Headline: "Mom Test Runs New Scare Tactics in Home"

I just read this article this morning...

"Cop Cardboard Cutout Used to Cut Crime at Massachusetts Transportation Hub", wherein a strategically placed cutout of an imposing police officer has proved enough to reduce bicycle thefts by as much as 67% at a  Boston area subway station.  

This could be a very effective tool for moms in their own home. I mean, you know stuff happens behind your back.  You didn't witness it, but the aftermath is there: cookie crumbs leading from the pantry to a certain bedroom, a cerulean smear where it's obvious someone tried to clean up a spill of blue paint, or a shirt with a large zigzaggy hole in the back and a mysteriously missing pair of pinking sheers.  ("Mom, I mean it.  Those jagged edges are from shark's teeth.  A shark attacked this shirt, Mom.")

Can you imagine the effect that a cardboard cutout of Mom might have around the house?  A glaring face strategically placed above the cookie jar?  A wagging finger next to the art supplies?  A crossed-arms mom right behind her sewing supplies?  Or the best idea of all - a  mom who folds out of the fridge when the door is opened, sort of like a life-sized pop-up book.  There's a lot of potential here - the power of mom's steely-eyed gaze limited only by the number of old cardboard boxes you have to cut up.   

We don't even  have to form a research committee or launch any field tests to determine if this could work.  The effectiveness has already been proven by a major metropolitan police force.  If it works for them and major metropolitan criminals, surely it can work for me and my petty crimes crew. 

This concept is either sheer genius, or lazy parenting at it's worst - Mom resorts to scare tactics when she realizes her attempts at cultivating well-formed consciences in her children may not be working as well as she thought.  Either way, I had to know if this was a viable option.  

I decided to give it a try...

I have to admit, it had worked better in my imagination.

Perhaps you'll try it and have more luck.  Where would you keep a cardboard cutout mom??