Bad Boys, what'cha gonna do?

Ok, another long comment in reply to this post.

I may as well explain that my child hated me when I told him he was being a bad puppy. I have tried to use the good puppy/bad puppy stories to explain why I may seem to be acting in a cruel way to my child but that it is for their future happiness and survival. I wanted to raise good dogs, uh......children. For the most part I feel I have. But when I would punish the boy and he thought I was being too hard on him I'd say, "Nobody likes a bad dog!' and he would say, "I am NOT a DOG! Stop SAYING that!"

But it's true. Nobody likes a bad puppy. Puppies and dogs that jump all over you, lick your face, climb on your lap, yank at your pant leg, nip at your shoes, pull your shoestrings, get in the garbage, crap on the floors and bark all night do NOT have many friends.

Puppies can't talk so you can't explain things to them with words. You have to teach your puppy not to do these things so people will like it and it can have a happy social life with it's family. To teach it you use rewards and rolled newspapers across it's butt along with ignoring it when it is bad and petting it when it is good.

I think little children are the same way. I don't see how you expect children to respect their elders when we can't discipline them properly and consistently, in public as well as at home. While time outs and depriving a child of desert will work with older children I have yet to find a way to explain E=MC2, with E being the force that the car will smack you with if you are hit while playing in the street, to a 3 year old. Removing them from danger and applying warmth to the seat of learning is an action that even a child that young will understand; road=pain. I do not condone bruising or welts, canes and belts but there are times that words don't work and a little pain will keep the child from worse injury later.

Even animals discipline their young. Watch puppies and kittens play around their mom. She tolerates a lot of tail nipping and ear tugging but when someone bites too hard they get the "GGGRRRRRR" and if they don't stop they get nipped back or they will be bapped and rolled and the parent will put a foot on their chest and give them a major mean face look. One little pup would NOT stop biting on and then hanging from her mom's tail. The mom couldn't reach her well so she sat on her. The little one scrambled out from under and begged to be forgiven. The mom ignored her for at least two minutes while the puppy licked her chin more frantically each moment. When the mom thought the pup was sorry enough she looked at her and gave her a lick back. The pup never swung from her mom's tail again.

You have to teach children respect for you and obedience while they are young, before they can speak well. You have to communicate the difference and the consequences of good and bad actions and you can't use words. You use facial expression, body language and removal of child from danger. Only when necessary should you use force to teach them. It should be appropriate to the size of the child, done at the time of the bad action and forgotten by you as soon as the child is behaving properly.

Why is a child a pistol at home and sweet as an angel at Grama's house? Because Grama won't accept that kind of behavior and has showed the kid her word is good. If she says, settle down or no desert, there will be no desert. If the kid hits a sib in the head with a toy, a Grama is likely to snatch it from him and hit HIM in the head and say "Did that hurt? Don't hit people!"

As soon as a pup is old enough to CHOOSE an action, the parent provides feedback on whether it is an ok or a NOT OK action to the pups. Dogs ignore bad pups and play with, smooch and groom good ones. The pups soon stop the NOT OK behavior to get the approval and attention from their parent.

You might spank a kid at home but you can't spank a child in public - and they KNOW that! Some idiot made a law that you can't hit kids. They might be good at home but the minute you are at the store they are running around ramming carts into people, hollering for treats and toys and saying "you can't make me!" when you tell them to stop. The parent stands there, beaten, onlookers pretend to ignore the confrontation and the child romps on through the store.

When the pups are old enough to meet the pack the mom is on full alert. When the older dogs come over to sniff the young ones if a pup tries to nip, growl or jump at them the mom comes down on them HARD! She will snap them up and shake them then put them down between her front feet. This is to PROTECT the pup even though it appears to be disciplining the pup.

If a puppy, through ignorance, is too aggressive or rude, the other members of the pack may kill it. The mom knows this and treats her children in a manner that will show them how to behave with other dogs without getting killed. If a pup continues to annoy the elders you can bet it won't live to grow up.

There were kids sleding outside my house. When a big boy tossed a little one down in the snow one day and the dogs, over enthusiastic in checking to see if he was ok, walked on his face I was out the door before the kid could get to his feet. I stomped right out, grabbed the big one, tossed him down and held him there with my foot till the dogs walked on HIS face. "WAS THAT FUN! Don't EVER let me see you hurting littler kids again!" I shouted. Then I went back inside. Once they were over there shock the kids went back to sliding and there were NEVER any incidents in the years I lived there. At least, not where I would see them....LOL.

