Sure, I agree with that if you're in the supermarket and Mum speaks too harshly or maybe grabs her LO and dumps him/her in the trolley because he/she won't stop grabbing things, but what I was trying to say is that even though that can sometimes be the situation, there is no way what was going on was acceptable - (A) because of the age of the children involved and (B) because hitting a child with something is just never acceptable IMO.

Just wanted to clarify that I'm not for a second condoning what happened at all - no previous behaviour from the kids would have made his actions acceptable and I most definitely would have said something to him. A parent at my DD's kindy last year "picked up" his maybe 2 year old son by the upper arm and walked across the room with him like that. I said something - much to the amazement of everyone around me and the I'm sure disgust of his little group of chatty parents - but geez, that's child abuse as far as I'm concerned.