Join Them If You Can't Beat Them

Was it really from a cartoon or did the characters just borrowed them?I totally agree with you on the disciplining part. Thank God my wife & I are always in agreement when it comes to these things because we both agree that we must be 10 steps ahead our son, haha!~ And mind you he just turned 31 weeks today & he'll be full 8months next Saturday but he's already VERY SMART already, sometimes, TOO SMART, haha!~ Shocking but true. The other day I was at my mum's place & I was scolding him & my mum said don't scold him, you know how grandparents are, haha!~ My son quickly turned to my mum & sis to call for backup, like putting on his innocent cute angelic look but when he turned towards us he was like quickly trying to look away. That really left the 4 of us looking at each other!~ Haha!~ It was so cute but at the same time so wrong. My mum said this fella is smart & I said yeah, now you know why I discipline him the way I do & she just smiled :)

I agree with you and not your wife in that if we let them have their own way all the time when they are young, then whatever will happen to them when they are older? It seems that the children of today are different. There answer back where I would never have dared to when I was a child. There was punishment then if I amswered back. I da 100 lines to write out if I forgot something and repeated the same thing again - 200 if it happened another time We try to give them everything but then they don't have to 'earn' it by being well-behaved. It is not easy being a parent in any generation but this one, with everything moving so quickly, the television always on and often giving them s bad example, and less time to be withthem because parents both have to work tends to mean that nmore parents 'give-in' to them and let them have their own way

I don't what cartoon it was u are referring to but i think most parents nowadays let the children raise themselves & that's not good. If children are not taught how to act, to have respect & manners etc. then they want. Parents should be ashamed of themselves for not teaching their children what theey need to know.

I will wager it was the Road Runner. He would get so very frustrated and never able to catch that bird no matter what he did or tried. It wouldn't put much store by it because it is sort of a defeatest attitude. If ya can't beat 'em just join them. What's up with that? Don't keep fighting or trying, just give up and give in. Kids now days are much more disrespectful than even my generation. I was taught manners and to respect my elders. And alot of us aren't raising our kids today. We are letting the day care, teachers, counselors, principals, scout leaders, church goers, etc. raise them for us and only enter in when we have to to save face. Pretty Pathetic. And, I am not saying that all of parents today are doing this but alot are.

Hello Neidlc, I guess it's safe to say, thank god for now i don't have a family most specially kids. my brother came in tonight because of something he needed to gave my mom. He's going to have his third child next month, mind you, he didn't plan on this. right after her wifes operation, she got pregnant for some reason now, i can see how tired he can be. I am still happy at least i don't have to go to their experiences. I am still free in some ways, anything for myself. with regards to your topic, i think the "Ban" of spanking kids can literally make things worse. though, i know there is some abuse but discipline has helped me become mature abit. i mean, i even experience candle lit punishment. i think these kids are gonna grow up more to be arrogant and weak in the future. just like some of my pamangkins..

Such things are nonsense. Those children represent you and if they are disrespectful and disobedient then it shows how you raise them. Same can be said if they are respectful and have a good attitude towards people. You can't be lazy to raise a child. You are grooming them for the real world. There are many methods of improving their attitudes, find one that works.

yes kids are very disrespecful now! Parents have ot each them respect like thank you please yourwelcome. adn always be nice to older people. ones older than they are. like the say Miss Lakota when talking to me or Mr whomever when a man. WHEn Welfare stepped in and take away kids if they get a spanking that really hurt how people could raise kids. Istill beleive spare the rod spoil the child you have to have disapline in your home . You are the parent not the friend parent first then friend. I had very stricked rules and if my kids tried to over rule me wihdad I would have ot straighten him out. If I told them no they go to him if he said yes then I would haveto tell him I already said no and why. Nope ya dont let them get away with whatis not right speak up! They could iend up in prison if not taught and they dont listen like one of my grandsons didnt listen to me or this grandpa went along with other grandparents and his mom grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

