Lazy, children, unwilling to pull their weight when it comes to household chores, are the scourge of parents everywhere. But one Kent dad has taken to extreme methods to shame his 'stroppy' kids into using a mop and pulling on a pair of Marigolds.
James Richards stuck up a harrowing poster in his home, featuring child labourers in the US oyster industry, who routinely worked 12 hour days in the most awful of conditions. The photo immediately struck a chord with his two eldest kids, Ryan, eight, and 10-year-old Isabella.
Richards spotted the haunting image on Facebook and it was part of sociologist Lewis Hine's investigation into the living conditions of children for the US's National Child Labor Committee.
The heart-breaking image shows three bleary-eyed, exhausted children with dirty overalls and messy hair staring sadly into the camera.
They were just three of thousands of children sent out to work from a young age wielding sharp knives to open oyster shells from around 3.30am until 5pm six days a week.
The dad-of-three, pinned a note next to the image in his kitchen, declaring, ‘don't you dare complain about doing the washing up once in a while!'.
His eldest son’s response to the poster and being ordered to do the dishes that night, wasn’t quite the reaction dad was expecting; instead Ryan threw a tantrum like noughties sitcom character Kevin from Kevin and Perry.
However, it wasn’t long before the child oyster workers did have the desired effect, and Ryan and his sister soon began to feel empathy towards the oyster kids and started household tasks uncomplainingly.
"I saw the image on Facebook and it struck a chord with me," said James, "It was a eureka moment.
"It's educational, it's behavioural and I don't see any issues. It's been a miracle and sorted the moaning out and it's opened up a Pandora's box of positives.
"I wanted to give our kids some context to what children around 100 years ago were doing as opposed to what the children in the present day are doing."
After sharing a picture of the poster on Facebook, it has attracted over 500 comments, with opinion split on James’ methods.
One user said: "Genius! May have to try that with my little darlings."
Another complimented: "Out-of-the-box parenting, I like this."
A third added: "That's fabulous and I may pinch the idea!"
However not everyone was impressed by the idea, as a different user wrote : "But this was a terrible thing. It's not a level to aspire to."
Someone else proclaimed it was a "bit extreme."
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