Depending on what kind of parent you are and the kind of methods you employ to teach your children lessons, you will either praise or cringe at what this mother did to discipline her children.
Writer and producer Jaime Primak Sullivan was at a Dairy Queen store treating her children to ice cream after dinner when it happened.
Image source: Facebook / Jaime Primak Sullivan
“They ordered their dessert choices and we waited about 5 minutes for them to call out our number,” she said in her Facebook post.
“The young lady (maybe 17) handed each child their ice cream. Not one looked her in the eye. Not one said thank you. Not to her, not to me… So I waited.”
In her head, Jamie counted to ten as her kids gleefully dug into their ice cream.
“The young lady just looked at me (probably because she thought I was hearing voices) and I watched as my children strolled out the door.
“I followed them outside where I calmly collected their ice creams and my kids watched in horror as I deposited them into the nearby garbage can. All 3 launched into mass hysteria. I waited. Quiet. Calm. When they realized I had something to say, they quieted down.”
She explained to her kids that one day if they are lucky, they would work a job not unlike the young lady and hope that people would really see them, look them in the eye and say “thank you.”
“We are too old at 8/7/5 to move through our days without exercising manners and honestly basic human decency,” she said. “So today, I am the meanest mum in the world.”
On her Facebook post, where it accrued almost 400,000 likes and at least 50,000 shares, the reactions from people were split.
Image source: Facebook screengrabs
One netizen who works in the service industry greatly appreciated the gesture and said, “As someone who works in a restaurant and deals with people who ignore me when I ask ‘how are you?’ or sit their money on the counter when I’m holding my hand out for it, or won’t even acknowledge me after I say ‘thank you, have a nice day!’ Thank you. Thank you for instilling into your children manners and plain human decency!”
Image source: Facebook screengrabs
On the other hand, some netizens thought it was too harsh. “I thought that was a bit over the top! I would have made them go back in the ice cream place and apologize for not saying thank you. They are great kids, and this was quite harsh and this memory will really stay with them, even though I know you were trying to make a point.”
Disciplining children is a highly subjective matter; what may seem to you right, may not to another parent.
Personally, what do you think, mums and dads? Were Jaime’s methods too over the top, or did she do the right thing to teach her children a lesson?
If you have any insights, questions or comments regarding the topic, please share them with us!
