A Neglected Garden is Full of Weeds

This is more of a rant then anything else. It's about taking responsibility and actually raising your children. I was at the laundromat last night at a late hour (11pm-after midnight) and there were 4 kids running around. I don't think any of them were older than 6 years of age. Their behavior was appalling! Running around, screaming, banging on vending machines, climbing in washing machines and dryers, climbing on top of dryers. It even got to the point where one of the younger kids (about 2 years old I'd say) was running around with one of the carts and ran into my room mate! The entire time the parents just sat there and did NOTHING!

Now, perhaps I'm just getting old, but in my day, that behavior would NEVER be acceptable out in public! My mother would have given me to count to 3 to stop. If i hadn't, she would have grabbed me and took me to the car. If i still didn't stop, I would have gotten spanked. I would never have acted that way in public for fear that my mother would break my legs or kill me! Not that she actually would, but kids today don't seem to have any shred of respect or fear for their parents! I remember when kids wouldn't do certain things because the first response would be "Oh my God! My parents are gonna kill me." It's just not like that anymore.

I seriously think that parents are too lax with their children. Children need to be raised, and have morals and lessons instilled in them. Newsflash: they don't just pop out knowing wrong from right! I also think that spanking is a good for of punishment. I don't know about any of you, but "time outs" never did anything for me. I just sat there singing to myself and then when my time was up i would go on my merry way. Children are like dogs. If they get their nose into something they aren't supposed to, what's wrong with a light tap of the newspaper to show they're wrong? Spanking actually gets through to a child. At that age you can't fully explain why what they are doing is wrong, you simply need to instill into them that it is!

It just disgusts me how unruly these children were and even more so how neglectful the parents were. Honestly, my room mate and I could have walked out with them and the parents wouldn't have even noticed. It took them 15 minutes to realize their 2 year old son had even walked outside into the parking lot through the automatic doors! If i ever have children, they will be spanked, and punished, and reprimanded, because I'll be damned if they'll run around with no moral compass, not knowing acceptable behavior.

End rant.