My kid stole a cookie, did I handle it well?

oh my god!
anyway, this is my last thread in here so after that you can party!!!
i am studying criminology and law. so i was just expressing my views and my professors’ views. but what we know. for the last time i am saying that i did NOT (i hope this time some of you will understand) that her son should not be punished. i am just implying that it should not that way. now, as i said every parent should do as he/she thinks to be the best, i just don’t. simply as that. i think is a big deal but not to be handled this way. i have never stolen anything in my life due to respect to the others because i was taught to respect them. and i personally think this is a good way to teach something to kids. now, if this doesn’t work then do other things.

“oh my god” what, natalia? That 5 year-olds sometimes take things? That the child who did the taking shouldn’t be the one to do the returning and apologizing, but the parent should? That you’re superior to me because you never took anything as a little kid? That I’m disrespectful?

What on earth are you blathering about?

You sound young and inexperienced. You definitely don’t have children, that’s for sure.

I’d strongly recommend that you not parrot a professor’s child-rearing advice, but try to formulate your own opinions. And stirring up dissent in a thread and then bowing out when you get called on “your” opinion is cowardly.

But hey, we’ll just party on without you!!

P.S. I can see that English isn’t your first language and I’m happy to make allowances for grammar and spelling. However, I’m confident that whatever language is native to you, your keyboard has an “Enter” key and a “Shift” key. Utilizing both of those would make your posts much easier to follow, considering they take more effort to read due to language skills. Thanks for you consideration.

Dragongirl, you did the right thing IMO.

natalia, you’re full of it. Been hanging out on the TCS site have we?

A friend of mine’s kid once stole an ornament from me. I saw it at her house and asked for it back. Ex-friend said, well, J loved it so much, I guess she just had to take it. Excuse me? Kid never apologised and I got the strong feeling I was supposed to say, oh well, that’s just fine, you keep it kid.

I once marched a 5 yo P the Elder back to a shop to pay for a stamp he’d lifted. The shopkeeper wouldn’t take the money and praised him for being a brave boy. I was seriously not impressed with her. Grrrr. He was only brave because I frogmarched him back, howling all the way.

Goodness gracious! Better to have a public apology in a store when the child is 10 years old than to appear before a judge when he’s 18…I can’t think of anything more humiliating than that!!

Good jobDragongirl ! Nice to know that there are parents who are teaching their kids right from wrong.:wink:

** natalia**, I was hardly being impolite by using the expression “hogwash”.
I noticed that in your “how to please a man” thread, you assured one of the posters that you’d been lurking for quite a while and were familar with the SDMB.
Surely you’re aware that disagreements ofter occur here and that opinions are strongly expressed.
If “hogwash” gets your knickers in a wad, I feel reasonably certain that your feelings are going to be hurt often.

Dragongirl, I’ve never met your friend, but she seems like an idiot.

ick.

if the future of the criminal justice system is in the hands of natalie and her professor’s clones, i greatly fear that civilization as a whole and society in general are in a much greater decline than i ever imagined.

i have yet to hear of any child that ever died of shame. people SHOULD be embarassed if they are caught doing wrong… it at least shows they have a conscience, in however rudimentary a form. if you have no shame in breaking society’s taboos, then i would worry about the possibility of a sociopath being on the loose. if there was no stigma associated with wrongdoing, then in effect wouldn’t it be alright?

anyway, Dragongirl, add my congratulations and a job well done to the list. and i’d definitely keep an eye on your friend’s kid if he’s ever in your house.

Good job, Dragongirl.

Someone has to teach today’s kids that supermarket food is only free if you finish it before you get to the checkout line! :smiley:

Dragongirl, I concur with all the others. You did the right thing. When my son was about 9, he stole some tweezers, of all things. My husband saw him put them in his pocket, and hauled him up to the front of the store. He didn’t steal after that.

I just received an e-mail that echoes some of this sentiment:

I Can’t Believe We Made It!

According to today’s regulators and bureaucrats, those of us who were kids in the 30’s, 40’s, 50’s, 60’s, 70’s or even the early 80’s, probably shouldn’t have survived.

Our baby cribs were covered with bright colored lead-based paint.

We had no childproof lids or locks on medicine bottles, doors, or cabinets, and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets.

Not to mention the risks we took hitchhiking.

As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags. Riding in the back of a pickup truck on a warm day was always a special treat.

We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle. Horrors!

We ate cupcakes, bread and butter, and drank soda pop with sugar in it, but we were never overweight because we were always outside playing.

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then rode down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.
We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the street lights came on. No one was able to reach us all day. No cell phones. Unthinkable!

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo 64, X-Boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, video tape movies, surround sound, personal cell phones, personal computers, or Internet chat rooms.

We had friends! We went outside and found them.

We played dodge ball, and sometimes, the ball would really hurt. We fell out of trees, got cut and broke bones and teeth, and there were no lawsuits from these accidents. They were accidents. No one was to blame but us. Remember accidents?

We had fights and punched each other and got black and blue and learned to get over it.

We made up games with sticks and tennis balls and, although we were told it would happen, we did not put out any eyes.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend’s home and knocked on the door, or rang the bell or just walked in and talked to them.

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn’t had to learn to deal with disappointment.

Some students weren’t as smart as others, so they failed a grade and were held back to repeat the same grade.

Horrors!

Tests were not adjusted for any reason.

Our actions were our own. Consequences were expected.

The idea of parents bailing us out if we got in trouble in school or broke a law was unheard of. They actually sided with the school or the law. Imagine that!

This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers, and inventors, ever.

We had freedom, failure, success, and responsibility — and we learned how to deal with it. And you’re one of them!

Anyway, kids need to know any action they have like that has a consequence. So if they do it again they are going to think twice about it- so you did just fine.

Dragongirl, you were Right. Don’t listen to your friend.

It’s the Kid, not the Cookie. And Public Humiliation for the crime (and this isn’t that public, and it isn’t that humiliating) IS called for.

We all grew up with more harsh standards than are being applied today and by-and-large, we all ended up OK. We parent by how we were parented and by what we have seen as effective strategies that Work. When we are forced to parent by the Exception instead of the Rule, the result is Always the same: Non-Parenting. And Active Parenting is Always better than Pensive Non-Parenting.

Exceptions Be Damned! You Go Dragongirl!!!

I think you handled it properly. I also think that it is good that you did not take the boy home and beat him like some other parents would have.

I really don’t get natalia. The circumstance of a child being caught stealing and a child being raped and then not believed by her parents are so different that they can’t be compared.

oh and Delores

I’m pretty sure that there were some overweight kids back in the 30s 40s 50s ect.

and the other claims of the email are a little too over-reaching and generalizing.

I realize that. It was supposed to be a cute nostalgic look back at the way we were raised, where our actions had consequences, instead of the way things are now, where everyone is a victim. I thought everone would get that.