hi neildc I think today's parents get confused with all the conflicting advice on raising children the right way. what I did when my son was little was go with my own gut instinct. If it told me he was being rude or disobedient I dealt with it. He has grown up to be a fine decent m an.I also disagree with the idea if you annot chnage them just tolerate them no way if you do that you raise children who refuse to follow any rules as adults like so many here who do not check the rules and break them. We need to be more firm again and go with our gut feeling and keep telling our children to mind and why they should mind. If we threaten punishment for misdeeds we should be consistent and deal out the punishment albeit time out or stand in the corner. Neil I am not a spanker as I feel spanking acc omplish nothing but I do believe in time outs or losing priveleges. when a child misbehaves he cannot watch his favorite tv program for a week, or he cannot play his video game for a week, whatever is the child's most beloved thing to do.we are just a bit too easy, we want to be pals not parents to our children and yet they want some rules, they crave limits so we must provide limits so we do not raise what I call brats. I cannot fathom little ZayZay being a big problem, hes just such an adorable looking little guy. but I agree we should not just throw in the towel and give up on being a parent who really parents. we should never feel we just have to tolerate them. brats are not born as brats but become so when parents will not enforce their parental rights to demand obedience and respect from one's own children.by the same token we must learn to respect our children so they can see we love them and want their love and respect.My parents respected me as a little child and thus I respected them as a child and teen. oh sure I rebelled a few times and was told to grow u p but when I was asked not to do something I was also told why. it comes from respecting ones child as that brings respect for the parents from that child. I was never spanked but had other punishments and also I knew from toddler hood on that there were limits I cou ld not cross.I always said don't give in to a kid's bad behavior give out the appropriate punishment, either time out or priveleges taken away for a reasonable period of time,

Hi Neil! I think that kids raised with lots of love will turn out all right, no matter how they seem to act when they're young. I wouldn't want to be raising kids these days, at least not here in the US. Everybody seems to be afraid to discipline kids now because so many kids are accusing adults of every kind of abuse imaginable. All a kid has to say these days is "He/She touched me" and the authorities are all over the adults. It just seems like some of these kids are "using" this to control the adults who are supposed to be controlling them... and the scary part is that it works! My mother was a kindergarten teacher for many years and confided in me once, many years later, that she sometimes worried about having one of her previous students claim to have repressed memories of her abusing them. It seems that, every time you open the newspaper or turn the news on TV that somebody is "remembering" childhood abuse. Personally, I would be more inclined to side with you on the issue of how to discipline kids. They don't know what is right or wrong, we have to teach them. Letting them do what they want, especially when it means that they are not listening to their parents, is only asking for trouble down the road. It shows the kids that the parents are okay with their disrespect and it can only become worse with time. The time to let kids do what they want is when they are old enough to be out on their own. Letting them make their own mistakes then will help them to become better people. That's the hope, anyway.

hello neil, I don't understand either...are we too lenient or are we not a good parents. If we go with rules and policies,we will be branded "strict" and kids might get more rebellious. If we are too lenient and play with their music,they abuse. i am facing same problem with my son as you knew that. I want to surrender ,hands up and wants to scream " i resigned as your mom " I am fed up,i want to say "go on with your life" just get out of the house and never comes back. Why kids are too stupid,and at the end of the day needs our help. I wish and hope my other 2 kids remain as good as they are (GOD help me) Have a good day dear brother

I think that really does have merit in life to an extent. I mean there are times where you have to agree to disagree in all facets in life. Sometimes things are not going to work. If there is not some kind of common ground then life is going to be rather hard. Granted with children, there are just some battles that you just have to let be, but there are others where you have to take a firmer stance.

i love the line of your discussion cause it is very true indeed! there are some people we cant compete with, either cause they are too smart, cheap, cunning. . . ..the list goes on! so it is better to be in good terms with them and rather learn the smart things they do!?

