Rude, right? When we hear our kids say this we’re supposed to reprimand them and tell them it’s not nice, right?

Well I applauded my son the other day for saying it to his classmate.

He told me a student was reading aloud and the little shithead next to him kept huffing and puffing because he thought she was taking too long.

Reading aloud is nerve-racking enough for someone who does it well; to struggle with it can be straight up traumatizing.

After the 3rd time the kid let out an annoyed sigh, my son told him to shut up. Thankfully, he did.

My heart swelled to 10 times it’s size. Then with passionate disdain for people like the shitty little huffer, my boys got a 10 minute emotional tirade/ lecture about why what that kid did was so wrong and what my son did was so right.

After telling him I was proud of him for shutting down the little jerk, did I add, “but saying ‘shut up’ is wrong”? No I did not. I actually went on for about 5 more minutes, praising him up down, left and right.

Parents, don’t worry so much about the words your kids are using, but how they are using them.

What’s worse, A or B?

A. You are not very smart and you are also unattractive.

Or

B. I fuckin’ love you, man.

Right.

Stop obsessing over if your kid say “bad” words and more about how they say them.

While raising my kids I heard so many parents express their absolute horror over the word ‘stupid.’

But is it:

You’re so stupid!

or

This game is stupid, let’s go do something else. ?

Just cover the ‘don’t be an asshole’ part of parenting and the “bad words” part will take care of itself.