Stark contrasts in parenting.

[Der Cute]

A bit Overparenting:
One day at the gas station cash register, I had a family with one young boy come up to the counter. Young man put it onto the counter top and said something like "Ring this up" or "Can I have this". He was at the age of 5 ish. I smiled and said, "Whats the magic word?" He froze up, but I still smiled and was ok to keep going. His parents started hollering at him "OMG We taught you that you don't know say that to the lady" just on and on. I shook my head at them, they didn't stop. Young man was crying a bit, I rang him up and whispered "It's ok honey you did fine" Felt bad for the kid.

Underparenting:
Yesterday in the gym locker room I was trying to get changed to go work out. Two kids, around the age of 6 or so were running in there playing tag. Between locker strips, bench seats, entrance hall, single toilet. I gave them the "HEY" and evil look a few times, they just stayed away from my spot. Since I could see their mom at the mirror, I decided to not holler at them. Just the "HEY. HEY. Don't do that."Then they started fiddling around with the scale. I just said, "when you're done, I need to use it." Some credit - they got off the scale right then. But, damn, your monsters could have knocked me over!

[quitcallingme]

When my daughter was about 1 we spent the day at the mall. After several hours and several dozen stores, we leave. When we got out to the car and I took her out I saw them...10 or so pens. Evidently, little miss sticky fingers grabbed a whole slew of them and I never noticed.

Problem was the price tags had no indication of what store they were from, so I spent the next hour wondering back through the mall till I found the right store. We did not do the whole 'confess to the manager' thing because she was just a baby, but dang it was such a massive pain! We made sure to check her every so often for a while after that!

[frosstty]

Years ago I worked for a snack food company, potato chips etc. I was in a variety store one morning when the manager caught a kid of about 12 with a pocked full of gum/baseball card packs. She called the kids parents to give them chance to deal with it and when the father showed up he looked at his son and said " remember the new bike you were going to get this weekend? Well now you will have to wait another week for it. " After they left the manager said from now on she would just call the police and let them take the kid home.

[Ironclad Alibi]

Quoth frosstty

Years ago I worked for a snack food company, potato chips etc. I was in a variety store one morning when the manager caught a kid of about 12 with a pocked full of gum/baseball card packs. She called the kids parents to give them chance to deal with it and when the father showed up he looked at his son and said " remember the new bike you were going to get this weekend? Well now you will have to wait another week for it. " After they left the manager said from now on she would just call the police and let them take the kid home.

Did the manager think the punishment was too much or too little? I think if the police had taken the kid home, he would have had a worse punishment.

[frosstty]

Far too little as did I, the kid needed a lesson in reality and waiting another week for his new bike was not it in my opinion. Maybe next month or next year.

[Eddyisme]

Quoth frosstty

Far too little as did I, the kid needed a lesson in reality and waiting another week for his new bike was not it in my opinion. Maybe next month or next year.

Maybe a little of that old "You'll be too busy with the next 2 months of chores and duty's to ride a bike, and after that you'll earn it yourself."

[Lace Neil Singer]

Regarding the OP; I have a similar story that took place when I worked at the pet store. This woman came in with her little girl during the quiet time, when I was working on order forms. The customer bought a sack of dog food and left. About forty minutes later, she returned. The little girl was crying and the mother said, "Now, go up to the lady."

The girl walked up to me and handed me a small dog biscuit that she'd obviously nicked from one of the pet food bins. She apologised thru her tears; I said it was ok, but she'd better not do it again. The mother said to me that she didn't want her girl to grow up thinking she'd get away with stealing; I agreed with her.

Better to have her daughter in floods of tears as a small child cuz she had to return a stolen object and admit to stealing, than to have her up in court on a theft charge later on.