Hello there buddy. I have too kids and its really hard to discipline them, most of the time I or my wife will hold a stick to just make them still. No parent will want their children to be bad or harm. In your case, teach your children what is right and wrong, the good parent style, you and your wife are the only person who can do this. today children are so active maybe due to commercial milk they think, just be patient and loving to your children.

I find the youth and my generation much more disrespectful than how my parents or grandparents were raise. I really do think most of it is just from how parents raise their children, and what they let them get away with. It's ridiculous. I see people my age working on their third car, and my parents wont even buy me car insurance! I'm 18 and have had a permit for 3 years... and it just amazes me how much people don't appreciate what they have, how undisciplined they are, and also how disrespectful they can be.

Hi Neildc...times have changed. When we were kids our Mums and Dads said no to us for just about anything...even when we were babies we had to fit into the family schedule, not the family fitting the baby's schedule. We had to eat what everyone else ate and toys were just for Christmas and birthdays. We had to do as we were told from the time we could crawl. Mum and Dad said no to us all the time for many reasons. These days, kids get what they want. If they cry, they are picked up or given something to make them happy. If they want something and don't get it they cry or throw a tantrum and the parent gives in...basically parents are leaving it too late to set limits for their kids, to say no, to discipline the kids. When the time finally comes and the kids really have to be disciplined they refuse it and the parents wonder why. The sooner you begin to set limits for your kids the easier it will be...for the kids, the parents and the family unit. Even as adults we have limits. We cannot have what we want, we cannot do whatever we want. We have to work hard to be a responsible family from paying the bills to conforming to society's laws. To achieve discipline the two parents must set the rules then stand firm to keep the rules and punish the kids when they go wrong. The parents have to teach the kids, not the parents giving in to the kids or tolerating the kids. The kids have to listen to and obey the parents. Both parents have to do the job ...not the father alone, not the mother alone.

I totally and completely disagree with your wife. How are kids to learn anything if they're allowed to get away with everything? They're not. They need discipline or they'll never learn right from wrong. Kids learn first from their parents and then they learn from their friends however, if their parents teach them from the very start what is right and what is wrong, they'll learn to want to do right.

Hi Neil .. been awhile hope you and family are doing great. I think there needs to be some kind of discipline in the family and in raising kids. I'm going to have to go with your view rather than your wife's view of just letting your kids behave how they want. There needs to be some intervention at least. Anyway I think you are a good parent and your wife too.

I cannot recall which cartoon the phrase originated from …I do believe that kids these days seem to be a lot more worldly, this could be due to the Internet, television etc...Parenting styles have changed from the early days because parents are more willing to deal with their children in a more intelligent manner than dishing out a wallop whenever there is the slightest sign of misbehaviour. I also think that there are still good children out there because I’ve got one and I am blessed to have her. We tend to allow little personalities to shine through and avoid soul destroying punishments these days. Call me naïve but I think that there is the possibility to do our best at parenting and bring up decent human beings even during these times.

I really don't feel confident speaking about parenting and discipline as I am not yet a parent but basing on my own experience as a child to my parents, I could say that they raised us well. My parents are strict. Sometimes even they lacked the tolerance for misbehaving and other mischief we did as kids. We were always scared of them. But, they always instilled us with moral values. It is important not just to impose discipline but to instill values. Otherwise, kids will barely have any idea which is right or wrong. Moral values are like a student's handbook. One can refer anything and everything from it all throughout life. "Lick them if you can't beat them." I read that from an Archie's comic book but since that phrase is really popular, it could have originated somewhere else centuries ago.

Being a father must be really hard for you. When I was growing up I was very afraid of my father.I always think about what he thinks and what is the right thing for me to do. When I got to college everything change I want to be my own self and do most of the things I haven't tried back them. It's not you or your children. I think environmental surrounding plays a part too. Don't blame yourself or your children so much. If you join them YOu might learn a few things which will harness you to become even better.