Hey Parents! What’s YOUR favorite form of discipline? If you're anything like that guy from North Carolina whose 15-year-old daughter bad-mouthed him on Facebook, the answer to that question is a no-brainer. You simply go to your gun locker (assuming you bother to keep it locked ), get your favorite .45, lock and load one full clip and have at it (on the laptop she used, that is. Not the kid.) Let's for the moment put aside the fact that this nut used a deadly weapon on a perfectly good computer when all he had to do was take it away from her. Isn't the way he handled this whole thing on exactly the same level as his daughter’s behavior? She's fifteen. She's not supposed to be making adult decisions just yet. But he's supposedly an adult who should be thinking like one. Here’s where this misguided sole has gone wrong. Like many other parents have done at one time or another (me included), he has made the assumption that his daughter is going to listen to what he’s saying and learn from it. We all know from hard experience that this rarely- if ever -what happens. But what we do know for a fact is that parental behavior has much more of an impact on a child than their words. It’s what we have done that children emulate—not what we’ve said. Scary thought, isn’t it? This guy whether it was intentional or not managed to send his daughter a message that said loud and clear “Violent, over-the-top behavior is a perfectly appropriate way to handle a problem. Just watch me and I’ll prove it.” Unfortunately, I suspect he wouldn’t have a problem with this. In fact the father was so pleased with his own cleverness that he made a video of the whole thing and posted it on YouTube. The video went viral. Before you know it, millions of people had viewed it. It even made the rounds of the morning talk shows. Here’s the part I just don’t get. Of all the people who commented on it—in the hundreds of thousands—the vast majority applauded this guy’s handing of the situation. What am I missing here? Is it me? Am I over analyzing this thing? I just don't get it. Am I wrong to think that his handling of this aspect of his relationship with his teenage daughter was completely inappropriate? One of his biggest complaints was that his daughter embarrassed him on Facebook. But didn’t he turn around and do exactly the same thing by embarrassing her on YouTube of all places. Doesn’t he know that the number one rule for dealing with teenagers is to never EVER embarrass them? You sit them down, have a quiet rational discussion where you by all means express your concern but at the same time respect their feelings and privacy. You then work together to put in place a mutually agreeable form of restitution. Judging by the number of viewers who approved of his actions, I am clearly in the minority. What do you think? What would you have done?