i think it's fine. often enough i'll take the 'politically correct' side of things (though not to the extremes that the media seems to take them), but this is just fucking stupid.
there are very few options when a child is misbehaving very badly - most threats just end up being hollow, or the child will find a way to get around them, and anything else is just pointless.
what a parent needs to work on is disciplining when neccessary, and rewarding as much as possible. when i was little, i was punished a lot (basically i was a cunt of a kid and tried to do the wrong thing as much as possible :D), but even still, my parents raised me pretty well: every time i went to do the grocery shopping with mum, she'd tell me i could have a golden book (small kids' book) if i behaved well.
it didn't always work, but unless i behaved really badly, i was never punished. eventually i realised that good behavious was rewarding, rathen the bad behaviour being unrewarding, and i calmed down and tried to do the right thing.
not only did it help me to see the good side of good behaviour, but it also helped contextualise my own responses to any behaviour that i had or performed. eg., when i got to primary school i used to get in a lot of trouble, but i rarely (looking back through untainted eyes, i think) felt persecuted if i wasn't. when teachers had it in for me, sure, but mostly i just got in trouble because i enjoyed manipulating the teachers and seeing when they would decide i should be punished. eventually teachers got sick of this and punished me for just being an insolent prick, but the point is that i always understood their reasoning - something i wouldn't have been able to do if my parents hadn't have raised me the way they had. in short, my parents' upbringing of me helped me to view the real world.
