What an idiot. He could have sold or even better donated it to someone who could really use a computer. Yeah yeah, the daughter is a brat but I'm thinking there is a good reason for that. Parents don't need to be such hard asses if they raise their children right.

What kid doesn't complain about chores? What an over the top, and ironically childish, response.

What lesson is he teaching by doing this? This isn't discipline, it's revenge for getting embarrassed on facebook, which an adult should care less about.

It's sad that the father/daughter relationship they have communicates through facebook/youtube.

ASSHOLE!

>> ^Lann:
What an idiot. He could have sold or even better donated it to someone who could really use a computer. Yeah yeah, the daughter is a brat but I'm thinking there is a good reason for that. Parents don't need to be such hard asses if they raise their children right.


I watched this video and thought to myself "good on him, his daughter will learn the lesson that there are consequences for our actions". Then I saw your comment and I completely agree, this video could have been so very different if it was one of him handing the laptop over to a grateful child who will appreciate it.

Not sure that we should comment on his parenting, we're only seeing a small glimpse of it and what I see is someone who feels they must resort to harsh tactics because the considerate approach has failed. Ideal parenting is desirable but we have no control over the influences our children are exposed to when they're at school, therefore we have to react to behaviour that ideal parenting techniques can't definitively deal with. Mind you, ideal parenting techniques generally recommend home-schooling for complete control over influences, but home-schooling just doesn't work for the majority of families.

My honest opinion is that we become better people when we're exposed to harsh realities of life and have to adjust and deal with them. It makes us more considerate of the needs of others when we've had to deal with life's shit. I think this lesson will make his daughter a stronger and better person.

A more clever solution would to have faked it, by shooting a laptop bag full of holes. Give the kid a good scare.

"My daughter complained about me to the whole world! I will get revenge by complaining to the whole world about her!" That's some good parenting there, Lou.

The Father is immature and over-reacting. This kind of parenting only pushes the kids away, and the only thing it teaches them is to be assholes to their kids in the future. The daughter should be able to vent her frustrations wherever she wants. If she's wrong, then communicate with her in an adult way.

As a parent myself, I think he's making a fair and forceful statement here. His daughter's posting clearly demonstrates her entitlement, disrespect and immaturity. I'm guessing Lou is a consistent and fair disciplinarian and to this point his daughter hasn't gotten the message.

True, he could have donated the laptop to someone. But I doubt very much that he wants to spend more time wiping the personal data off it!

*nsfw

This video has been flagged as being Not Suitable For Work - declared nsfw by ant.

I'm seeing faults on both sides here. She obviously shouldn't have been so blatantly disrespectful like that, though at the same time EVERY kid needs to vent at some point. He had every right and was right in fact to punish her, but not in the way he did. Honestly they're both being pretty immature here (the mom too from the sounds of it). The 3 of them need to sit down for an evening and have a long talk about a)the privileges she enjoys as a member of the household and b) the responsibilities she and her parents both have as members of same. Almost always the responsibilities are the only things considered and the privileges simply get taken for granted. She needs to understand that her parents do an awful lot for her. At the same time, they need to understand she needs some privacy, which is where the venting should go. NOT out to the world of FB.

Separately :
Sucks about the laptop. But then, anger and guns never did the world any favors. And gun owners wonder why so many people are irritated at them. Because morons like this treat them like toys.

Better than redtube...
>> ^notarobot:

It's sad that the father/daughter relationship they have communicates through facebook/youtube.

Ultimately this won't work. Grounding is really a non specific way to force authority. It punishes instead of teaching and won't ultimately create any more respect from child to parent.

Surely she needs a to learn about responsibility and compensation?

Agree to pay her for work around the house. If she only works 10 minutes like he says, then she only gets paid for 10 minutes (what $4 a week?). Why not? you don't work for free. Chores without allowance is dumb. Slaves have no loyalty and kids learn nothing about how the real world world works.

She wont get a job, then no upgrades. There's nothing stopping him uninstalling them. Rent her the battery for a fixed charge until it's paid for. If he works in IT then it should be no issue to make himself Admin of her laptop and give her only limited access to the minimum necessary for school work.

Present her with a weekly bill for her share of expenses. you can't blame her for knowing nothing about the real world if she has no visibility and ownership of it. Give her ways to contribute and reward contribution.

I was going to make a comment about smoking, but then he said he was IT, and I was like, "ooooh, never mind."

