General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: should parents of bullies be held liable? [View all]renate
(13,776 posts)There's probably a middle ground between "some bullies have good parents, so we can't make all parents responsible" and "until they are adults the parents are responsible." Maybe they should be required to do community service with their kids, or to take anti-bullying classes with their kids... something that can be standardized and documented. (I suggested standardized, even though every case is different, because that eliminates the possibility of a kid charming his or her way out of punishment or parents' threatening their way out of it.) Depending on the severity of the incident(s), maybe counseling should be required, like it is for drunk drivers. After that, I think that if parents are seen to have really tried their best to fix the problem, they shouldn't be held criminally liable.