I think that there has been a trend in the last couple of decades toward the absoultely ridiculous in terms of what is child abuse and what is good parenting.  However, I did recently bear witness to what I would call incredibly horrible parenting.

A woman and her son, he being a mere 3 or 4 years of age, were in my store shopping.  The boy had somehow acquired a flashlight, which the mother did not want him to have.  She had taken hold of the flashlight and was telling him to give it to her, but he emphatically said "NO!"

I ask of you, the common blogger, whether you have exercised your reproductive capabilities or not, what you would do in the mother's place?  Would you decide that this was not a battle that you wanted to fight and let the child keep the precious flashlight?  Would you be the bitch and rip the flashlight from the child's hand, risking a raging temper tantrum?  Would you apply a firm slap to the back side and then take the flashlight, still possibly inducing the much loved public crying and yelling?

While I would be willing to bet that most of you would choose one of those options or some derivative thereof, this mother did none of the above.

She bit him.

She actually took hold of his arm, raised it to her face, and bit his wrist.

She then asked the child "Did that hurt?"  "NO I WANT MY FLASHLIGHT!!!"

What do you think she did next?

That's right, she bit him again.  And then took the flashlight from him, inducing the much anticipated screaming and crying that sounds so delightful when coming from someone else's child.

Being that it was not my place to tell this woman how to raise her child, and that I'm sure it wouldn't have changed her parenting methods one iota, all I could do was watch her walk away.  Would that I could intervene, raise this child for my own, and maybe screw him up anyway, I'm pretty sure that I would never have bit him.

I don't remember, at least once I got to be school age, being spanked.  I was a good kid anyway (and modest too).  But I sure as hell never got bitten.

I hope that this mother remembers that she bit her child - twice - when he gets big enough to beat the shit out of her and raid her purse for drug money.