Ask any mother or father and they’ll likely tell you how difficult it is find harmony one hundred percent of the time as it pertains to parenting.
I mean, it’s important that parents try to align with one another where their babies are concerned, try to pull in the same direction, impart the same wisdoms and lessons, and generally make sure they don’t counteract one another wherever possible.
Now, there are bound to be times when a couple will have differing views as to what’s best for their son or daughter. Perhaps they’ll be at odds over a potential learning method, or maybe a certain food type. Maybe they’ll argue over the screen-time their little one is allowed.
Yet of all the things for parents to bicker over, I don’t think many will have encountered the below situation. It involves a husband and wife who reportedly had contrasting views when it came to the prospect of piercing their baby’s ears.
The husband later took to Reddit in order to present the rather strange turn of events, wondering if he was in the wrong for taking a stand.
“My wife and I have a two month old daughter, Alicia,” he explained in the Reddit post.
“We’ve been having the piercing debate since before she was born. She comes from a culture where it’s the normal thing, but I’m just not comfortable with a painful process like that and would prefer to wait until she’s older so she can choose whether to go through that for herself.”
Naturally, the husband was content in his belief that his views would be respected, at least until the idea became a topic of discussion once more. As he went on to explain, however, that wasn’t the case.
“While we still hadn’t made a decision, my wife went for a day with her family with the baby while I had a few things I needed to sort out,” he wrote. “When I got home the first thing I noticed was that Alicia had a pair of gold studs.”
He continued: “I demanded to know what had happened and she said they decided to ‘make a day of it’ and just get them done. I felt pure rage and immediately removed the earrings and threw them away.”
At that point his wife also grew angry, as the husband continued: “This enraged my wife and she said removing them was ‘totally disrespectful’. She slept in the spare room last night and isn’t speaking to me at all. As far as I’m concerned I did the right thing.
“She got them pierced without asking me (or more importantly, ASKING ALICIA), so I took them out, because our baby doesn’t need bits of metal sticking out of her ears.”
Needless to say, Reddit (and indeed the wider internet) were divided. On the one hand, there were plenty of folks ready to agree that the father in this situation had done the right thing. One individual even claimed that piercing a baby’s ears was tantamount to child abuse.
On the other hand, though, there were others who were more supportive of the wife following the traditions of her culture.
“In my culture it’s too common to pierce ears,” Redditor FinstereGedanken shared. “I think they don’t even ask at the hospital when your kid is born. My ears were pierced and I don’t have any personal objections to it, I would have wanted it anyway and they healed fine, but as soon as I was old enough to know about consent, I thought it is bad. Piercing guns are bad. Piercing a baby’s ears is awful.”
I just don’t know if I agree with people who think that piercing a child’s ears is acceptable. What do you think? Let us know in the comments box and share this article so we can keep the debate going.
And if you liked this story, why not check out the 12-year-old who was kicked out of his class for wearing a four-word bag patch on his school bag!
