My Future Delinquents

Today I saw (part of) a video featuring horrible children. I am now concerned with what I will do should Operation Raise a Good Kid fail. What if My Future Kids are bad people? What if they do such wrong that I am ashamed to call them my own?

The video I saw today has been getting around the internet, so maybe you've seen it. It depicts a bus monitor being harassed by a pack of middle schoolers and made quite a bit of money off some poor saps who felt bad about it. It is of course well-known that middle schoolers are essentially the devil's spawn as a rule, but sometimes they can be truly horrible. They are smart enough and brave enough to be hurtful but lack the wisdom to not exert their power.

People have commented on the incident with the bus monitor, horrified by the acts of the children, ruking those among them that did nothing to stop it. They act as though they would have done the Right thing if they were there, and that may be true, but I am doubtful. They've done the experiments on conformity, on cruelty, and I know from 10th grade US History all too well what a mob of adults is capable of. So screw those guys who think that it's so easy to be a good person.

I guess it's hard to even know what the Right thing is sometimes. We all need to make mistakes. We all need to hurt someone to know what it means. Or something. I don't know.

Anyway, back to the original question. Situation: My Future Kids are terrible people. What to do?
If My Future Kids do something horrible, is it enough to punish them? I never really understood punishments, maybe because I've never really been punished. I have been punished for things, but I can only recall a handful of distinct times and then I have no idea what I did wrong. Except for the one time. But other than that, I'm pretty sure even when I was actively being punished, I didn't know what it was for. I remember being told to think about what I had done, but I don't think I ever considered that to be relevant, so maybe that's something for Future Me to keep in mind. I don't know, maybe my sense of cause and effect was not fully developed at the time. Or maybe just how things were related.

Maybe I should just be really disappointed, that's a good way to make a kid feel like shit. Maybe even the best way. But is making a kid feel bad a good way of teaching them good morals? Or at least good conduct?

Is it even about teaching them the difference between right and wrong? Maybe it's not about doing the Right thing. Maybe it's about teaching them how to be brave. Not to know what is Right, but to stand up for it. People act like it's easy, natural even, but I don't even know if I could do it.