There are a lot of nits to pick on both sides of this but at the end of the day it is his house, his daughter, his money and time put into the laptop. Whatever solution he wants to implement is his business.

My personal take is that as long as he does have a long talk with the daughter about the whys and what needs to change as a result of this, I like his style and think it is much closer to "tough love" than "ass". She won't see it that way at first, but based on similar experiences I had growing up she will probably come to appreciate that this was a valuable and important lesson to learn. Did he let emotion get the better of him and react a bit more strongly than necessary? Probably, but that is something that he can learn from as well as a parent.


I can see the point of the other comments here, but just thought I'd be Devil's Advocate for a few here. No offense meant, this is just my take:

@Lann - sold or donated would have been OK, but IT things tend to not have much resale value. Plus the costs in time and money to format / wipe it of personal data first. His property, his decision to make.

@longde - I don't think he is upset about getting "embarassed" on facebook. He is upset that his daughter feels entitled to everything, doesn't respect that her parents have to work to provide her with things, and doesn't realize that at some point she will have to take care of herself. I think this is actually more about discipline than revenge.

@raverman - Chores without allowance is dumb? I don't see it that way. The chores that he listed for the daughter basically amount to her taking care of her own messes. Pretty important thing to learn, I think.

Thinking about it more, what really bothers me about this video is the gratuitous use of the gun. To display that level of intimidation and violence in his home is one thing, but to broadcast it to other youth in his community is reckless.

One unintentional lesson that kids will take from this is that it's acceptable to wave a gun around and shoot off a few rounds to vent your anger and resolve a problem.

If I were a parent in this community, I would be making a few calls to the authorities.

And I'm the guy who supported belt whipping guy. I think gun guy is way worse than belt beating guy.

(also, how did this genius know that there would be no flying shrapnel from the components in the laptop?)

I couldn't watch it all due to the butt-hurt idiocy of the father.

If more parents treated their children like adults, we would have more adults in the world that grown-up children.

EDIT: Oh... and @longde - You supported that guy? What the fuck man? Physical violence is not, ever, EVER, fucking EVER a ... Christ man... you made me rage the words right out of my mouth. You know what I'm saying.

You can argue the shooting the laptop all day long. It doesn't matter.

The kid is a useless blight and Dad is saying it time to grow up. Some lessons in life are hard.

Good for Dad.

A father that talks to his daughter. WOW !

>> ^longde:

Thinking about it more, what really bothers me about this video is the gratuitous use of the gun. To display that level of intimidation and violence in his home is one thing, but to broadcast it to other youth in his community is reckless.
One unintentional lesson that kids will take from this is that it's acceptable to wave a gun around and shoot off a few rounds to vent your anger and resolve a problem.
If I were a parent in this community, I would be making a few calls to the authorities.
And I'm the guy who supported belt whipping guy. I think gun guy is way worse than belt beating guy.
(also, how did this genius know that there would be no flying shrapnel from the components in the laptop?)


I fully understand and appreciate your concerns here, but once again I'm on the other side of the fence. Maybe just because I grew up on a farm in a rural area where a very high percentage of households owned at least one firearm and most kids in those homes were taught how to responsibly use a gun.

A lot of people think that there isn't really any justification for owning a gun outside of being a soldier or policeman, and that therefore the only way to practice being responsible with a gun is to simply never own or fire one. I would disagree, but if that is the mindset I'm not going to be able to convince anyone otherwise.

Anyway, I don't see his use of the gun as displaying any "intimidation" or "violence", so I don't have any problem with his posting the video on his daughter's facebook and/or youtube or whatever. By shooting the laptop, he wasn't telling his daughter "straighten up or next time its YOU!" (intimidation), he was telling her that actions have consequences and since the laptop is his property he can do whatever he wants with it -- including destroying it rather than have her feel like she is entitled to it.

There are plenty of freely available videos on the internet (even here on the sift, say) where people use firearms in genuinely reckless and irresponsible ways orders of magnitude beyond this one. And that is before considering ubiquitous reckless or malevolent use of firearms in fictional media like movies, etc.

If you were a parent in his community, you would be welcome to call and complain to the authorities, but they would tell you that he definitely didn't do anything against the law. So you'd pretty much be wasting your breath.

