comments about her and kept trying to show her his genitals. She couldn't walk away, so she punched him in the d**k.
She's always had quite the temper, and must have been very angry, because the boy was taken to hospital for extreme bruising and swelling, and so was my daughter because she broke 2 bones in her hand, and needed a cast. We've since signed her up to martial arts, I figure she needed to learn how to punch without injuring herself.
Report
300points
#2
Broke a boys finger because he tried to put his hand up her skirt.
Report
275points
#3
14yr old son changed overhead projector slides (after his teacher approved them) for his ELA group project to screenshots from his classmate and other students in the school. The text were from the night before calling him names and telling him repeatedly to unalive himself. This particular group has been relentless. His presentation was based on an animal project. After a few slides he says “you guys wanna see what real animals look like” and proceeds to let the whole class read them. He respectfully apologized to the teacher and said I’ll see myself down to the principals office now. I was proud, pissed, and sad.
Report
235points
“I was thinking about an instance where a parent had to strictly admonish their child outwardly while on the inside they struggled not to laugh about whatever it was their child did,” the OP recalled, discussing what made them pose the question on the ‘Ask Women’ subreddit.
“It made me think how kids will do things parents have to tell them not to do because they are dangerous, or break the rules, but they are still the ‘right’ thing to do. It’s a funny dichotomy.”
Some instances like this do tend to be funny, which makes it difficult for parents to keep a straight face, but it’s crucial that they do if they want to teach their little one to distinguish right from wrong. Children reportedly build the foundation for ethical behavior over the first five years of their lives and parents play a crucial role in the process.
#4
When my daughter’s high school student leadership (of which she was a part - freshman class president) decided to stage a walkout to demand action on school shootings, some of her friends told her they wanted to participate but their teachers were saying they would not be allowed to leave the classroom. She asked if they meant they would face suspension or other discipline? Her friends answered “no our teacher said we wouldn’t be allowed to leave no matter what.” My daughter said “that’s not okay, you aren’t a prisoner, if you want to leave and are willing to accept the consequences, the teacher cant lock you in." Then she said that anyone who wanted to participate but needed moral support should message her and she would personally come to their classroom and get them. She collected several kids who were too afraid to defy the teacher and walk out, but who wanted to join the protest.
We had had many a long discussion about civil disobedience in our home on various occasions, and she was fully informed and prepared to take responsibility. I was so proud of her I was fit to burst.
Report
231points
#5
In middle school. A bully at my kid’s school told her that she was going to Hell because she has lesbian moms, and that she should just die now. He said something about sinners not deserving prayer too. She responded, “You should pray my mom doesn’t steal yours from your dad. F**k off.” This happened in front of the class and teacher. Both were sent to the office.
When the school called, it was clear admin was not upset with my kid, but couldn’t tolerate cursing. Issued a warning. My wife and I took her for ice cream when she got home and told her to never stop standing up for herself and those she loves. I warned that cursing at school was against the rules and so by all means to keep up the sick burns, but maybe clean up the language.
193points
The redditor admitted being quite surprised by the sheer amount of responses their post garnered; clearly, this type of wrong-right behavior among children is a rather common occurrence.
“It was interesting to see how many were about kids having to defend themselves against bullies,” they added. “I was in high school when ‘zero tolerance’ was started in my school, where just being a part of a fight, even defending yourself, would get you a suspension—a rule that is just asinine and lazy. Generally it seems to punish the victims more than the bullies.”
#6
Had a daughter constantly getting paired up with a kid who was failing while everyone else got to choose their partners. My daughter started just doing all of the work and turning it in. The teacher noticed and got on her for not teaching the kid how to do the work. My daughter told her “when you give me part of your paycheck I’ll do part of your job”. While I’m glad that she spoke up for herself, I told her that we don’t talk to teachers like that.
Report
183points
#7
My sister got suspended from school for dacking a guy (pulling his pants down) in front of everyone. Later we found out it was revenge for him using a mirror to look up girl’s skirts. 🤷♀️
We were all proud of her.
We were all proud of her.
178points
#8
Our neighbour had asked my son (who was about 9-10 years old) to help her bring some logs inside her house. No compensation mentioned.
He was back, on his own, about 15mn later. Apparently the neighbour was calling him lazy and telling him he was not working fast enough (for free).
So he left her and her wood and came home.
159points
When discussing the “wrong” things kids do, the OP shared that fighting in your own defense or someone else’s defense is definitely something they wouldn’t consider wrong. “If you ask a teacher what to do about someone beating you, the popular response from my childhood seemed to be ‘walk away and get a teacher’; as if it’s that simple.”
They continued to point out that not blindly listening to authority figures would be there on the list, too. “Adults do not always have a child’s best interests at heart and kids need to know when it is appropriate to stand up for themselves when they know what an adult is doing is wrong,” the redditor explained. “Some adults may still see standing up for yourself as disrespect but I think that is slowly changing in society.”
#9
My daughter back in 7th grade had a friend (male) who had his hair pulled back into a ponytail. A couple of bullies were walking behind them and kept pulling the boys' ponytail and calling him names. Ponytail told them to stop but they kept on. My daughter, having seen quite enough, turned around and punched one of the boys right in the face, closed fist and all. She told the boy if he had kept his f*****g hands to himself she wouldn't have had to punch him.
