A Virginia father is defending his decision to punish his son for bullying on the school bus by making him run in the rain to school. His video of the punishment went viral, with over 30 million views in a week.
Bryan Thornill originally posted a Facebook Live stream of himself filming his 10-year-old son running a mile to school while he drives behind him. Thornhill deleted it, but it was shared by a page called WarriorCode. That post has been seen over 30 million times and has over 613,000 shares.
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“My son has finally gotten in trouble on the bus enough to where he got actually kicked off the bus for three days because he was being a little bully, which I do not tolerate,” Thornhill said at the start of the video.
During the rest of the video, Thornhill gave his philosophy on parenting, calling the punishment “healthy.”
“Ironically, since he’s been running to school this week his behavior has been much better,” Thornhill said, notes PEOPLE. “His teachers have approved of his behavior this week.”
Thornhill said the punishment was “exercise,” which is “something a lot of people don’t think children should do anymore so you just stick them behind a damn Xbox for the rest of their lives.”
Thornhill’s son, Hayden, told WDBJ he was suspended from using the school bus for three days, and admitted to misbehaving.
“I was yelling, being really obnoxious, jumping from seat to seat,” Hayden said. As for his father’s punishment, “I thought it was going to be horrible when I started the run. I was like, oh, this isn’t too bad.”
Hayden told WDBJ that he has learned a lesson from the punishment and his suspension. “It might be fun being hyper, but after that, it’s not going to be fun, because you have to pay the price,” he said.
Thornhill told the station that he did not think the video would get so much attention. Of course since it has, Thornhill has been criticized for his tough love.
“Its called parenting – not parented. There is an ‘ing.’ It’s an action, you keep going with it,” Thornhill told WDBJ. “It’s an everyday process.”
Thornhill has also posted several updates on Facebook. On Wednesday, he said Hayden was now curious to see how fast he could run to school, and he might be motivated to become a track star now. He also set up a Facebook fund called “Bryan’s Boot Camp” to make donations to help kids have outdoor fun.
Photo credit: Facebook/ WarriorCode