About the risk of flying shrapnel, I think that he "knows" that there wouldn't be any (or at least that the risk is acceptably minute) because he has used firearms before. Part of learning to use a gun responsibly (at least, how I would define responsibly) is shooting at things and seeing what happens to them. You shoot a BB gun at cans or bottles set up on posts. You shoot a rifle or handgun at targets at a shooting range or in a rural area with nothing in front of you. You shoot a shotgun at an empty 2-liter bottle thrown up in the air, or at clay pigeons.

While doing those things, you notice that whatever you are shooting at generally doesn't explode like it does in the movies. If any fragments fly off (not likely), they won't have much mass, they won't be traveling very fast (vastly slower than the bullet), and they will most likely be traveling in the same general direction as the bullet -- not back towards you. Physics dictates that his shooting the laptop was relatively safe, even at close range like that.

Thanks for the thought out response MMD. Actually, my father and grandfather owned guns and kept them in the house. They were former marine and army, and definitely believed in the 2nd amendment. My father even gave me a rifle for a birthday as a child and taught me basic safety and maintenance.

But I never saw them use their guns in an emotional outburst to make some argumentative point. They had too much discipline for behavior like that. The guy in the video is clearly very angry and emotional (from the timbre in his voice) before and while using the gun.

As far as the legality of him doing what he was doing. From my experience, cops can make up a charge if they really want to, and maybe they (and child services) would at least bother the guy enough to make sure he thinks twice before brandishing a gun in this manner and putting it on youtube.

Yeah people shoot at things all the time, but a laptop? I know how they are assembled, and there are several layers of components that make up the machine, including many brittle materials that can easily shatter. Not to mention toxic materials like solder, etc. I doubt this guy has been taking laptops down to the quarry for target practice regularly enough to know how they take a hollow point.>> ^MilkmanDan:

>> ^longde:
Thinking about it more, what really bothers me about this video is the gratuitous use of the gun. To display that level of intimidation and violence in his home is one thing, but to broadcast it to other youth in his community is reckless.
One unintentional lesson that kids will take from this is that it's acceptable to wave a gun around and shoot off a few rounds to vent your anger and resolve a problem.
If I were a parent in this community, I would be making a few calls to the authorities.
And I'm the guy who supported belt whipping guy. I think gun guy is way worse than belt beating guy.
(also, how did this genius know that there would be no flying shrapnel from the components in the laptop?)

I fully understand and appreciate your concerns here, but once again I'm on the other side of the fence. Maybe just because I grew up on a farm in a rural area where a very high percentage of households owned at least one firearm and most kids in those homes were taught how to responsibly use a gun.
A lot of people think that there isn't really any justification for owning a gun outside of being a soldier or policeman, and that therefore the only way to practice being responsible with a gun is to simply never own or fire one. I would disagree, but if that is the mindset I'm not going to be able to convince anyone otherwise.
Anyway, I don't see his use of the gun as displaying any "intimidation" or "violence", so I don't have any problem with his posting the video on his daughter's facebook and/or youtube or whatever. By shooting the laptop, he wasn't telling his daughter "straighten up or next time its YOU!" (intimidation), he was telling her that actions have consequences and since the laptop is his property he can do whatever he wants with it -- including destroying it rather than have her feel like she is entitled to it.
There are plenty of freely available videos on the internet (even here on the sift, say) where people use firearms in genuinely reckless and irresponsible ways orders of magnitude beyond this one. And that is before considering ubiquitous reckless or malevolent use of firearms in fictional media like movies, etc.
If you were a parent in his community, you would be welcome to call and complain to the authorities, but they would tell you that he definitely didn't do anything against the law. So you'd pretty much be wasting your breath.
About the risk of flying shrapnel, I think that he "knows" that there wouldn't be any (or at least that the risk is acceptably minute) because he has used firearms before. Part of learning to use a gun responsibly (at least, how I would define responsibly) is shooting at things and seeing what happens to them. You shoot a BB gun at cans or bottles set up on posts. You shoot a rifle or handgun at targets at a shooting range or in a rural area with nothing in front of you. You shoot a shotgun at an empty 2-liter bottle thrown up in the air, or at clay pigeons.
While doing those things, you notice that whatever you are shooting at generally doesn't explode like it does in the movies. If any fragments fly off (not likely), they won't have much mass, they won't be traveling very fast (vastly slower than the bullet), and they will most likely be traveling in the same general direction as the bullet -- not back towards you. Physics dictates that his shooting the laptop was relatively safe, even at close range like that.

