We have all been there, most recently it happened to me in my school library.
A mother/father doing their own thing while the child screams and cries,or, in what I would consider the more extreme cases, the child is screaming and crying and the parents are nowhere to be found.
So what do you do?
Most of us would do nothing, at least I would never. Mostly because we have been there and we understand that situation although I tend to not take my nieces anywhere if they want to throw temper tantrums, but I realize that it is an every day thing and cannot really be avoided.
Do any of you ever say anything to the todler's parents? Do you get annoyed? Or do you understand??
Have you ever thought about hauling off and slapping the kid (obviously you wouldn't, but has it crossed your mind?) Well this guy actually did it!
Yeah- I'm not kidding. He's 61 and the scene was WalMart. The young mother's todler wouldn't quit crying so the old man told the woman that if she didn't shut her kid up- he'd do it for her. Well little did she know that she'd run into him again a few isles down. And because her child had not quit screaming and crying- he hauled off and slapped (I think it was a little girl) her 4 times in the face!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AND- get this- after he slapped the little girl FOUR times in the face, he then turned to the mother and said "see, I told you I'd shut her up". Police say that the man apologized to the mother (before the police got there) for his acts. Either this guy was truly an "old-timer" and thats how he punished his children, or he is really sick. Either way- can you imagine slapping another person's child that you don't even know in the face? 4 TIMES?! Thats insane! You can find the whole story here- and a picture if it so interests you... I know I like to stay up on current news, even the crazy stuff.. I'm kind of a news junkie.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/09/02/georgia.tot.slapped/index.html#cnnST...
Jeepers, girl, you post a lot of blog entries!
Anyway...I'd probably attribute the man's actions to old-timey thinking....the kind of thinking I almost want to come back, because the children today *shudders* ...well let's just say I wouldn't be too proud to have them as our future.
4 times seems a little harsh, but who knows? Perhaps he didn't hit all that hard. It could've been a light slap that doesn't hurt--just shocks the child into behaving. Just a thought.
While I'm not entirely opposed to the idea of spanking one's own child if one feels such punishment is necessary (and it does not reach the point of abuse), the man was slapping someone else's child.
I don't care what either adult's position is on corporal punishment, you don't do that to a stranger's child.
I am treated as evil by people who claim that they are being oppressed because they are not allowed to force me to practice what they do. ~D. Dale Gulledge
Yeah I can definitely agree with you on that aspect. I share you **shudders** and like you said maybe he didn't hit that hard- and he apologized. We have all been there where we really wish that kid was ours cause we'd take them home and give them a good spankin'. Especially with the younger teens these days- and the "i hate yous" and "F*CK yous" I really really want to slap them a couple times. Or the ones who practically run over the elderly, that angers me too. But then again this guy could be a creeper. I'd probably kill somebody if they hit my kid, ya know? But I don't have a kid, and when I do they won't be throwing temper tantrums at walmart.
And yeah- I love this whole new blogging thing. I'm a lonely college student :-( I don't have any friends here and my only real friend is my boyfriend but he lives 4 hours away and goes to school & work too so we don't have a whole lot of time to talk, so you guys are my new bffs :-)
n/t
---
What is a "Real American?"
---
Check out Progressive PRIDE, a Gay-Straight Alliance for the ProU community.
Totally see your point. Yeah, you never know if this guy was just a whacko. Who knows? Who can even tell anymore?
Also, use the "reply" link at the bottom of a post you are replying to. Makes it easier when more comments are posted to see who's talking to who.
When I first started college, I was lonely too :) and bored all the time. I became addicted to the Internet, spent unfathomable hours on Youtube, ProgressiveU, and other sites. Now I'm not nearly as bad and give myself time limits and find other ways to keep myself occupied. I've always been a big reader, so I always have a book or two on hand.
Anyway, I'm sure no one here will hate having you as their "bff". We try to be friendly here. :)
to switch the focus a little. I want to know what is wrong with a mom that would leave a screaming child's side or go far enough that this could happen. The fact that he got 4 'slaps' in is shocking. If anyone raised a hand to my child I would be irrate and probably be giving retribution before the second act.... the poor man would probably have a broken arm or hip or something.
I am completely opposed to face slaps as that just is demeaning. Under appropriate circumstances a spanking is fine but on the bottom.
Anyway, before I get stuck on some sort of tangent rant, Thank you for sharing this with us.
There are very few human beings who receive the truth, complete and staggering, by instant illumination. Most of them acquire it fragment by fragment, on a small scale, by successive developments, cellularly, like a laborious mosaic.~- Anais Nin
One thing I haven't been able to find (granted, I've been too busy to do any digging), is the size difference between him and the girl's mother. Hell, if I was a smaller person, I'd be afraid to see that guy in real life, he's scary enough in the one mug-shot I saw. From what I understand, she was right there (IIRC, the article stated that he said something along the lines of "shut her up or I'll do it for you."), so my guess is that either she felt too threatened by him, or was in too much shock that he was actually hitting a stranger's child to be able to do anything.
I agree with you, though, about what my reaction would be. Like I said in the blog I first saw this article in, if it was my kid, the guy would have been a steaming pile of twisted flesh on the ground by the time I was through with him. You don't get between me and my children.
I am treated as evil by people who claim that they are being oppressed because they are not allowed to force me to practice what they do. ~D. Dale Gulledge
There have been plenty of instances where people are just rooted in place from shock. It's like with many other things... you can't really know how you'd react until you're there, in the same situtation. Perhaps you would tear the guy's head off, but perhaps you'd be just as shocked at the man and be physically unable to move or speak. I've read cases where mothers stand and watch their children be murdered because they are physically in so much shock they cannot move, however much they want to.
~C
Check out the latest entry in the Between The Lines column!
Want the highest rated list to change? RATE those blogs, then!
I wonder if that was an evolved defense mechanism? Perhaps we, at one point, had a predator that could only see movement?
Just a random thought on the "frozen in shock" thing.
I am treated as evil by people who claim that they are being oppressed because they are not allowed to force me to practice what they do. ~D. Dale Gulledge