Joseph:
You wrote, “if one’s child is a mechutzef to the parent, you don’t think he ought to be disciplined? Or that the parent should teach/uphold kibud av v’eim?”
Please answer for yourself the following questions:
* Will disciplining help?
* Will the child change his attitude or just his behavior as a result of the discipline?
* What will the child learn from the discipline?
These are teaching moments, not opportunities to show who is boss. There are many ways to discipline. Sadly, most of the ones we readily employ are not the ones that the Gedolei Hadoros who spoke about chinuch show us to use. If the child is taught about who is boss, he might repress such behaviors in the future. But it is a grave error to claim that this is the job of the parent or mechanech. All that this will produce is a child who is bottling up feelings, or someone that will figure out ways to do what he wants and not get caught. Neither of these options are helpful, and both cannot be considered a chinuch success.
I suggest that you visit a seforim store, and peruse the shelves for seforim on chinuch. There are several that are likutim (anthologies) of statements and quotes from Gedolei Yisroel of past generations, and some are collections of guiding lights from Gedolim such as Rav Shach ZT”L, Nesivos Shalom – Slonim ZT”L, Pinsk-Karlin Rebbe ZT”L, Rav Gamliel Rabinovich shlit”a, Rav Yitzchok Zilberstein shlit”a, the Chasam Sofer ZT”L, Rav Eliyahu Shalom Berkovitz shlit”a, Rav Aharon Friedman shlit”a, and many others. None of these are students of the Dr. Spock liberal thinking ideology, nor are they students of any secular schools. Their guidance in chinuch is 100% Torah based. None of them suggest the discipline that dominates the chinuch world (sadly this remains so, despite pockets of improvement). You are correct that the chutzpah calls for intervention. But the disciplinary approach has far more risks than benefits, and this changes the mission of the mechanech or parent in such situations.
I learned Kibud Av V’Eim by watching my parents respecting their parents.