Ugh, this guy is psycho. Based on just this video, which is even the father's version of the events, I'd have to say the daughter is completely right at the father is completely wrong in so many ways. People get pissed off and vent, it's normal. She vented by complaining to her friends. That's about as benign as venting gets. And he flips out and punishes her for it. Does he think people are supposed to never get upset? What a fucking tool.

0:10
I'm pretty sure Hannah nor her friends thought her post was cute. She was upset and venting, and her friends were probably sympathizing. The father seems thinks her Facebook post was some kind of performance piece intended to elicit laughter at his expense. He seems to be self centered, and indifferent or oblivious to his daughter's frustration.

0:18
He thinks other parents don't know their kids curse or get angry and vent. And given his level of shock and over reaction to his daughter's behavior, he apparently didn't know it himself. How could he be that naive and out of touch?

0:25
I doubt she thought she was being "smart". She was sharing something with her friends, it wasn't meant for her parents. Phone conversations are by default private, Facebook is not so she had to make it private. On this point he's effectively getting upset at his daughter over idiosyncrasies of different technologies or the fact that Facebook is currently the trendy way to communicate. This reminds me of the judge that flipped out on his daughter over a computer. God bless America and its luddite rednecks, ruining childhoods one at a time.

Also, him using words like "cute" and "smart" to describe his daughter's behavior again hints that he is completely out of touch with how she feels and why she's acting this way.

0:45
Is he hinting that he found the post by logging into Facebook as her on her comp and snooping around? If so, that's pretty fucked up. There's nothing quite as infuriating and rage inducing and relationship ruining as having your parents treat you like an animal with no right to privacy.

1:35
It's absolutely disrespectful and extremely inconsiderate to track dirt across a floor that you know somebody else has to clean. If you have shitty shoes, take them off at the door. If he can't be bothered to do this he's an assbag.

1:40
Telling her to get a job at 15? If she wants to get a job at that age, in addition to school, then good for her. But telling her she has to get one? What an ass.

3:15
What a smug douche. He absolutely should pay her for doing chores. The amount she makes should correspond to the chores. If the chores amount to nothing, then so does her pay.

3:35
She has to wipe the counters? Really? In itself that's a minor thing to do, but it indicates that he(or his wife, or somebody) doesn't clean up after themselves. It's exceptionally infuriating having to run around behind fucking slobs and clean house.

3:52
Making beds. What an entirely useless activity. I have never understood peoples' obsession with this. And it's her bed, not his! Does he hold business meetings in her bedroom? How many shares of stock does he own in her bed? Is he afraid Martha Stewart and the SS are going to drop by for a surprise daughter-bed inspection? Being uptight about pointless (and unseen) aesthetics fits in with his overall douchiness.

4:15
Oh my god, she wants a battery and a power cord! That is so much to ask for her! How dare she ask her parents for relatively cheap items that are essential to her education!

4:25
Calling your daughter a lazy ass. Good parenting, bravo good sir! That'll surely strengthen the familial bond and her encourage her to be productive!

4:40
Just because you had to deal with a lot as a teenager doesn't mean your daughter is capable or should have to do the same. What kind of psycho parent wants their kids to have as hard a life as their own? Don't most loving parents want the opposite?

4:45
Well no, just a moment ago you also listed chores she has to do. Using hyperbole is not a way to get your daughter to respect your argument. You sound like a husband bickering with his wife.

5:15
Is this the same instance of grounding as he mentioned earlier, for three months? But he can't remember what it was? Did he have a stroke? Or does he just not give enough of a shit about his daughter's life and concerns to remember what he grounded her for three months for? Three months! For three months he had to enforce restrictions on her. Every day for those three months he would obviously have to remember she was grounded, and that in turn would reinforce his memory of what she was grounded for. But now he can't remember?

5:18
More name calling.

5:30
Pure unbridled psychotic. He got so pissed off at his daughter using Facebook that he felt a serious urge to discharge a firearm into her laptop? Grade A fucking lunatic. This man is dangerous.


I'll stop here, it just gets worse. I'm going to try to find out what town they live in and contact the local police. This guy may be a hard worker, but he is an extremely shitty parent, is no doubt terrorizing to his daughter, and possibly a danger.

This is why we should be phasing out the involvement of parents in raising children.

How much longer can we afford to allow maniacs like this to interfere in the development of potentially useful people?

He paid for the laptop. Fortunately, as an a American, he is still free enough to DO WHATEVER he wants with his stuff. For those of you with no children -- you have some conceit commenting on this individual's parenting skills.

