Teens Epic Facebook Fail

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
101

Speaking of stopping smoking: he says on his FB page that he still smokes because he can’t afford a Chantix prescription. That says volumes about him because it’s a totally bullshit excuse: Chantix is far from the only aid to quitting smoking, it’s not necessary for quitting smoking, there are other prescription drugs to quit smoking, etc… More than half of people who quit do so cold turkey (as evidenced on a recent poll here that almost perfectly reflects several actual studies in its results) and there are more nicotine replacement therapies on the market than ever: lozenges, patches, gum, e-cigarettes, and I’m sure I’m forgetting some, and not only are they available at Wal-Mart but they’re cheaper than fucking cigarettes.

If you haven’t quit it’s because you don’t want to, and frankly, that’s fine. I have no problem with that, free country, your body, etc… No matter what you take you still have to be motivated. BUT, don’t cough up a bullshit excuse when you know damned good and well that if your wife or son or daughter gave such an obvious bullshit excuse for not doing something they didn’t want to you’d be dynamiting the Wii or whatever.

I totally understand him getting pissed, I understand him taking his daughter’s laptop permanently, but I think dude has some attention whore and narcissistic needs at play as well. He is by his own admission relishing the attention and by the Chantix bullshit can’t really admit fault other than the “I make mistakes, just like other guys” (though other guys don’t do it quite so visibly, do they?).

As for his “won’t appear on your talk shows or radio shows or” blah blah, I’ll bet anybody $100 here and now he’ll go on one within two weeks and will have been on 3 or more within a couple of months using the excuse “wasn’t going to do this but wanted to set the record straight” (i.e. wanted to hold out for one with a big audience where I was sure I’d be treated like a folk hero or one that paid a lot, maybe in Chantix and hollow points).

The more I think about him the more despicable I think the video posting was. It’s going to take his daughter years to live that shit down, and while she comes across as a moody (surprise for a 15 year old girl) and possibly spoiled little whiner, I really really don’t think international humiliation (which is not an overstatement- this is in the foreign press) is going to help.

102

3 years ago, my daughter – who has had the privilege of attending excellent schools her entire life, not to private tutors when she was struggling – simply chose not to do a term paper, which was worth 40% of her English 9 grade. Her teacher spoke to her in person on the day she failed to turn it in, and kindly gave her a weekend extension. On Monday, after she failed to turn it in again, the teacher gave her a SECOND extension, which my daughter declined to accept. On Tuesday, the teacher called me, at work, to report why my daughter was going to get an “F.”

I came home from work to find her in her room, on her bed, singing along to a song on her iPod touch, nary a care in the world. I hope she enjoyed it, because that was the last song she heard on that iPod touch. I crushed it with my heel of my boot right in front of her.

Was it abusive to crush her property? No. It would have been abusive for me to crush her head. Was it stupid of me to destroy it instead of selling it? I suppose, but the money wasn’t my priority. What WAS important was to clearly communicate the message to my daughter, who I love immensely, that with privilege comes responsibility. Fail at the latter, and there is no former.

Oh, and what Mom giveth, Mom can most certainly taketh away.

I’m happy to report that that was the last in a long line of fights over homework. 2 years later, after making the honor roll for 3 consecutive semesters, she got another iPod Touch for Christmas. If therapy is in her future for having to witness her crazy mother crushing her iPod, she can pay for it out of her own money when she (finally) gets a job.

So, yeah, on the Dad’s side here.

103

Great going Dad. Say hello to your daughter, the future pole dancer.

What an ignorant fuck nut this guy is.

And seriously, the amount of people in this thread siding with the dad baffles me. I had to double check the address bar on my computer to make sure I wasn’t on sort of right wing repub forum. I think SA may be rubbing off on some of you guys. Jeesh.

And let’s not forget the girl is 15. At that age, I think she is allowed to be somewhat of an “attention whore”.

