Kids say (and do!) the darndest things. The world is a giant playground when you haven't yet learned to grow a filter.
So redditor u/Granted01 polled the crowd: "What inappropriate thing did you do as a child that you didn’t realize was inappropriate?"
And, well, I'm glad to know I'm not alone in doing insanely doofy things as a wee one. Check out some choice responses below!
1. "Back when I was 7, I was shopping for clothes with my mom and she went to the 'clothes testing' station or whatever it's called (English isn't my native language). I didn't know which one she was in, so I peeked through every single one of them until I could find her."
2. "I used to play with this cup in the bath and drink water out of it for years, did it in the shower, too, as I got older; it had a handle on the end of it, and I never knew why. One day I witnessed my mother use this cup in the toilet violently, and that was the moment I realized what a plunger was."
3. "Right, so anyone who's seen Bean (the movie) probably remembers the scene where he waves his middle finger at people trying to say hi? I did that. To an elderly person. Need I say more?"
4. "My parents used to keep mini bottles of liquor in the fridge (the ones you’d find in a hotel minibar). We had to make our own lunches at times when mom and dad were busy with work, and my first grade ass decided to empty the bottles into the sink and put juice in them to bring to school…"
5. "Grabbed people's butts to watch them squeal."
"Apparently kids aren't supposed to do that."
6. "Not me, but my sister used to lap her drinks up like a dog. Turns out she was calling this 'doggy style.' One time they forgot to bring her a straw at the restaurant we were in, and she loudly screamed, 'GUESS I'LL DO IT DOGGY STYLE!'"
7. "We went to an Easter egg hunt at my mom's friend's place who we hadn't seen in a long time. When I saw her friend, I said, 'Oh my god, you got old.'"
"My mom was really embarrassed and laughed it off, but I can see the pain in her eyes thinking back on it."
8. "I opened a door. It was the, 'Don't open this door except in case of an emergency' at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum."
9. "I had a stuffed animal as a kid that was my favorite. It was a red bull, and I carried it everywhere I went, but it took me a while to give it a name. I thought, Hm, well, it has horns, so what would a good name be? I named my stuffed animal Horny."
10. "I was holding my mum’s hand on the right and an older male family friend’s hand on the left and thought that holding their hands felt warm and good, so let’s extend that feeling to them both and brought their hands together. Got scolded by my mum because she was so embarrassed."
11. "I grew up on Looney Tunes and would call people who were mean to me stinkers or dirty bastards. I called my granny's boyfriend a dirty bastard 'cause he started teasing me. I had my mom dying 🤣 😭"
12. "I used to respond to everything with, 'That's what she said!' not realizing it was a dirty joke."
13. "I heard Bender in Futurama say, 'It's a grower, not a shower,' and I repeated it constantly, not knowing what it meant."
14. "I used to chase the boys down and kiss them, because I liked to watch them scream and squeal, the same way they would chase the girls with muddy hands and worms and the like. I thought it was only fair. 🤷♂️"
15. "When I was 5–7, I used to put my hand in a karate chop sort of way and swipe upward between people’s buttcheeks."
"A bit like an upward card scanner with my hand being the card and their buttcheeks being the scanner 😅"
16. "I used to eat dishwasher tablets whenever my grandma got them out of the cupboard. I did it about three times until she just started locking me out the kitchen when she wanted to load the dishwasher."
17. "I thought 'clusterfuck' was a real word and not a swear. So I would use it in school and just all the time."
18. "When I was about 3 years old, I would constantly ask elderly people when they would die. In my mind, I just wanted to make sure that if I ever had something important to tell them I'd do it by then..."
"Never got a straight answer tho."
19. "I was at a family gathering in the winter and displayed all the gloves everyone had removed giving the finger."
20. "I spanked people who were slightly bent over because I thought it was funny. It's weird no one ever told me to stop doing it."
21. "I secretly threw things outside the window. I lived on the 25th floor."
22. "Once upon a time in first grade, I went to a birthday party of a classmate. This classmate's mom worked with my mom, and my mom couldn’t stand her. My mom talked mad shit. Me, being 6, didn’t watch my mouth, and the first thing I said to the mom when I got to their house was, 'If you’re so rich, why is your house so small?'"
"I’ve never lived it down to this day. I was 6. Maybe don’t talk so much shit in front of your innocent, loudmouthed children."