Why is the daughter a brat and acting out on the Internet when things don't go her way? Consider the source.

so let me get this straight... the guy installed 100 and something dollars of software on his daughter's laptop, because she probably asked for it, and he agreed and installed it, and now he wants to be paid for it? Destroying the laptop wasn't enough?

What a fucking child. (the father)

This guy's a straight up douchebag.

Anyone watching this video and then defending parent's rights, rights to destroy personal property, rights to discharge weapons...whatever...you're doing nothing more than transposing your own ego over this particular event and other people's responses to it. Feeling personally threatened by and affronted by people's reactions to someone else's outrageous behavior.

Point being, if you're defending this guy you're needlessly applying this debate to yourself and not paying attention to what you're actually seeing here. Which is, this guy's a bonafide shit bucket.

There are many ways to parent and sure, who are we to criticize...but I find one general rule to hold true: When in conflict with a child, remember YOU'RE the adult. If at any point a bystander has difficulty discerning, based on words and actions, who is the adult in the conflict...then you're being a shitty parent.

This guy acts as bad as, or worse than, the teenager he's describing. He's a self centered fuck stick.

Shooting a laptop? Really? Gotta love the redneckery that's out there! I certainly wouldn't hire anybody like that man to solve my IT problems; for all I know, the 45 is how everything gets solved.

The guy is in IT, and he actually spent more than 100 dollars on software for his daughter's laptop.
Not condoning piracy here... just saying.

>> ^MonkeySpank:

Shooting a laptop? Really? Gotta love the redneckery that's out there! I certainly wouldn't hire anybody like that man to solve my IT problems; for all I know, the 45 is how everything gets solved.

I can't say what it's like to be a parent, but I can say what it's like to have been a teenage kid.

You complain about everything. Your parents. Your school. Your friends. Everything that doesn't go your way in your life seems like an unprecedented tragedy of galactic proportions. You're emotional -- when you're happy you're freakin' giddy, and when you're mad all sense of proportion goes out the window, and you let fly with everything you've got.

I'm old enough now to see why that's hard for anyone to handle. I'm old enough now to realize a lot of it was petty childishness, and most of the rest was the kinds of overwrought emotional responses that seem to be common to most teenagers.

Like I've said, I don't know what it's like being a parent, but I'm sure the bit where she said she wouldn't be there to take care of him when he's old probably hurt him a lot more than he's willing to admit. And I'm just as sure she doesn't really mean it.

Growing up isn't easy. I can honestly say I think the first 15 years of my life were a lot harder than the last 15 years of my life. But it's a big adjustment going from complete dependency to being independent. It's a big adjustment going from having your life strictly controlled by someone who knows you and loves you, to going out into a world that's controlled by people who are indifferent, uncompromising and mechanical with how they'll impose limits on you.

I'm just gonna go out on a limb here, and say that it seems unlikely to me her behavior improve because of this. His daughter will not be complaining less. His daughter will not be swearing less. I wouldn't even be surprised if she fights back, stops doing chores, starts swearing to her dad's face, or maybe even runs away.

Maybe I'm just projecting my own childhood onto other people, but that's how I reacted when my parents tried to ground me for thought crimes.

I guess it's a little dangerous letting your kids read 1984 when they're teenagers. The world of Big Brother and your life as a teenager start seeming scarily similar.

LOL I cant help but see his hat-brim shadow as him having a Wolverine Haircut

The tighter you squeeze, the more they fight back.

Parenting is easy. (I never want to be one!)

this guy seems far more immature than his daughter.

For all the raving and quibbling over this guys actions, our world would be a much better place if the average parent was more like him.
1. He actually cares about how his child is behaving, that's already better than almost 50% of my kids classmates have.

2. He is actually trying to discipline his child. It seems most parents these days think a stern 5 minute talking to is punishment enough for anything.

3. He actually is trying to teach the value of hard work and make sure his kids don't grow up expecting everything and anything be given them on a platter. If you look at the self entitled attitude that is omnipresent in society, I'd again love to see this guy's approach adopted in place of the status quo.

Your not the father so stfu... how about that?

Does he have a right to be angry? Yes. Did he handle it like a mature parent trying to be a role-model? No.

