Welcome to the Daily Dad podcast where we provide one lesson every day to help you with your

most important job being a dad. These are lessons inspired by ancient philosophy, by practical

wisdom, and insights from dads all over the world.

Thank you for listening, and we hope this helps.

You can't be a hypocrite.

A few years ago, William H. Macy was asked the best piece of advice

he'd ever been given. Never lie, he answered. It's the cheapest way to go. Lies cost you a lot,

and they're never worth what they cost. But as the authors of Unacceptable, the new book about

the college admissions crisis, right?

Precisely as Macy was giving this interview, he and his wife, Felicity Huffman,

were helping their daughter unknowingly cheat on her SATs.

They were discussing plans for their other daughter to do the same.

The worst part, his daughter wanted to go to a theater school that didn't even need high SAT scores.

It was the cheapest way to go and not remotely worth the cost. His wife would go to jail for her role in it. His daughter was crushed, crushed that her parents didn't believe in her,

crushed at the embarrassment, crushed at seeing her parents who talked so much about being good

people, crushed to

see them do a bad thing. We've talked before about how we should try to behave as parents in such a way

that when our kids are older, they'll be impressed with us. My father has suffered more than Christ,

Ambrose Beers' son remarked when his dad finally sealed a painful family secret. We can imagine

that Macy and Huffman's daughter felt the exact opposite.

She found that her parents were hypocrites, that they were liars, and no child deserves that.

And so this is something to think about today before you slide into someone's DMs,

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