Negotiations....parents and kids

Far be it from me to tell people how to raise their kids, but I must share something I witnessed which absolutely blew me away. Last weekend we had some guests over to the house, one couple in particular had a cute little daughter...maybe 4 years old? Things were going well throughout the evening, the little girl was having a great time playing with the other kids that were there and with the dogs. When it was time to go, that is when the negotiations began.

The little girl (understandably) didn't want to leave to go home. She was having such a great time! I sat there, and for 10 minutes, watched two adults (the parents) bargain with their 4 year old, in order to get her to put her shoes on, coat on, hat on. Threats to take away toys at home, or promises to "let you do this" if you put your coat on so we could go home. Or, would you like to see your cat that's at home that misses you? Finally I think they reached an agreeable bargaining point, and she consented and went with them.

WOW

Of course, this is nothing new. We see this all the time in the store when junior wants a candy bar, mom says no and he whines and the negotiations begin. Again, I'm a flawed parent and am still learning from mistakes I've made. However, it would seem that an obvious and standard "rule" in all parenting situations is that the parent is in charge, and the child does what the parent says. No questions asked, and I (as the parent) need not provide an explanation as to my thought process, and I seriously could give a fuck about what input you have on said topic. Let me caveat this response by saying that I believe a graduated scale should be used in that with age the ability for the child to reason with or provide courses of action to their parent should increase. Let's say that my 13 yr old daughter wants to go out to a skating party, and I say "tell me why I should let you go, I think you should be doing chores and homework." If she shows me that her homework is done, pulls her grades up online and they are acceptable, and gives me a good plan of action for the evening, then I could be agreeable to it.

Getting back to the original topic of smaller children though...I have a huge beef with this. If you don't establish dominance early, you will lose every time and end up wondering why your 10 year old is running your life. I'm not saying that we as parents shouldn't have compassion, or be flexible, but in fact we ARE the parents, we ARE the rule makers and owe are children NOTHING in the way of an explanation or reason. The old school term "because I said so" is perfectly applicable here. When I, as a 31 year old man who pays bills, holds a job, and feeds/shelters/clothes a child start becoming accountable to that child in ANY way....the world has definitely gone down the shitter.

If I were in that similar situation, the solution would have been simple. Get your clothes on, we are going home. Child wants to whine and cry? I put the coat/shoes/hat on the child and we leave anyway, and the child gets a firm ass chewing in the car. Child wants to continue to cry? Alternate measures are always available, and I'm not talking about "time out."

In the military we have a phrase, when in charge, BE in charge. When a parent, BE a parent. You make the rules, it's not a democracy but a dictatorship. If my kid doesn't like it, well TFB (too fucking bad).