>> ^alcom:

As a parent myself, I think he's making a fair and forceful statement here. His daughter's posting clearly demonstrates her entitlement, disrespect and immaturity. I'm guessing Lou is a consistent and fair disciplinarian and to this point his daughter hasn't gotten the message.
True, he could have donated the laptop to someone. But I doubt very much that he wants to spend more time wiping the personal data off it!


too many parents want to be friends with their children

that's not what a parent is... they are an authority figure... and if they don't teach their children that their actions have consequences, NO ONE WILL

i'm not a big fan of guns and yeah, i think a punishment of making his daughter donate the laptop would be more politically correct, and I'm not a big fan of him shooting off some hollowpoint exploding shells within sight of several homes and busy roads

but over-reaction? no... more people need to discipline their children... entitlement and disrespect are HORRIBLE character traits for a parent to allow to fester in their child...

making comments as to his parenting aptitude is plainly moronic... you are making a judgement based on this ONE instance of your knowledge of their relationship... and that leads me to think you fall into "lets be friends" camp

there's no room for REASONING until they reach the age of REASON... and that isn't their teens... it usually falls much later, after they've moved out and had to start to deal with some of the things they put their parents through... when they come back to mom and dad and say "I never understood until now"

some kids never get there... more and more often it seems... a nation of self-important brats

really? if a parents reaction to emotional idiocy by their kid, is emotional idiocy in return, they're essentially validating emotional idiocy.

I'm wondering if the people that strongly disagree with this father's tactics are still living at home themselves. At the very least, they're either not parents themselves or they are new parents and their children are very young.

I don't think this father's reaction is "emotional idiocy" at all. He said he grounded her for 3 months for doing something very similar to this before, so the message needed to be made clearer. Furthermore, he is not alone in this sentiment. The girl's mother is also behind him, so it's hard to argue that this is a case of one man gone crazy overboard, despite the number of posts in opposition to the tactic.

>> ^criticalthud:

really? if a parents reaction to emotional idiocy by their kid, is emotional idiocy in return, they're essentially validating emotional idiocy.

Update from the father:
http://www.litefm.com/cc-common/mainheadlines3.html?feed=421220&article=9744152

>> ^alcom:

I'm wondering if the people that strongly disagree with this father's tactics are still living at home themselves. At the very least, they're either not parents themselves or they are new parents and their children are very young.
I don't think this father's reaction is "emotional idiocy" at all. He said he grounded her for 3 months for doing something very similar to this before, so the message needed to be made clearer. Furthermore, he is not alone in this sentiment. The girl's mother is also behind him, so it's hard to argue that this is a case of one man gone crazy overboard, despite the number of posts in opposition to the tactic.
>> ^criticalthud:
really? if a parents reaction to emotional idiocy by their kid, is emotional idiocy in return, they're essentially validating emotional idiocy.



uhh. no i don't live with my parents.
but anyway, his response was hardly rational. instead he acted like he got his feelings hurt and his primary response was to try to embarrass his child in front of her peers. not a very stellar example.

also, show me a teenage girl who isn't emotional and "overburdened" by their parents and life.

The generations of the present are products of the generations of the past.

The latest instant-powdered viral controversy that has the whole world a-Twitter. People end up overthinking something that happened thousands of miles away to someone else, as if it really matters. "He should have donated the laptop", "he's a lousy parent" blah blah blah, it all strikes me as forced controversy.

If I ever walk a mile in his shoes then maybe I'll have an opinion.

Wow, that is a whole lot of crazy. Public humiliation and such extreme violence. What is with the gun? Do you want to use that gun on your daughter?

Thanks for that link to the belt-whipping guy - again, all kinds of crazy.

Did this guy reach out to his community for advice on how to discipline, or did he just assume that "father knows best"? I think she was reaching out to her community to vent and perhaps find some solution or support.

I think all is well answered above, and a very interesting discussion. I am thinking though that belts and guns are a "Dangerous Method". Wait for the results down the road. Um, movie reference, in case you didn't.

>> ^oOPonyOo:

Wow, that is a whole lot of crazy. Public humiliation and such extreme violence. What is with the gun? Do you want to use that gun on your daughter?
Thanks for that link to the belt-whipping guy - again, all kinds of crazy.
Did this guy reach out to his community for advice on how to discipline, or did he just assume that "father knows best"? I think she was reaching out to her community to vent and perhaps find some solution or support.
I think all is well answered above, and a very interesting discussion. I am thinking though that belts and guns are a "Dangerous Method". Wait for the results down the road. Um, movie reference, in case you didn't.


