As was proven by these Quora users who had some kickass answers to the question “What is the most badass thing your parent has ever done?”

Take a look.

1. This dad who knew when to take a stand. 

This happened during college. I was down with viral fever and had to take a break for three days. My best friend, a girl, was in constant touch via phone and she sounded dull. 

When asked what the problem was, she said it was nothing and I thought she worried about my health. 

Day 4, I return to college and I learn that a guy from a different department was teasing her (in an abusive way) and was stalking her everyday. 

And she, being very reserved, did not even tell it outside. I went and punched the ‘mofo’ right on his face and broke a couple of his teeth. His friends came for his help and started attacking me and my friends.

Word spread and my head of department and my principal started scolding me and gave my dad a transfer certificate to fill up for me to take me out from the current college and put me somewhere else. 

My dad remained calm and filled up the form and asked if there are any more procedures to be done and simply said…

2. This father who didn’t tolerate nonsense. 

This happened in 2011. I was in my 3rd year of college. I had a really fancy phone number ( something like 55776). The next day was my semester exam. 

Sometime late in the afternoon I got a call from an unknown number. I answered the call and there was a guy on the other side . He asked my name without telling any details about him. I refused to share and cut the call. Sometime later in the evening I got the call from the same number and this time he sounded a little bolder and when I refused to share my name, he started using vulgar words . I cut the call and added his number to block list.

I had a Samsung Galaxy Duo. In which, if you added a number to the block list, it still rang once and the cut the call. There, I saw about 10 missed calls from that number. I was becoming nervous and the semester exams were making me feel even more tensed. I got a call from a second unknown number. This time, it was a different guy on the line and he asked me why I refused to speak to his friend and why I wasn’t answering his calls. He started harassing me too. 

Throughout the night, I kept getting calls from 10 more different phone numbers from more than 4 different guys. I put my phone in silent mode and slept. Next day morning I saw about 100 missed calls and lots of messages.

I called my mom and dad, cried and told them about all this. My father asked me for all the different phone numbers. I gave them the details and left to give my exam .

I returned to my hostel in the evening. I did not see any more calls. 

I called my dad In the night to tell everything was alright. He told that he already got 3 guys arrested and they have confessed to the crime and are already in jail.

3. This mother who checked the examiner himself.

While I was writing my 9th standard half-yearly examination, my invigilator (teacher on-duty) was the most furious teacher of our school and was also my class teacher then. He (with all due respect) saw me while I was normally scratching my neck. 

He came up and said “This is the last warning. If I see you next time doing a mischief, you will be responsible for the consequences.” I said (shocked) “But sir…”

He interrupted and said “No arguments.” After 15–20 mins my pen fell down and he saw me while I was picking it up. He quietly came up to my desk, snatched my answer sheets and tore them into half. It made me lose control, hence I got up and went out of the hall. After examination he called me back and made me solve/write the test again from start. I calmly wrote my answers but it was not my best obviously.

I went back home. Mom asked me reason for being late when my twin brother had already reached home a couple of hours earlier. I told her the whole story. Although she knew everything from her more trusted source i.e. my twin brother, she listened everything carefully. 

She commented very calmly “No one can tear your paper. Let us wait for the parent-teacher meeting.” 

After a couple of weeks, the meeting happened. Now my mom is a strong personality who herself is a renowned teacher of the U.P. Board and hence, knows education system inside out.

We reached inside our classroom and stood behind few parents. I was hiding behind my mom and my legs were trembling. I respectfully greeted him and he replied back, again he went busy with other parents. My mom waited for our turn for 15 mins. When her limit crossed, she exclaimed, “Excuse me sir, it is my turn now.” 

Everyone stopped, parents moved aside with their kids and within a second, we were in front of the teacher and there was a pin-drop silence in entire room.

Mom continued “You cannot tear any student’s answer sheet, do you know or you don’t?”

Teacher replied “Actually ma’am, he was looking here and there…”

Mom interrupted him and said “I’m not talking about what my son did since I’m talking about legal ethics. Should we go to the principal and discuss the agenda? I have 19 years and 7 months of teaching experience which might be 10 years more than yours. Based on which I suggest you to maintain the dignity of this profession. There can be legal consequences for this act of yours. My son respects you a lot.”