Obviously, I was called to the school for a meeting with the principal, the bullies mom, and ponytail's mom. They tried to suspend my daughter for 2 weeks but her friend defended her. 2 hrs later, the bully ended up with a week's suspension, and my daughter received 1 day.
Do I encourage violence? Absolutely not. But my kids know when and where to defend others who can't/won't defend themselves. I'll never forget that day. I was so proud.
Report
149points
#10
I’m not sure if what my daughter did was technically ‘wrong’ - actually I think it was perfectly correct. Last October her English class was given an assignment to write a horror story for Halloween. Well, my daughter wrote one hell of a story.
I want to be clear the story wasn’t about a school shooting or actively harming a specific person - it was actually about the passive horror of our society and the existential horror of poverty.
I won’t go into details, but it was very well written and descriptive and well and truly horrific. She had to do to a lot of research to get the details correct in her story. I was actually really proud of her, she knocked that assignment out of the park.
Her teacher and the school admin, however, were not impressed. They thought it was too horrific. My husband and I got called in, they wanted to know how a 13 year old girl would write a story like that - the teacher said it was too horrific and not at all what she expected when she gave the assignment. They even wanted our daughter to go to counselling!
We both pushed back hard on the school, she did nothing wrong, she understood the assignment! Anyways, she got an A but I doubt she will be in that teachers class ever again. .
Report
129points
#11
She saw two younger students getting beaten up by a group of senior kids. Everyone watching (recording on phones) with no one intervening. She (and her friend) jumped in and started defending these younger kids. Threw a few, copped a few, put some on their a**es. Teachers finally intervened. Because there was so much video evidence, she was not given any form of suspension/punishment. She didn't even know the kids being attacked. She just knew it wasn't right. Took the, "never start a fight but but god be the one to end it" a little out of context lol. Am proud of her for sticking up for people who weren't able to, but still a scary thing at the time.
Report
117points
“Kids can be amazing and seeing them become their own people and interpret the rules can be an amazing thing,” the OP told Bored Panda. “Too often life will teach us to just follow the rules and not question things. We let the bullies of the workplace or corporations push us around and it might be good to remember what it was like to be a kid when we just did what we thought was right, no matter the consequences.”
#12
My son punched a bully at his school after ignoring him for a few days and the bully never stopped until he finally grabbed him so my son snapped. He got suspended. I was secretly proud of him.
113points
#13
He hit a guy picking on a young woman wearing a hijab. It happened in high school. He got suspended for three days. I told the principal he was a moron and he had suspended the wrong kid.
Report
109points
#14
My kid constantly invents "problem solvers", but since he loves paper, they are mostly made out of paper and upcycled stuff. Everytime I complain or even sigh, he comes up with a solution. This week I have gotten: a tile cleaner (a box with a sponge that can be attached to the tile and when I pull a string it wipes), a hot cup hand protector, a coffee machine that brews the coffee cold (yes, he invented the cold brew, just with a milk carton) and today he programmed his lego robot to respond to my egg timer noise and drive up to me to poke me, because I often don't hear it with the headphones in and almost roasted the potatoes too dark yesterday.
It's all so useless, but I am so proud.
108points
#15
My daughter got in trouble on her 2nd day of kindergarten bc she kicked a boy who [took out] a moth on purpose for fun. My little animal rights activist lol.
107points
#16
My oldest was taking the classroom part of Drivers Ed online at the tail end of Covid. He’s a bright kid and a fast reader …he got through all the material and passed the tests quickly. However, they apparently require a certain number of hours with the material in addition to passing the assessments to get the certification to move to the “on the road” portion of the class. So he wrote a script that would click around and advance the screen automatically to hit the hours requirement. I loved that he figured out how to code something like that for such a dumb requirement. Work smarter not harder!
105points
#17
My daughter had a boy who was coming up to her at recess and screaming in her ear. Yard duty and teachers did nothing to help. So I told her to stick a piece of bark in his mouth. And she did! When he came up to her the following day she picked up another piece and said "you want another one?" No more issues with screaming bully boy. I was so proud.
Report
105points
#18
Probably a common one, but the time he changed our alarm clocks and the clocks on the ovens to 3 hrs early on Christmas Eve. He had us up at about 3:30 am. Was quite proud as I didn’t know he knew how to change either of the clocks. He was 6.
104points
#19
My 17 year old daughter is deaf, has a cochlear implant and does very well with herself. She took sign language as an elective course to learn what she missed out on growing up learning to speak. the teacher treated my daughter like c**p, letting her know that she was a “disgrace to real deaf people” my daughter had enough, flipped her off, saying “here is some sign language for you” and left the class.
I told her she can’t talk to her teacher like that but I was so proud deep down LOL.
I told her she can’t talk to her teacher like that but I was so proud deep down LOL.
100points
#20
During my daughter's 4th grade parent teach teacher conference, her teacher informed me she was teaching the other girls in the class about menstrual cycles. The teacher asked me to put a stop to it. To be clear, my daughter hadn't had the full sex talk yet, but I had taught her and her sister about how their bodies worked, in case either of them were early bloomers. When she was in high school, we became the safe haven for pregnancy tests, plan b, condoms etc... for her friends.
Report
97points