What is it with people and guns?

If he'd driven over it with his car would you all be here asking if he wanted to run over his daughter?
If he'd thrown it in a deep fryer would you all be here asking if he wanted to deep fry his daughter?
If he'd hit it with a hammer?

He (Gasp) owns a gun and used the gun to destroy some of his own property. Get over it already, your own personal phobias and prejudices don't apply here.

Seems like an overreaction, but he's not breaking any laws and its not as if its abusive or traumatising, at least not imo. So yah, its not what I'd do but I don't think it'll do her any real harm. A lot of controversy over nothing.

But then this is coming from a kid that didn't have a computer until I was 11, didn't have access to the internet until 15 or 16, and bought my own desktop at 18. Honestly I don't know how I spent my time before that...but I did. So yah.

"If more parents treated their children like adults, we would have more adults in the world that grown-up children."

What a load of horseshit... Kids/teens are not adults and the ones that act like adults are usually the ones that have taken responsibility (got a job etc), or had responsibility thrust upon them, rather than bitching about the 30 minutes a day they have to contribute to the family.

Respect is earned, not freely handed out, and she has no respect for him despite the fact that he's providing for her. Why the fuck should he treat her like an adult when she isn't acting like one?

Freely admit the guy probably could have done something else with the lappy rather than blast the shit out of it, but you can tell all the way through that vid that he is pissed as hell and just holding on. Perhaps all the people bitching about how immature he's being would prefer he took a 3 inch belt and strapped some sense in to her?

That's a big problem with the world today, not parents snapping after being driven to the brink, kids who are so fucking entitled they believe everything should come to them and just can't understand why a parent wouldn't be more 'mature' about it. Actions have consequences and she just got hers. Kudos to the dad.

I believe he also said that he couldn't remember any more what that "something similar" was.

To me, that was a big red flag. He could remember with clarity punishing her, and what the punishment was, but not what she'd done to deserve it.

Makes me think the punishment didn't fit the crime.

>> ^alcom:

He said he grounded her for 3 months for doing something very similar to this before, so the message needed to be made clearer.

The fact that the father doesn't explicitly cite the exact nature of the previous offence is not a significant issue. Your conclusion that the punishment doesn't fit the crime is a weak correlation.

It issue hear is a lack of respect for authority and appreciation for the comforts and privileges of living at home with parents that can provide such luxuries as a personal laptop. The only thing out of proportion here was this girl's perception of slavery and entitlement. If you read the follow-up link posted above, you'd see that this tactic hasn't ruined the family by any means.

The father's actions were extreme, and the only waste involved was to his own property. Get over it already!

>> ^NetRunner:

I believe he also said that he couldn't remember any more what that "something similar" was.
To me, that was a big red flag. He could remember with clarity punishing her, and what the punishment was, but not what she'd done to deserve it.
Makes me think the punishment didn't fit the crime.
>> ^alcom:
He said he grounded her for 3 months for doing something very similar to this before, so the message needed to be made clearer.

@alcom I'm not really taking some hardcore stance on this. Mostly I feel like the right conclusion to come to from this video is that it's hard to say whether this is right or wrong having only really heard one side of the story, and seeing only this little slice of their lives.

Personally, I don't really understand people who feel the need to rush to the father's defense. At a minimum, it seems to me like he let his emotions get the better of him, and did a series of inadvisable things without really thinking through what the consequences would be. Like, say, having the whole world come out of the woodwork to give their opinion on his parenting. He's supposed to be the adult here, and this didn't strike me as adult behavior.

All I said in my original comment was how I'd react if my dad had done this to me. I'm happy for them if they've worked things out and have largely gone back to normal now. Good to know not all families are like mine, where people just retreat into their corners and never accept that the other person might've had some legitimate cause to be upset.

Very late and this is off the front page, but here is another follow-up link:
http://www.wsoctv.com/news/news/local/youtube-dad-who-shot-daughters-laptop-gets-visit-a/nHbcR/

A couple things that I learned from there:
The dad is a former Marine. I'd say that pretty much makes him an expert on firearm safety.

Many people complained to the local police. The police got in contact with the family/dad and said "kudos, sir". "I actually had a 'thank you' from an entire detectives squad." When asked about the incident, the local police and sheriff depts said it was either out of their jurisdiction or that he did nothing against the law.

The dad mentions a few regrets: smoking in the video, using the word "ass", and wearing his Tilley hat instead of his Stetson.