When Bryan Thornhill found out his 10-year-old son was kicked off the school bus for bullying, he decided to teach him a lesson.
So he made him run the two kilometres to school, filming him as he drove along behind. His son would be running to school for a week, the dad said. Even in the rain.
The video Thornhill uploaded to his Facebook page is dividing opinions about the line separating effective discipline and going too far, and whether or not this boy’s punishment crosses it.
Watch the Sunrise team debate whether this dad’s form of punishment is acceptable below. Post continues after video.
Samantha Armytage discussed the video with radio commentator Alan Jones on Sunrise on Wednesday morning. The journalist said Thornhill’s decision to publicly humiliate his son online constitutes bullying.
“I feel like if the kids a bully, he learnt it from his father, this father is bullying his child,” Armytage said.
“Once you start videoing and Facebooking your child’s punishment, that’s where you lose me, that’s when it becomes bullying.”
Jones disagreed, arguing this kind of old-school punishment is the only way to teach the boy a lesson.
“Oh stop being a softy. That’s exactly what my old man would’ve done to me,” he said.