A Lesson From a Teenager

Call Out The BS Directly

The other day, my teenage daughter and I were hanging out and talking when there was a knock on the door. She answered it.

Two other teenagers from the neighborhood, who used to be friends but haven’t been around much lately, were standing there. I overheard one of them say to my daughter, “Oziah has been telling lies about you.”

Without hesitation — and with a straight face — my daughter replied, “Of course he is. He’s always telling lies about me.”

The two drama instigators stood there, dumbfounded into silence. Then my daughter asked, “Is there anything else?” When they replied no, she said, “Ok bye” and calmly closed the door.

I was as floored as they were. What an incredibly mature response, especially coming from a teenager. And she wasn’t just pretending to not care what kind of lie Oziah was making up that day. I asked her about it and she just rolled her eyes and said that she has no more patience for their BS.

Wow. I’m commonly impressed by my daughter, but this was next level clarity and emotional control.

In our country right now, we constantly see headlines and quotes that are meant specifically to create fear, or rile us up emotionally. Outrageous lies! You have to see this! Can you believe this is happening? What used to be reserved for sleazy tabloids is now coming directly from mainstream media, and from our leaders themselves.

It can be exhausting.

Or, we can take a lesson from a teenager: Observe who the liars are. Call them out directly for their lies, without taking their bait and becoming emotionally involved in the drama they are trying to create. Block the people who lie for a living. Learn to recognize propaganda and then change the channel when you identify it in the programming you’re seeing.

Then — and I cannot stress this enough — seek out people who display integrity. There are still some out there. Follow them. Amplify them. Vote for them. The degree to which we need examples of integrity right now cannot be overstated.

*I realize that this is my pipe dream. I realize that blatant lying has become so commonplace that it has become a prerequisite to getting attention in any arena. The more outrageous the lie, the more attention the liar receives. Some of our kids are learning how to seek attention too. But it doesn’t have to be like this. We can choose to call that shit out. Calmly. Directly. Like my daughter did. Of course they’re lying again. They lie every day.

Stop pretending this is normal. It’s not normal.