Man furious with child's camp counselor; 'Your daughter is spreading information she doesn't understand.' AITA?

When this man is furious with his daughter's camp counselor, he asks the internet:

"AITA for correcting my daughters camp counselor?"

I [35/M] have a daughter [7/F] who has recently been attending an animal-themed(?) summer camp during the day -- she's obsessed with animals so honestly it seemed like a great fit.

I usually drop her off in the morning and pick her up in the afternoon, so I am familiar with her camp counselor/group leader. Group Leader [30(s?)/M] seemed like a chill guy and my kid seems to like him, though today when I picked her up he asked if he could 'pull us aside to chat.'

When I asked what this was about he said that my daughter was very disrespectful to him today, and that he couldn't have her 'attitude' again. When I asked him what happened he said that they were discussing sea creatures today, and he referred to octopus as a fish, which my daughter corrected him as they are mollusks.

He tried to tell her that she was wrong, but she politely corrected him again (his own words). I told him that if she just corrected him politely then I didn't really understand the problem, but I would speak to her.

He then explained that that octopus were fish, and that my daughter shouldn't be 'spreading information she doesn't understand.'

I told him that my daughter was correct, octopus are mollusks -- even pulled up a bunch of links from google to show him.

His response was to get angry and tell me that he 'sees where my daughter gets the attitude from' and that 'she was wrong for correcting him, and that [I] was wrong for backing her up and usurping his authority.'

I explain that correcting someone isn't usurping authority -- being corrected is sometimes just a learning experience, one that I've experienced often, and that I wasn't going to reprimand my daughter for trying to 'politely correct' him.

He told me that I didn't understand how difficult his job was, and that sometimes he just needed a parents support, regardless of 'their beliefs' and stormed off.

My daughter asked if she was in trouble and I said no, of course, but I am questioning as to whether I should send her back to this camp given the behavior of her counselor; that being said, I wondered if I should have just told my daughter that sometimes it's best to let things go, even if people are wrong.

tl;dr: Daughters counselor claims that octopus are fish (they are not), my daughter corrects him in that they are mollusks, he asks me to tell her not to correct him even if he is wrong, I tell him not unless she is being impolite/incorrect, he gets angry and storms off. I am not reprimanding my daughter. AITA?

Let's see what readers thought:

teenysod writes:

NTA, this guy's attitude over something so simple is a red flag tbh, I'd be speaking to the camp co-ordinator/his manager quietly about this, not to get him into trouble if he's generally good at his job, just for some extra support around understanding that kids are people too, and his age and authority does not mean he is always right

... His response SHOULD have been - after running his own Google check - "So they are, thanks and well done for pointing that out." Especially if this camp is supposed to be an educational/learning experience, not just a fun one.

As far as this goes - "I wondered if I should have just told my daughter that sometimes it's best to let things go, even if people are wrong." - I think a fair number of adults (especially judging by some of the posts on this sub lol) need to learn this life skill tbh.

bivagial writes:

NTA. As an autistic with special interests, I've been in the exact position that your daughter is in.

Most of the time, the adults I corrected asked me where I got my information, or just went with it. Some of them would even look it up for themselves and turn it into a teaching moment about the fact that everyone makes mistakes, and that it's OK to say you're wrong or change your mind when you get new information.

Those were the adults I greatly respected. Of course, there were times that I was wrong too. And because of the lessons I learned from the adults above, I was able to let go of my wrong information and absorb the new info.

But then there were adults and teachers that thought that because I was a kid and they were an adult, they were right even when they were wrong. They got stubborn. They tried to punish me. My dad had my back (after doing his own research to determine if I was correct or stubborn).

Those adults, I didn't respect. And I never trusted their information again. If they got this wrong and refused to correct the error, what else were they teaching me that was wrong?

My suggestion is to sit down with your daughter and tell her that the councilor was showing her what not to do when corrected. As long as she remained polite, she didn't do anything wrong.

It's also a good lesson to learn that sometimes you do have to back down from an argument, even if you know that you're right, otherwise it could escalate and cause trouble. My grandmother always said "well at least you know you're right. Some people just can't learn when they're wrong. That's their issue, not yours. No point wasting time trying to teach a dead fish to climb a tree."

If you could swing it, I'd say after camp is done, see if you could take her to an aquarium or zoo. Not only could she use that as an opportunity to check the facts given to her by the councilor, but she could also show you all that she learned and what she knows.

Kids love to share that stuff, especially if it's in a subject they're passionate about. You sound like a supportive parent, so I think she'd absolutely love to show off her animal knowledge.

Good on you for supporting and encouraging her interests. Some stick, some don't. But I can tell you now that kids who get special interests remember those who indulged our info dumps and took an interest. Even if it was only a pretend interest. Even if it was the same information over and over.

As an adult, I'm thankful to my dad listening to me go on and on about my interests, talking to me about them, learning about them, even though he had absolutely no interest in the subjects himself.

(Lucky for me, my dad and I both share an interest in sci-fi. We've had many conversations about the technical manual for the Enterprise - a book we both have. But he also indulged my barbie interest. My painting. My crafts. My games. Whatever I was into, he would make an effort.)

You know best whether your daughter is old enough to understand that she needs to work out which hills are worth dying on / be able to recognise the difference between important and should be politely challenged and what is low stakes and not worth the energy and time.

messsy0 writes:

Three things. 1 an octopus is a mollusk, so your daughter is right. And on top of that “fish” is not a scientific term, it is a colloquial term we use to refer to a wide range of animals of the sea.

But since there is no scientific or technical definition, what you chose to include in that is subjective and may or may not include octopi. So your daughter correcting him, is not factually wrong if all she did was say that octopi are mollusk.

2 correcting someone is never disrespectful or wrong, as long as it’s done right, and it sounds like you daughter did it the right way, as was very respectful about it. However, adults generally don’t like to be corrected by children, especially not in settings where they are supposed to be seen as a “teacher” or source of knowledge.

3 I get where he is coming from, that his job may difficult to deal with, and being openly corrected by a child can be seen as a challenge to his “authority”. I also don’t see that is what your daughter intended to do, just that it is how he may have experienced it.

In conclusion, your daughter did nothing wrong, counsellor is sensitive and taking this out of proportion, and making issues out “nothing”.

Unfortunately he is not going to be the last adult she is going to encounter who will react this way to being corrected by a child.

Like you suggest, a valuable lesson for your daughter is to explain this problem to her, and let her know that some adults just isn’t very grownup, and doesn’t like to be corrected by kids. She did nothing wrong. NTA.