Who said my son doesn’t listen to authority?
When I can’t deal with him at the moment I say “Mommy needs to do XYZ and you need to ABC.” He goes and does what I say. I rarely use this and he recognizes that he absolutely needs to listen. If he pauses, I point to where I want him to go and he does.
In the case of the cookies, I would ask the person to hold, tell my son no cookie right now and move them out of reach. He is welcome to carry on with a tantrum (without destroying things) and I will move to a different room. [Or I might move him out of the kitchen because our kitchen is hazardous and he can’t be in there alone, but that’s a seperate issue]
In general, if I was about to do something that would require my son to leave me alone for a while, I would make sure he was taken care of before starting. A lot of time, parents set their kids up for failure (not necessarily on purpose).
I doubt my son is an abberation – he is a normal, healthy child. He understands the limits we set for him. He tests them sure, but he realizes when we mean absolute business.