Did anyone in this thread suggest beating children to make them behave?
Nope, heart.
Anja only wickedly insinuated that that may be one way to turn little kids into well-behaved children. It works for some children. The parents have few problems while the child is small. It's only when they are released into society that the problems start in that scenario. It had nothing personal to do with you directly.
Colmena said something that gave me pause for thought. Several others, including myself have mentioned that the style one uses in confronting the parents of ill-behaved children may result in a backlash type response. I said something about that also.
That's a tender spot with parents and requires a sensitive approach if one doesn't want to be blasted with defensiveness. Passive-aggressive confrontation doesn't work well. It tends to breed passive-aggressive responses.
Whenever we confront people with personally sensitive material, it behooves us to think about how we word it unless we don't care about being bombarded in response. A quiet, direct statement of said behavior followed by a brief statement about how it affects us and a request for change of behavior is one of the approaches recommended by communication educators. Some add the communication of a feelings state as well. Adding the feelings state can work wonders.
A simple, quiet, "I am angry." often stops people dead in their tracks. I think it works because we are all so accustomed to people acting out their anger.
One model also includes adding an intentional statement at the end of the process with follow-through.
Example: Deep breath here. "Ma'am, your child is running loose and has broken a toy here. I am in a hurry and needed to stop him. That has interrupted my shopping and I am angry. I would like you to watch him more closely. If you don't, I will be reporting you to management." Watch your angry body language and tone of voice and remove self from immediate space.
"Facing-off" or steady eye-contact for an excessive time will invite aggression.
That was an example of the "Awareness Wheel" style of communication. The "facing-off" statement is mine.
But what I thought of while reading Colmena's post was that sometimes I think people use their children (and pets) in passive-aggressive ways, allowing the children to act out their own hostility towards others or the world in general.
Maybe I would secretly like to dump dirt on my husband's boss's wife's new white living-room carpet because she is so overbearing and smug about it. Instead, perhaps not even consciously, I allow a situation where my toddler wanders into the living room and acomplishes the act with a nearby flowerpot. The toddler, her own aggresion in action (or experimentation,) also smears the dirt all over herself and her new dress adding a serving for her taste buds for extra effect.
Yes! It happened to me. Argh. I hadn't had the conscious thought but can't say I was too dismayed about the dirt on the rug as the woman was insufferable.
Didn't know that my toddler sometimes thought I was also insufferable for making her stay clean and neat in her new clothes!
Anyway. Get what I''m saying? We'd all prefer a neutrally-stated fact of what someone doesn't like rather than having it expressed sidways.
Edited: The above was addressed to OP.