Mother of the Year or Mommy Doom?

So, I think everyone knows that I have five wonderful, active, occasionally destructive boys.

The following blog discusses the controversy surrounding one mom's decision to punish her boys' EXTREME destructiveness by selling the toys in question on Ebay. In addition to this, she also took pictures of the boys and posted them there, just as a final "PPPPPPFFFFFFT" to them.
http://childparenting.about.com/b/2011/02/27/mom-sells-her-kids-toys-on-ebay-to-punish-them.htm

So much controversy. Why? Why do we care so much about this instead of, say, the mom who sends her child to school dirty, tired, and with no homework done every day? Why do we not question the mom who is obviously more interested in her current boyfriend than her children? What about those kids who are allowed to wander the neighborhood freely in all kinds of weather until all hours of the night on school days?

This here is lightweight stuff. Yes, actually selling the toys instead of removing them temporarily is harsh. Frankly, I would have just hid them, like I do their DSIs, when they misbehave. If you ask my boys, that is far worse, since half the time, I forget where I put them. (Hey, it's their fault - they keep sniffing out all of my good hiding places, and I'm running out of spots). Considering the damage to the tub, though, the punishment does seem to fit the crime. I mean, it's a porcelain bathtub - one of them HAD to have though "oops - I think Mom's gonna be mad" after the first piece of the tub chipped off. I know my boys would have. Sheesh.

Someone asks: "Didn't she hear the noise??" Um, yes, probably - and I'm sure she covered her ears and sang "LALALALALAAAAAA!" really loudly to try to get her mind off of it. Boys are LOUD. All the time. Maybe mom was watching TV and just want to see the end of her show before she checked to see what's been broken thistime. Or maybe she was on an EXTREMELY important call and prayed that whatever it was would stop by the time she hung up.

For some parents, though, the bigger issue is her posting of "the Pictures of Shame." Yeah, maybe she went too far here. But in her defense, she was probably livid. She acted spontaneously, most likely, and she wanted her boys to suffer over this.

I was the child who ducked so that the cool kids didn't see me in the car with my Dad. And I've heard stories of my grandfather coming out after dark to claim my uncle, who was playing baseball in the street and did not come back in when he was supposed to. Oh so embarrassing. Kids are easily embarrassed, so this punishment would have been quite effective.

This incident, in and of itself, is not child abuse. And we don't know enough about this woman or her situation to know if her "embarrassment tactics" extend to other things. But frankly, it's her choice as a parent, and unless the children are in danger, or are being severely emotionally abused, it's really none of our business.

Do we really want Big Brother (and Sister) watching our every parenting move? Have we no leeway to make these kinds of decisions when we are very, very angry and must spend thousands of dollars to repair damage caused by our own children? Don't we want our children to own up to what they do and learn from their mistakes? I for one don't want the world judging everything I do. Been there, done that. I've had store clerks ringing up my morning java stare at my extremely pregnant belly and ask, "Are you sure you don't want decaf??" Um, no thank you - just ring me up, please.

And while I would not sell my children's toys, it's only because of extreme laziness - I'd rather toss the "problem toy" out than take pictures of it, sell it, and have to ship it somewhere. And, we already know that I'm not the "embarrassing mom" type. But that's just me. Don't judge me, I won't judge you.

I will, however, add a word of advice for this mom: Next time, invest in a play arena for these types of toys. Or banish them to the backyard. It will save your bathtub/walls/floors/tables from real damage. Oh, and invest in a mute button. This way if you're on the phone the next time this kind of noise occurs, you can just hit "mute" and yell "STOP BREAKING THE XXXXX THIS MINUTE!!!!" to your heart's content.