In that case, the big boy was mine. We have to be a little more careful with other's children. You can't just break the neck of a bad kid and toss him to the side to rot like an unacceptable puppy. If strangers in a store were to tell a child to stop ramming the cart into them in a properly cranky manner the child would run back for protection to it's parent and not risk ramming in the future. But, NOOOoooooo, disciplining another persons child might get you in trouble.

At a football game, where hundreds of parents were watching, I saw a big boy teasing a younger one by holding his shoe over his head. It had been raining and the ground was waterlogged and muddy. The little guy was hopping on one foot and crying. No sign of the parent or older siblings. When the little guy fell on one knee in the mud I had had enough.

I got up, took hold of the large boy's collar from the back, removed the shoe from his hand, gave it to the smaller boy and told him to sit down on the stands and put it on. When he had his shoe tied I released the big one and told them both, "Now GO and SIT with your parents!" with my best grumpy face on and in my best cranky voice. They both ran off and we didn't see them again that night.

I turned to go back to my seat and and a whole sea of faces was just staring at me. You could have heard a pin drop. I just shrugged at them and said "Somebody had to do it!" and went back to watching the game. On the way out someone I didn't know said, "Hey! Nice job with those boys!" Everyone was waiting for "someone" to "do something" and it wasn't happening.

You ARE someone and YOU CAN do something. A child knows when it is behaving in a socially unacceptable manner. They expect to be corrected. When they are not corrected they feel guilty but can't stop now - so they continue the behavior. I don't want to live with a bunch of free range hodlums! I still correct others kids if I have to because they NEED it.

I really belive that as they get older all these undisciplined offenses build up inside. They FEEL like they are bad kids. They think no one loves them enough even to correct them and help them be good kids. No one; Not a parent; not a stranger - cares.

Then they act even more badly but they start punishing themselves. You have cutters out there bleeding for attention and love. There are kids that make trouble just to see if someone cares enough for them to correct them. They make their appearance strange, ugly or bizzare to prove to themselves that people don't like them the way they are. They are rude and even threatening. There has never been a big dog that growled them down and rolled them over.

These kids are trying, out of hundreds of kids in schools, to be noticed. Attention = you are worth my time. They don't get it being good. Good kids are ignored. so they have to be bad. Sure, they hate detention, but they love the attention they got by being bad. All their peers notice them while they were acting up and then an adult NOTICED them! Some one CARED!

Showing an older child that they can get attention for being good takes time. Especially since none of us has enough time to just be there with our kids any more. It takes both parents working to pay for a household now. And you have to train yourself to notice them when they are being good. You have to be right on top of things, like a mama dog, paying attention to the good pups. "Thank you for hanging up your coat" may seem pretty lame but they will feel good that you noticed. And how does "Pick up your d@#$@ coat and put it on the hook, stupid!" sound?

Showing a child you like them as a person, even when they do bad things, is hard. Discipline IS is hard but disipline is love! You care about a child enough to correct it so it does well in society as an adult. Some times the "seat of learning" needs to be warmed to make a point. Maybe cleaning the crayons off the wall or washing the whole wall will do it. Or a time out. Or no TV for a week. What ever you use you are showing you care enough to let them "hate" you now so they have good lives later. They will love you for it in the long run.

YES, there are BAD kids - just born that way. I know 3 or 4 of them, one is a cousin. Same family, with 3 other kids, same life and just bad! Not everyone is born a ray of sunshine.

It is not always the parents fault when a child is mean or a bully. It is, however, always the parents responsibility. You have to make sure your child is not a threat to others. The cousin was beating up the other kids, skipping school, stealing and nothing they tried helped him. He was taken to juvenile court and turned over to the state. They sent him to a home for hard cases.

His parents loved him enough to admit that they could not teach him to behave in a socially acceptable manner and put him where they hoped he could be taught. No one was happy with the solution but it worked. He joined the Army at 18. He is a functioning member of society and comes to see the family but is still no ray of sunshine. He's a scary dog but there is a place for scary dogs to live a good life, too.

My kids are good dogs. One is a friendly, tail wagging "pet me!" dog that will come right up to you and follow you anywhere for some pets and a cookie. One is a quiet appearing layabout that is always alert for bad guys and waits to be asked before approaching new people. One is assertive, protective and barky but loyal to the bone and ready for petting as soon as you are properly introduced. The other is a show dog, with shining manners but that takes time to get to know you before allowing you to approach to give pets. None of them will jump on you unless invited, nip, or bite without cause, bark all night, get in the trash or be rude to older dogs. Every one of them comes when I call them and I love them to death! Good puppies!