From A Concerned Father To His Resentful Daughter

[Elok]

Me too, but my parents weren't like this guy. I don't really wish they were--this approach probably wouldn't have done me any good--but it may for this Hannah girl, and I can see his point. It sounds like he was giving her a pretty easy life, all in all, before she flipped him the digital bird. Some minor chores and some unenforced hassle about getting a job.

XPost

This post implies I approve of a man destroying a valuable piece of electronics with a firearm purely to spite his rebellious child.

...

...yeah, I'm going to go ahead and blame the sleep deprivation for that. LazMax has developed a recent habit of screaming inconsolably, evenings. Anyway, saying "okay, you little punk, you're cut off from the money tap from now on" is reasonable IMO. The gun thing was just stupid and counterproductive. Would've been better to confiscate the thing and tell her (privately would be best) she could buy it back from him with her income from her job, as soon as she got one. The guy does seem to have anger issues.

[DaShi]

Worst. Parenting. Ever.

Stooping to your kid's level of emotional maturity and bullying her in public (not to mention: with effing firearms!) in the name of "discipline" is an epic fail of the first magnitude. What he shot was any hope of a normal relationship with his daughter.

Too true. She has a right to vent to her peers. That she made an effort to keep it from her parents probably should have clue Mr. Nobrain into that it was none of his business. Uh, this whole thing was disappointing. I was hoping for the first time that I'd see some clever wit from a conservative. Instead, it's another person acting like an ass and getting patted on the back for it because (and this is what is really disturbing) "we've all been there."

This is why I believe that parents should have to go through the same process as people adopting children to be able to raise their own.

[DaShi]

Although it is funny to watch him struggle to pronounce words more than one syllable.

[EPW]

Let's just hope the daughter doesn't kill herself after this.

[Aeson]

Parent acting like his 16yo. Dumbass

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

I think it says it all when the father explains that when he was his daughter's age he's left home, was holding down two jobs, was attending college and was a volunteer fireman.

His daughter is 15. Either he's lying or was the product of terrible parenting.

[Dinner]

Probably a bit of both.

[a.kitman]

if i was hannah i would be fearing for my life right now. i mean shooting a computer and demanding she pay for the bullets thats like straight out of a mafia movie.

also he is doing more than just takeing back gifts. he said he would allow her to buy a new computer after she paid for the software he is now takeing back. he is just going way overboard here.

[dannubis]

Up until he starts shooting the laptop I wan't leaning either way.

The post was stupid and any grown adult should see straight through it. However, sometimes it is good to have teenagers taste some of their own medicine (esp. when they are disprespectful in public to their parents. I had my fights with my parents but I never went public to say they were dicks because I always realized I was depending on them for just about everything)

But after he started shooting the laptop up I had something like: dude, any idea how childish and stupid this makes you look ?

[DinoDoc]

Let's just hope the daughter doesn't kill herself after this.

Well she did sound like a bit of a drama queen.

[loinburger]

Sell the laptop as punishment? Okay. Shoot the laptop? Blasphemy.

[MrFun]

Personally, I think he's not only an idiot but he's a douche bag for snooping through a young adults private correspondence. He says she's almost 16 and she's a young adult who needs to get a job but he keeps treating her like a child with no right to privacy. I know letting go is hard to do but as children stop being children, start driving cars, get jobs, and start living their own lives you have to respect their boundaries a bit more and that includes not snooping through her private writings.

Second of all when you give someone a gift it is no longer your property but the property of the person you gave it too. Yes, for a child you can restrict them from using it because children aren't adults but for someone in their mid to late teens they're almost legal adults and you need to start transitioning. That means you don't give them a gift and then take it back the next day because you got your little feelings hurt. Also if you're not a violent psychopath you don't go shooting firearms and destroying other people's property. It's no wonder this douche bag is divorced and his kid hates him because he sounds like a complete ass; worse his violent outburst didn't achieve anything constructive at all and only further alienated his daughter from him.

[MrFun]

Worst. Parenting. Ever.

Stooping to your kid's level of emotional maturity and bullying her in public (not to mention: with effing firearms!) in the name of "discipline" is an epic fail of the first magnitude. What he shot was any hope of a normal relationship with his daughter.

[Al B. Sure!]

Although it is funny to watch him struggle to pronounce words more than one syllable.

Yeah when he came out with a cowboy hat and a Southern drawl talking about he works in IT, I was like what the hell? How is this possible? But the fact that he couldn't pronounce things made me feel a little better in my prejudices

[The Mad Monk]

What? Southerners can't work in IT? How do you insert your accent into a programming language? Or are you saying that people of certain geographic or liguistic origin are incapable of going to college?

[The Mad Monk]

Child Protective Services paid a visit, found nothing amiss.

Sheriffs department visited, no tickets. A couple high-fives, though.

[SlowwHand]

They should ground her for eternity.

[dannubis]

She should move...

[SlowwHand]

They could help her pack her bags.

[Oncle Boris]

I have not looked into his case (and don't intend to), but I believe the real issue is that the "cleaning lady" the girl mentions is actually her stepmother.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Let's look at this from both sides. The daughter was a spoiled brat who was being absolutely ridiculous in doing what she did. However, the father was just as bad when he decided to air the family's laundry on the internet (the original problem that the daughter did) and shoot the freaking laptop. You don't teach your kid right and wrong by acting like a freaking child.

[SlowwHand]

He shot the laptop, that he paid for; he didn't shoot her. That might have been over-the-line.

[Wezil]

...he didn't shoot her. That might have been over-the-line.

15 year old girl?

Debatable.

[SlowwHand]

I didn't speak in absolutes. You're correct, it's certainly debatable.

[Imran Siddiqui]

I'd imagine that showing your 15 year old daughter that you aren't any more emotionally mature than her isn't the best way to parent, however.

[The Mad Monk]

Mid-teen girls just happen to bring out the best in people, that's all.

[Oncle Boris]

Let's look at this from both sides. The daughter was a spoiled brat who was being absolutely ridiculous in doing what she did. However, the father was just as bad when he decided to air the family's laundry on the internet (the original problem that the daughter did) and shoot the freaking laptop. You don't teach your kid right and wrong by acting like a freaking child.

Despite a general consensus against what he did, I am still ambivalent.

Why? He's teaching her a valuable lesson most teens should learn: the Internet is not a private place, treat it as such. I remember as a teen, I vented publicly about my parents to acquaintances (in their presence). They quickly responded by listing my wrongs at a family brunch later on. I got the point. I don't think they did this out of immaturity, they knew what they were doing. No idea about this guy though.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Watching it again, I do think that everything up to the shooting of the laptop was fine, FWIW. That was just the thing that made the response seem childish. The rest of it, perfectly ok and demonstrated in a calm and rational manner that the internet is public and you can't just do whatever you want. And what he did was just respond to each of her points and didn't bring in other outside stuff (well aside from his spending $130 in new software).

[Wezil]

I can agree with that.

My dad would have sold the computer.

[Wezil]

The gunfire was entertaining though.

I was hoping he'd open it up afterward so we could have a look-see at the insides.