Should parents publicly shame their kids for bullying? It’s a question many are asking following the action taken by one mum.
More: I found out my son was the thing I feared: the bully
Single mother Terry Evans, who is believed to live in Wales, took to Facebook after she caught her 12-year-old son Jacob bullying a new girl at his school, reported The Metro.
In her no-holds-barred post she said she was “absolutely disgusted” that her son had seen fit to “purposefully tread on a new girl’s foot at school,” which caused her “brand new” shoe’s heel to snap.
Evans didn’t expect her post to create such a stir but it quickly got over 50,000 likes and was shared thousands of times by those who praised her “fantastic parenting.”
Initially Terry had tagged Jacob in the post so his friends would also learn a lesson from his actions but after the post went viral she removed his name.
Not all parents saw Terry’s move as “fantastic,” however, and some comments revealed their concerns.
“Why extend the humiliation?” said Alison Kyle. “Your poor son. This will haunt him forever. A mistake at 12, online now for all to see.”
“This is an incredibly dangerous thing to do to any child,” wrote Michael Crowley. “What is even more disturbing are the huge numbers on here who cannot even see the dangers of what she has done.”
More: Dad pulls no punches after learning his son is a bully (VIDEO)
Terry’s original post has now been removed from Facebook but it was printed in full on Metro.co.uk:
“Absolutely disgusted that my 12 year old son saw fit to purposefully tread on a new girls foot at school and twist his foot with such force it broke her brand new shoes (causing the heel) to snap. I’ll tell you something Jacob ( JustPost Rng Photos) if you so much as breath in her or anyone’s direction in a bullying manner I will personally hand you over to their parents for every demeaning chore they see fit for as long as they do… kiss goodbye to your birthday money as you will be buying the girl a new pair of shoes and a bunch of flowers! #?iwillnothaveabullyinmyhouse [sic]”
She later added:
“Update. To answer a few questions, yes my son can see it, he was tagged in it before it went viral (which I didn’t realise was going to happen) so his friends could see that his actions have consequences, he is not big, clever, hard or funny, he’s a 12 year old boy answerable to his mam.
“I don’t much care who doesn’t agree with my parenting style, my son humiliated and embarrassed a girl, regardless of his reasoning (which was he didn’t expect to break the shoe he just thought she may step out of it or stumble) that little girl still cried, for anyone’s knowledge that girl may have left her old school because she was being bullied… then imagine how much worse my son’s ridiculous act would have made her feel.
“So my so called embarrassing him online is a to be quite frankly nothing in comparison to the humiliation that little girl had to face walking round with a broken shoe and red eyes from crying when she is new [sic].
“Ps… of course I sat and spoke to him about his behaviour, I didn’t just tag him in a post and he read it! I am wholly confident this was a single occurrence which won’t be repeated.”
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