104

I survived two teen aged daughters and one son. ALL of them said and did disrespectful things growning up. For some it, they got grounded, priviledges removed and always were provided with details as to why these were put into place. Never did I shoot anything or destroy property. (Is that what I wanted my kids to learn while growing up? Nope.)

I read some of the posts on FB for this guy’s page and what bothered me even more than his video, his cigarette or his actions were the horrible comments people were posting about his daughter. Regardless of what she did or didn’t do, he opened up a can of worms when he put this out there and allowed people to take shots at his daughter.

Putting her in this position may cause more damage to their relationship and her self esteem than he ever realized. She’s a careless teen aged girl, but he should know better.

105

…and I hope you let her take that F on her paper… Sometimes the consequences of our own actions are the best teachers.

106

A couple people above have said they were raised in abusive homes and this isn’t abuse. I was raised in a home with not perfect, but better than average parents. They were strict, but reasonable and never disrespectful of me or my brother. People raised in abusive homes are probably right that this doesn’t approach the abuse they suffered. But, as someone who was raised in a healthy atmosphere, this also doesn’t approach that.

This guy is a nutcase, a crappy parent, and needs to start acting like the adult in the relationship. Yes, if your child is not using the computer responsibly, take it away, sell it, whatever. Post a video of you shooting the thing? Get a grip and grow up.

107

I kept waiting for the part of your post where you said, “But of course I didn’t take video of this and post it on YouTube and then revel in delight when it went viral so that millions of people around the world could share in my daughter’s humiliation, because that would be ludicrous and insane.”

108

I always end up confused in these threads because it’s hard for me to know what is ‘‘normal.’’ I certainly would not react the way this father did because I do think it was too extreme (and as a parent will probably err on the side of being too soft just b/c of my upbringing), but I wouldn’t be beneath taking away the laptop as a punishment for disrespect.

I asked my husband what he thought, since he was raised very differently than I was, and he generally saw it the way I did. He thought it was an overreaction but that the kid seemed to live in a household with a lot of love. I think his love for his daughter is evident in the video and that makes a big difference to me. It’s also clear he discussed the punishment with her mother beforehand, so it wasn’t a flying-off-the-handle thing. I dunno, I just don’t get the psycho vibe. But it could be my meter’s broken.

109

It’s really the viral video element that raises this to the level of “psycho” for me. Actual punishment: a little overbearing and draconian for me. But not outrageous. Enjoying the fact that millions of strangers are laughing at your daughter’s humiliation? Psycho.

110

Perhaps I missed it, as I’ve not been following anything about this story outside of here and Jezebel, but where have we established that he’s taking delight in her humiliation? I mean, I get that he’s going for a tit for tat type theme. But after watching the video and reading excerpts that’s been posted here from his Facebook, I still haven’t come across anything that says he’s reveling in it.

111

Our policy, throughout the many, many years of homework battles, is that if she failed to complete an assignment on time, she was still responsible for getting the assignment done, whether she got credit for it or not.

Consequences. They suck.

112

There is no evidence to support that he is “reveling in delight.”

113

Pffff. He linked straight to his Facebook page from the video so he could get more views, more attention, etc. And even if he were horrified by the attention this is getting (which he’s clearly not or he’d have taken the video down) he’s still a complete douche for subjecting his family to this. I don’t care how bitchy his daughter was.

114

Love doesn’t have a desire to hurt other people. This father is so proud of what he did he posted it for the whole world to see. It doesn’t matter how loving he seems in the video. The fact that he released it to the world shows a decided lack of love.

Now, if he had done it out of anger, I might be able to excuse it. Angry people have poor judgement, and at least he didn’t destroy anything unreplaceable. It’s not the best reaction, but at least he wouldn’t be the total douchebag he’s shown himself to be here.

Punishment is not about shaming. It is not about visceral reactions. It is definitely not about trying to make the child angry. It is about providing negative consequences for undesirable actions.

Not about bragging to your friends about how you punish your kid.

I hope no one here films themselves punishing their kid and then posts it on Facebook. I’m sorry, but that is NOT love.

