AITA for telling my friend’s daughter the truth

A Redditor shares a situation where they became frustrated with their friend’s tendency to lie to her 6-year-old daughter to save money. After hearing several untruths, like the idea that kids can only buy things on Mondays and that ice cream trucks only play their song when they’re out of ice cream, the Redditor decided to tell the child the truth.

The friend, Sofia, confronted them, upset that it led to buying ice cream for the child. The Redditor wonders if they were in the wrong for telling the truth. Read the original story below…

‘ AITA for telling my friend’s daughter the truth’

So, my friend who we’ll call Sofia lies to her daughter to save money. Sofia has a well paying job, she isn’t rich but she isn’t poor. I’m pretty close with the kid, a 6/yo, and she’ll say something that clearly isn’t true, and when I ask Sofia about it, she’ll say its her way of saving money.

Example, the other day, the daughter said kids can only buy things from stores on Mondays, and other days aren’t allowed. Recently, she’s been saying even more of these obvious money-saving lies. It annoys me a lot. Recently, an icecream truck came by.

I offered to buy icecream for the daughter, but she said the song only plays when they’re out of icecream. I know this lie is pretty common, and usually it wouldn’t annoy me so much, but Sofia was telling her daughter so many of these lies. I told her that wasn’t true and her mom must have gotten it wrong. We ate icecream.

Now, Sofia confronted me saying that she had to buy her daughter icecream now because of me, and told me that I should have let her save money. I disagreed, saying she deserved to have some fun like this like the other kids. AITA?

Here’s the input from the Reddit crowd:

Forward-Dingo1431 −  I think that it’s ridiculous to lie to a child like that. What’s wrong with saying NO. If you don’t want or can’t afford to buy something, it’s really that simple.

When a child eventually discovers (or is told) the truth (lol), they will never believe a word that this person says. I would normally say that it’s up to the parents, but this is an exception just because it’s ridiculous! NTA

East_Parking8340 −  I do wonder what other lies she is / will tell the child. You can only get new shoes on your birthday, perhaps? Telling such blatant lies when the child will find out soon enough on her own is stupid and will build a wall of distrust between them.. NTA

Accomplished_Two1611 −  It isn’t your child, but your friend would rather lie than teach her child that you can’t always get what you want. Your friend thinks these stupid lies make it easier to parent, but it’s just not parenting. You should tell your friend the truth versus the child. ESH.

JayBenedetti −  Edit: NTA – I overlooked that she actually said the mom must have gotten it wrong instead of lying, left the original comment for transparency.. ESH. Just because your friend is a massive a**hole to her daughter,

you should have confronted her about it extensively, instead of telling a 6yo that her mother lies to her. Even if it was for the best, you did not do this for the child, you did this because you were angry at your friend and to make you feel like the bigger person.

Jazzlike-Election787 −  Her poor daughter will be so confused when she starts finding out what the lies were and will have a hard time, knowing what the exact truth is

hypotheticalkazoos −  NTA. but you need to keep it down so she doesnt cut you off. the kid is going to need your sanity as she grows.

HypotheticalParallel −  ESH. Her lying that much is cringy. All parents lie, fib, take shortcuts (famous example is Santa) but your friend is taking it too far. That said, whatever stupid parenting mistakes your friend wants to make are hers to make. It wasn’t your place to step in and decide what is right (given that while they are s**tty lies, they weren’t harmful actions)

SuperPookypower −  You certainly aren’t required to just repeat outlandish lies, especially in front of your own daughter. The idea that everyone else should also keep repeating the ice cream truck lie on her behalf is quite unreasonable. NTA

Lazy-Ad-7236 −  NTA, the mom needs to learn how to say no.

PV_eq_mRT −  Not your place… don’t try to raise other people’s children. If you respect your friend at all and it bothers you that much, you’ll talk with them directly about it instead of undermining them with their children.

Do you think the Redditor did the right thing by telling the child the truth, or should they have respected Sofia’s decision to manage her finances differently? How would you approach balancing honesty with respecting a friend’s parenting style? Share your thoughts below!