Dad Finds Out Son Is a Bully, "Demands No Apology" and Tells Him Go Back to School to "Make It Right"

A dad learned that his son pulled a prank on a classmate that he said was less of a gag and more of an act of bullying. His response to hearing the news is receiving praise from TikTokers who were impressed with the thought that went into his reaction and how he implored his nine-year-old to do the right thing.

Patrick Forseth (@thehalfdeaddad) uploaded his story on TikTok where the video has accrued over 74,000 likes as of this writing. In the clip, he details how he elected not to vilify his child, Lincoln, to make things right and not stress about trying to change the past, but how to make the student he embarrassed feel better moving forward.

Patrick begins the clip by saying: "So I got an email a few days ago from my 9-year-old son's teacher that he had done a 'prank' to a fellow classmate and it ended up embarrassing the classmate and hurt his feelings and so I don't care who you are that's bullying."

The dad continued, "I mean if you do something to somebody that you know has the potential end result of them being embarrassed in front of a class or hurt, you're bullying, don't take that risk."

The man then delineated how he decided to address the situation with his kid: "So my son and I we had a long talk of course he got punished, but we had a long talk about how things feel and how it feels to be on the other end and so I encourage him to go back to school and I encourage him to find a way to make it right."

The dad urged his son to live up to the old adage that a person's actions ultimately speak louder than their words. "I demanded nothing out of him. I demanded no apology I demanded no apology to the teacher at this point I just wanted I just told him that we have the opportunity to go back and make things right, we can't take things back but we can try to correct things and look for forgiveness."

Patrick went on, "He came back to school and said that he actually got with the other boy and asked him what he likes and it turns out the boy loves Pokemon. So Lincoln had 2 really cool gold Pokemon cards he loved so he came home and he got those. And he has this little case to put them in, and he wanted to give those to the boy."

The video then transitions to his son, Lincoln, cleaning the case to prepare the gift for the re-conciliatory gesture in a sink filled with soapy water. "Well done, bud," his dad says before walking away.

"So Lincoln was actually really nervous to go back and give these cards to the kid and apologize truly but also a little excited to fix it."

Patrick's video then transitions to him speaking into the camera and divulging what happened after Lincoln brought the Pokemon cards to school to give to the classmate that he ended up embarrassing. "All right so he's about to get home from school here, bus is pulling up, so we'll see how it went."

Lincoln then appears on camera with his dad, who queues him up to talk about his experience. Turns out the boy was very grateful for the gesture and ended up hugging Lincoln and saying thank you for the cards he gifted him. His dad congratulates him on making it right, before talking into the camera again.

"So I'm far from a perfect parent but I just want to encourage all you parents just to talk to your kids let's try to avoid just the swat of the butt send them to the room. Doesn't teach them anything. What teaches them things is having them figure out how to resolve the problem and how to make things right because that's what they're actually going to face in the real world once they move out of our nest."

Viewers who saw the clip applauded Patrick's advice to his son and that he stressed the importance of attempting to make things right and that it's all right to make mistakes, as long as one is focused on addressing the situation and honestly tries to make things better after the fact.