I think there are a lot of people who see exactly what you're describing. We are sensitive beings and notice quite quickly when someone wants to sell us a "U" for an "A". But if we also enter into such a swindle, because we lack the courage to admit our own absence, because we bought it after all, it doesn't help to point to others.
Just the other day I had a conversation about a man being persuaded by a woman to father a child and then wondering how it could happen that everything went terribly wrong. He will have known right at the beginning that nothing and nobody can persuade him to do anything that he himself does not really want. We all have this sense and this form of attention within us. We need to awaken it and encourage people with whom we come into contact to use their lie detector. Everyone has one, just like the children you mentioned. I could also say intuition. Do you have an example for me in which your intuition guided you correctly? Where did you prevent a stupidity that you were about to do?
Or what situation did you get out of because you realized that fighting or conflict intensification is the wrong way?