5 Comments

  1. Tracey on February 13, 2012 at 7:16 pm

    oops…..hit the button sooner than I meant to.

    All I know is that it’s easy to lose it a little bit when your 15 year old pushes it. BTDT and I did come out on the other side of 15 with all of my kids still talking to me. I didn’t make the right choices all the time, I AM human, and so is this guy. I can identify totally with that.

  2. Nancy on February 13, 2012 at 11:00 am

    I think it’s absolutely inappropriate to violently destroy an object to subdue another person. That’s what abusive husbands often do to scare their wives into “behaving.” They will smash dishes, punch holes in walls — and the implication is “you’re next.” Take away the computer to show her that disrespect is not okay. Give it away to someone less fortunate who can’t afford to buy a computer for work or school. Those actions would be more in the vein of teaching your child to appreciate a privilege . . . but shooting the computer to get your daughter to listen? Way over the top (and wasteful, too). Good grief.

    • Tracey on February 13, 2012 at 7:10 pm

      Look, I’ve been married to (for 18 years) and have divorced a violent man. I’ve had cops to my house and visited the ER for what my then husband did to me.

      Believe me, this guy isn’t it a violent man. He is no more going to shoot anyone who disagrees with him than he is going to run them over with his truck, or throw them into a large dumpster, both of which he could have also done to the laptop. If he wanted to scare his kid, he’d have done it in front of her, with only her eyes and where no one else could comment. Abusers abuse in secret, where there is little chance of criticism and they can control the outcome and not come under the scrutiny of others.

      This man is not that kind of man. Although he probably wishes he hadn’t posted on facebook, :-/

      And while I haven’t shot up my own kids’ computer, I did take a hammer to “her” cell phone. Actually “her dad’s” cell phone since he paid for it and paid the monthly bill on it for calls and texting. If I had been paying for it, I’d have just shut it off, but that option wasn’t available to me and he knew it and left it on for her because he knew I was having problems with her and it. ANYWAY, she is now 19, still living with me, (still in high school) no longer texts at the table, and we’re over it. I really don’t care if you think it’s bad of me to have done that. What matters to me is what my daughter thinks, not you. Despite the fact that the cell phone came to an untimely demise via said hammer, I was never compelled to take said hammer to my kid, ( to my ex, yes, but I didn’t) and having just asked her for the sake of this writing, if at the time, she ever felt that I would, her answer to me is, “Uh, no.”

      When all it takes to emancipate a 15 year old is her getting pregnant, she IS more adult than child. She DOES bear responsibility for her actions. She acted inappropriately and not only got a taste of her own medicine, but permanently lost the venue in which she thought was so freely hers. It isn’t as though dear old dad went on a drunken rage and decided to punish her simply because he’s a big fat meanie. He’d warned her, she’d been grounded before ( the fact that he couldn’t remember why also tells me that he’s not terribly focused on the things that his daughter has done wrong in the past and that he DOES take into account her maturity when he mentions he couldn’t even remember, just that it was some “dumb childish thing” ) they’d discussed her attitude before, and it clearly wasn’t getting through. That is not a fail on the dad’s part…..that’s a fail on the kid’s part, even though it’s apparently a lesson that has been visited more than once. At 15, time is running out for the lesson to be learned and it gets to a point of where things need to be done and learned expeditiously. Better learned in the home of parents who give a rip, than in a world where no one else cares that much.

      I have no doubt, she gets it now. I’m also fairly confident that anything else she needs to learn before she leaves home, will probably be learned the first time around when it comes to how her attitude may directly influence the outcome. Not in a “Dad is going to shoot me,” kind of way, but in a “Dad means business and I better NOT flip shit” kind of way.

      Did he do the right thing? Eh….who can really say? Lots of opinions out there All I know is that it IS easy

  3. Tracey on February 12, 2012 at 1:00 pm

    Yes, parenting teenagers IS hard, and, as one who has parented five children past that “wonderful” age of 15, I am extremely reluctant to criticize this particular dad in his parenting method of HIS child, with whom we have no other point of reference on.

    I don’t think his blowing several holes through a computer that HE likely bought his daughter ( which begs the question of whether or not it’s really hers, much in the same way as the things that have been given to us by God are really ours in that He is not free to take them as He sees fit.) is going to really be much of a fail on his part as many people so seemingly appalled, seem to think it will.

    Let’s be real. It’s only a computer.

    And I highly suspect that Miss Hannah has unequivocally learned two things. One is that her dad, negative or positive, will follow through. The other is that Hannah disrespecting her parents in public, is unacceptable.

    Further, yes, this dad IS the adult, however, Hannah is less a child and more an adult by the age of 15, almost 16. She bears responsibility for her part in the relationship between her and her father. She is the one who decided to use facebook as a way to vent about her mother and father and as she now knows, turn about IS fair play. Perhaps the next time she has a complaint about her dad, she will A. keep it to herself, or B discuss it privately with them.

    In short, Hannah was a brat, her dad called her out on it, and from what I understand, they have for the most part put it behind them. I doubt, from this one incident, that Hannah is going to be at all damaged or that the relationship with her dad has suffered any real damage.

    I suspect their relationship is stronger than that.

    So while I wouldn’t say that EVERY parent should do this, simply because this kind of parenting isn’t for everyone, taking into account the very different and individual dynamics in the parent/child relationship, I wouldn’t be too quick to criticize this particular dad any more than I am willing to believe that Hannah is a hopeless spoiled brat. She’s 15 and I already know from my experience of parenting FIVE kids through the age of 15, that it’s easy to lose your cool sometimes.

    .

    • Steph on February 13, 2012 at 11:48 am

      I can’t believe you see nothing wrong with this! Her dad is the spoiled brat that he got so angry that he shot her computer! He is obviously violent and abusive, and this is NOT ok. Like Nancy said, abusive people usually hurt personal objects to scare wives and children into obeying or else they will be next. Hannah is NOT a hopeless brat! She is a CHILD who needs RESPECTFUL guidance and discipline! Violence begets violence! Respect begets respect!

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