115

This is how it came across to me. It wasn’t lost on me how he was struggling to keep vocal control or how he crushed the paper with her thoughts on it into a ball so tight that his fist & forearm shook. The symbolism of “I have the right to crush your dreams and any dissent, because I’m your father” seemed obvious. There was “the List” posted large and open in the house on the wall for her to do every day with the obligatory “because you can’t remember them if you don’t” abuse/control ‘make the victim feel useless and stupid’ pressure point.
Then there was the reaffirming of his “my way or the .45 way” parenting style with how he was out of the house by her age. Its about as subtle as Schwarzenegger climbing into a truck cab and saying, “Get Out”.

And what was all that again? Moved out of the house, lived on his own, went to college while in HS (I guess he means AP courses? Money well spent…), held two jobs & was a volunteer [del]Tuesday night poker player[/del] fireman? Man, I sure am glad days stopped being 36 hours long. Liar.
Well, to be fair, I guess “…and I walked 20 miles to school up hill both ways” was already taken.

But maybe I’m being unfair to this “trade of services” Tax Thief parent. After all, he’s a Proud 'Merican and shooting things and making the victim pay for the bullets is a Purely American thing, isn’t it?
I’m just glad that "I warned ya… " and “if it ever happened again, it’d be worse” by a guy whose hand is shaking with rage, packing a loaded handgun in public, and playing Ricochet Roulette with the denser parts of a hard drive in an unprotected open field is what passes for acceptable parenting
and responsible gun ownership. I’m not saying that I wish he’d caught bullet fragments; I just think he’s very lucky he didn’t. Well, maybe he’ll spit out a couple copper pieces at dinner after he harvests his next crop. Mmmm-mm good. That’ll learn-ya.:rolleyes:

116

Destruction of the laptop, by any means, is petty and immature, when simply removing it would have sufficed. Shooting it with a gun, filming yourself doing so, yeah, that’s way past immature and into creepy, for me.

Reading over and over, teenage parent rants, weeping and shaking? You got issues, get some help.

Publicly shaming or humiliating your child? Not against the law, but pretty bad parenting, to my mind.

The destruction of an item of educational value to another (in your own community!), to make a point, bespeaks a wasteful prosperity and arrogance that I’m pretty sure speaks volumes about this household.

Put me in the camp of not surprised this child has issues. Good luck with the next few years, Pops!

117

I cannot imagine a loving parent who has ever raised a 15 year old fiinding this video amusing. No matter what she did, there is no excuse for an angry father publicly humiliating his child. It made me incredibly sad to watch this raving lunatic.

118

I go with natural consequences whenever possible. You posted unacceptable comments? You post an apology and probably lose your computer until I can trust you again. Do it again, more privileges lost. Keep that shit up and that computer will be gone. But destroying it, whether by gun or sledgehammer or industrial shredder, strikes me as creepy. It’s not an act that’s going to inspire respect and it’s going to reinforce daughter’s opinion, rightfully or not, that dad is a controlling athoritarian dictator.
I’ve raised two kids to adulthood and have two just getting into their teens, and I’ve never had to resort to vandalizing property or public humiliation to earn their respect. This dad’s parenting is not just now going off the rails, I’d guess…it’s been headed that way for a while.
(I have threatened to dance publicly on occasion.)

119

Exactly.

This is a uniquely 21st century form of child abuse.

Have you read his FB page? It’s reveling.

120

It seems pretty clear that this guy is trying to communicate directly to what he perceives as the source of his daughter’s rebellious attitude: her “reveling” in the disrespect she dished to her parents on a public forum like Facebook, and her attempting to gain social status for being a pariah.

I don’t fault him for what he did, just how he did it. I think he should have chosen his words more carefully, and I don’t think shooting the computer was the right choice. But since this girl is taking her personal issues to a public place, him choosing to deal with it in that place is perfectly fine.

Don’t want your dirty laundry aired in public? Don’t bring it there.

Having said all that, this guy probably does have some issues that will negatively impact his daughter more than he realizes.