Folklore: Neck Riddle (blame)

Genre: Neck Riddle                                                    
September, 8, 2001

Sineád Dinsmore

“Who did it?” “I dunno did it.”

At six or seven years of age, my cousin Sineád, who lives in Nicasio, CA., learned to redirect parental blame away from herself and onto a hypothetical character named “I dunno,” rather than onto herself or to her brothers. She is the second-born child, and only girl in a family of four: she has one older brother and two younger half-brothers who were always getting into mischief. More often than not, neither parent was home, in San Rafael, CA, during the day. Her stepfather Jimmy drove a tow truck, and her mother worked on an assembly line. Sineád and her older brother were expected to take care of the younger boys after school. And of course, since no one was really in charge, things happened, there was ample opportunity for mischief. And a need for a scapegoat.

Sineád explained how the custom began, “Whenever the last cookie was taken, or if somebody forgot to clean up after themselves, or something got broken, we’d all disclaim any knowledge of it. My mom would come home from work and ask, ‘Who did it?’ And we’d all reply, ‘I dunno.’“ Because she laughed, and we didn’t get into trouble, it became a trope. Sineád explained that “I dunno” was a convenient hypothetical scapegoat invented by them to pass blame onto, or to “pass the buck” to use another aphorism. She later added that it was probably related to another saying her mother used to repeat whenever they’d abdicate from their chores, “Let George do it.”

She recalled that laying blame on “I dunno” all began when a neighbor kid came over one day, and stole a doughnut and then left a note saying that ‘Not Me’ took it. So, “Not me” was the genesis of the make-believe character “I dunno.” Because Sineád was the only girl in a family of unruly boys, I think she felt a special need to redirect blame. She said she was later able to manipulate the gender bias in her favor, but not when she was six.