Tattling on siblings (punish, parents, girls, daughter)
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I was just thinking about an old memory, and it made me curious how other people handle these situations. We always had a general rule in our house that you shouldn't tattle on your siblings. With four older brothers, this was more of a sibling enforced rule than anything- kind of a snitches get stitches thing. I don't really remember if my parents actively discouraged it (and at times they ENCOURAGED it and even set it up- see below), but I do remember there was a rule that tattling was allowed IF the person was putting themselves in danger.
One day my brother told me he was doing to the schoolyard to get into a fight with a boy who had called him out. I remember being very irritated because now I had to decide if I should tattle or not, and I even had the very clear thought that was like a choice that would be in some contrived after-school special. In the end I told, and my brother got grounded and didn't speak to me for a week.
In other situations, my parents would basically use me as a tool to tattle on my brothers. They used to break into my parent's closet to see their presents before Christmas, for example, and would show me my presents too. One year I didn't get something I was expecting (since my brothers had shown me it beforehand). I was probably around seven- I held out for awhile before very awkwardly asking my mother about the missing present. It was then presented to me with great ceremony- and the boys got in trouble because now there was proof they had peeked at the presents. That time they didn't talk to me for a month. Or if my parents didn't know who had done some act of mischief, they would punish me along with the boys even if they knew there was no way I had done it so I would 'break' and tattle.
So two questions- do you encourage or discourage tattling among siblings, and have you ever used one child as a tool to get dirt on another?
I'm not a parent but I did teach school for a while. My rule was IF the person is doing something dangerous that could harm themself or someone else, come and tell. Otherwise tattling was unacceptable and not encouraged.
In my opinion, it should be the same for siblings.
We have a similar problem at our house. One daughter is EXTREMELY responsible while the other is a bit of an air head. Sometimes responsible girl will tell us something other said which we should know and I appreciate it but I don't know if it is tattling. Sometimes she will go into her backpack and bring us things from her sister which sister did not want us to see---like a note from the teacher or a bad paper.
I gently remind responsible girl I am the mother not her. The two girls get along very well and rarely fuss. They are only 4 months apart in age(duh---adopted). I kind of look at it as sisters looking out for each other.
In our house we made a BIG distinction between tattling and telling. Tattling was done to get someone IN trouble, telling was to get someone OUT of trouble. If one of the kids started to tattle, we asked the question tatting or telling? They would make up their minds what it was because tattlers got sent to their rooms...
In our house we made a BIG distinction between tattling and telling. Tattling was done to get someone IN trouble, telling was to get someone OUT of trouble. If one of the kids started to tattle, we asked the question tatting or telling? They would make up their minds what it was because tattlers got sent to their rooms...
We have a similar problem at our house. One daughter is EXTREMELY responsible while the other is a bit of an air head. Sometimes responsible girl will tell us something other said which we should know and I appreciate it but I don't know if it is tattling. Sometimes she will go into her backpack and bring us things from her sister which sister did not want us to see---like a note from the teacher or a bad paper.
I gently remind responsible girl I am the mother not her. The two girls get along very well and rarely fuss. They are only 4 months apart in age(duh---adopted). I kind of look at it as sisters looking out for each other.
Whoa...in my opinion, ResponsibleGirl is NOT looking out for her sister by rummaging through her backpack and coming to you with evidence of wrongdoing. She is trying to get her sister into trouble! How do I know this? It happened in my own family of six siblings. My brothers rooted through our wallets and found our locker combinations (junior high school), and if they found evidence of "less than stellar" test papers "conveniently" left in our lockers, they'd come home and tell our parents. My parents were VERY strict, and of course we'd be punished.
It's funny that the topic of tattling should come up in this forum, because two of my siblings and I were talking about this very subject the other day. Even though my brothers enjoyed getting the rest of us into trouble on occasion, my middle sister was actually the "family tattler". She loved to kiss up to my parents for extra attention, and she'd tattle on the rest of us to get into my mother's good graces, and to get another sibling into trouble.
As I look back, I think my mother encouraged the tattling. She was the type of person who would root through our rooms when we were at school, searching for evidence of wrong-doing. If she found something in your room that was amiss (example: my sister made an entry in her diary that she and her girlfriend had skipped classes one day), you would be in HUGE amounts of trouble when you got home and you would be punished.
I think you have to take a long, hard look and figure out if it's get-somebody-into-trouble tattling, or a true concern for the welfare of a sibling. And consider your own reaction when your child comes to you with "dirt" on a sibling. Family members usually fall into some type of role within the family...try to figure out why one child may seek out the role of "The Tattler", and then go from there. Unfortunately, I think your daughters have already fallen into their roles of The Responsible One and The Airhead...and don't think they don't know how they're viewed within the family dynamic. They do...
Whoa...in my opinion, ResponsibleGirl is NOT looking out for her sister by rummaging through her backpack and coming to you with evidence of wrongdoing. She is trying to get her sister into trouble! How do I know this? It happened in my own family of six siblings. My brothers rooted through our wallets and found our locker combinations (junior high school), and if they found evidence of "less than stellar" test papers "conveniently" left in our lockers, they'd come home and tell our parents. My parents were VERY strict, and of course we'd be punished.
It's funny that the topic of tattling should come up in this forum, because two of my siblings and I were talking about this very subject the other day. Even though my brothers enjoyed getting the rest of us into trouble on occasion, my middle sister was actually the "family tattler". She loved to kiss up to my parents for extra attention, and she'd tattle on the rest of us to get into my mother's good graces, and to get another sibling into trouble.
As I look back, I think my mother encouraged the tattling. She was the type of person who would root through our rooms when we were at school, searching for evidence of wrong-doing. If she found something in your room that was amiss (example: my sister made an entry in her diary that she and her girlfriend had skipped classes one day), you would be in HUGE amounts of trouble when you got home and you would be punished.
I think you have to take a long, hard look and figure out if it's get-somebody-into-trouble tattling, or a true concern for the welfare of a sibling. And consider your own reaction when your child comes to you with "dirt" on a sibling. Family members usually fall into some type of role within the family...try to figure out why one child may seek out the role of "The Tattler", and then go from there. Unfortunately, I think your daughters have already fallen into their roles of The Responsible One and The Airhead...and don't think they don't know how they're viewed within the family dynamic. They do...
Interesting take on this situation. Responsible Girl knows her sister will get into trouble for NOT turning in her report card or other papers and she is trying to help her sister stay in compliance. When this happens all we say to Not Responsible Girl is that she must give us all her papers regularly. We don't tell her if her sister, father or mother found them in her backpack.
Interesting take on this situation. Responsible Girl knows her sister will get into trouble for NOT turning in her report card or other papers and she is trying to help her sister stay in compliance. When this happens all we say to Not Responsible Girl is that she must give us all her papers regularly. We don't tell her if her sister, father or mother found them in her backpack.
But by doing this, and you ALLOWING this to happen, you have just put responsible girl in charge of irresponsible girl who now knows she doesn't have to remember to do anything because her sister will. Stop this, NOW. This is NOT a good thing. At our house responsible girl would have been in as much trouble as irresponsible girl for butting into her sister's business where it wasn't needed.
Did you miss the part where she doesn't know who found the report card or papers? She just knows it was found.
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I don't really remember if my parents actively discouraged it (and at times they ENCOURAGED it and even set it up- see below), but I do remember there was a rule that tattling was allowed IF the person was putting themselves in danger. 
