“That’s On Me”

Is it just me, or is the phrase “that’s on me” becoming more common?

A football manager is interviewed after a defeat and admits that he got his tactics wrong. “Thats on me”, he says. In her recently released memoir, Nicola Sturgeon discusses her failure to narrow the attainment gap between rich and poor pupils as she committed to do in 2015. “I did not succeed in all that I set out to do on school education — and that is on me”

It’s a way of saying: “I’ll take the blame”. “You don’t need to look for anyone else to criticise — the fault is mine, and mine alone”. It’s surely to be applauded as a humble acknowledgement of fault. In a world where people seek to blame almost anyone or anything else for their own failures, it can be refreshing to hear a politician come out and say “it’s my fault — that’s on me”. If you’ve listened to hundreds of interviews with football managers and heard them blame injuries, referees, weather conditions, fixture pile-ups — even the colour of the kit the players were wearing — it’s refreshing to hear one hold his hands up and admit that he got something wrong. When, rather than throwing his players under the bus, he will take the hit and say “that’s on me”. Read the rest of this article written by Rev. Stephen Steele for a local paper here.