Some riddles are fun and easy. For example, many kids remember finding easy riddles on the insides of candy wrappers or on Saturday morning cartoons. For example, one easy riddle people often hear appears below.
What is black and white and read all over?
Many children hear this riddle growing up. After a little bit of thought, most people can figure out the answer is a newspaper. A newspaper is black and white, and people read the entire object. It’s a riddle since “read” also sounds like a color, and this misleads some people. However, the riddle isn’t that tricky if you take the time to think about it.
Unfortunately, not all riddles are this easy. In fact, there is a riddle currently making its way around the Internet that is blowing minds. Have you heard it yet? It’s a riddle about a family relationship. Check it out below.
If Teresa’s daughter is my daughter’s mother, who am I to Teresa?
To help you out, here are a few options to give your mind a little kick start. The answer is one of the five choices below.
(a) Grandmother
(b) Mother
(c) Daughter
(d) Granddaughter
(e) I am Teresa
Did you figure it out yet? If not, here is a little hint. You can only solve this riddle if someone actually provides you with the above five possible answers. If those five choices aren’t present, any listener will be led up one blind alley after another in a vain attempt to solve the riddle. Keeping that important bit of information in mind, take another few minutes to try and solve the riddle.
Did you get it? The answer is the final choice. The speaker is actually Teresa. How can you know? First, you need to remember that words can mean different things when spoken by different people. For example, if a guy says, “My daughter’s mother”, he is referring to his wife. If a lady say, “My daughter’s mother”, she is referring to herself.
If you look at the choices available, you can quickly ascertain the speaker is not a guy. This means the speaker must be referring to herself. That would indeed make her Teresa! If this is still confusing to you, keep in mind we can always rephrase the riddle to make the answer clearer. The riddle could also read, “If Teresa’s daughter is me, who am I to Teresa?” Crazy, isn’t it?
Of course, there is a little bit of linguistic sexism in the riddle. We overwhelmingly suspect Teresa to be a female name. However, there is no law in the universe that says a person named Teresa must be a female. A male could have any name he wants! This means we can’t know for certain from the choices that all the options are female.
Now, you are doubly prepared to have a response to this riddle. If someone tosses this riddle out at you, you can easily provide them with the correct answer. However, after you bask in your glory of identifying the speaker as Teresa, you could deliver a little lecture on the linguistic loophole in the riddle by pointing out we can’t be certain Teresa is indeed a female.
Regardless, what did you think of this riddle? Where you able to solve it right away? Did you need a little bit of assistance to get there? Don’t worry if you did! Many people find this riddle a tough nut to crack. Let us know all your thoughts in the comments below. Also, don’t be afraid to share a favorite riddle with us!