The teacher realized and said “Yes ma’am, I understand that it is my mistake, I apologize for that and there’s no need to go to the principal. Varun (me) is a good student and he will perform good in the board exams next year.”

4. This father who taught a person some manners.

My dad used to travel a lot by train to different cities for his work related activities. 

There was this one time he was on a train and the coach was filled with different age groups of people. He noticed a girl who looked like a college student, sitting by the window opposite to him.

A few minutes into the journey, a middle-aged man, who was drunk, entered the compartment. He kept talking some bullshit and singing some inappropriate songs, directed to the girl. 

Soon he started going near her. On the pretext of closing the window, he touched her hand and occupied her personal space. The girl was visibly scared and uncomfortable but could do nothing about it.

The guy, scared as hell, stared at my dad in utter shock and disbelief. My dad made him sit by the washroom, came back and gave the girl some advice on how she should always stand up for herself, no matter how scared or lonely she felt. The girl thanked my dad profusely and things settled down.

5. This mother who went beyond her duty.

My mom was a nurse. One hot afternoon, we were coming along a road, when we saw an accident. 

A man’s car had crashed and he stumbled out of the car into the road, covered in blood and broken glass. I’d never seen anything as scary as that horrible, bloody mess in my entire life.

6. This father who was Superman in a literal sense.

When I was probably 5, my father and brothers were fixing a tire on the family car. The jack slipped (it was the old kind then) and the car rolled back on my foot.

7. This dad, who didn’t tolerate trespassers. 

One evening, I saw my father standing on the porch watching some people doing something way at the end of our yard near the road (we lived on a farm with lots of land). 

When a car’s lights shone on the spot, I saw that they had erected a large, wooden cross and started to light it on fire.

8. This father with superhuman strength. 

On September 13, army personnel came to our house to notify me that my first husband, an army combat medic, had been killed in action in Vietnam on September 5, 1969 — eight days before.

We’d just returned from the funeral and I was lying on the couch in mama and daddy’s living room.

Suddenly, there was a knock at the front door.

It was some Jehovah’s Witnesses. Normally, dad would politely ask them to leave, but it wasn’t working. 

He told them sternly “We just buried my son-in-law today. He was killed in Vietnam. I’ve kindly asked you to leave. Now I’m telling you.”

“We don’t believe in sending our sons to war. Those who die without faithfully serving God will receive the resurrection of the unrighteous,” they replied.

I think that’s when the top of daddy’s head blew off, because I heard the front door slam shut.

9. This mother who proved that mothers are never weak.

When I was young I remember that I’d plug in the coffee pot on Saturday mornings to help her wake up because she was tired from the week’s work. But then she got up and she was my mom; happy to be with us.

10. This father who took on an elephant for his family.

A few years ago my parents, uncle and sister were on safari in South Africa. I couldn’t make the trip due to prior work commitments. I wish I’d gone, I seem to have missed the experience of a lifetime!

Anyway, the family was out in a jeep looking for big game at Kruger National Park. They stumbled upon a young bull elephant that was in an aggressive and unpredictable mood. He trumpeted and snorted threateningly and even the ranger got nervous and prepared to back the jeep away. Suddenly, without warning, the elephant charged at the jeep. 

And wouldn’t you know it, the elephant simply froze in its tracks!

It just stood there momentarily, flapping its ears, probably assessing my father and the situation. And then turned around and fled!!

11. This mother who made sure no harm came to her daughters.

I was in grade school, and my sister and I were supposed to be catching the bus. Our mom used to accompany us to the stop but as soon as she got to the end of the road, we saw this big dog, coming around the house.

The dog lunged, snarling, into the air over the narrow two lane street that was all the space between my mom and him.

Then my mom got really crazy. She started walking, not away, like any sane logically minded person would do. 

No, she walked towards the pit bull! And to our incredible disbelief, with every step my mother took towards the dog, the dog moved one back. 

12. This father who knew how to get his money back.

My dad’s act of badassery stands out in my mind precisely because my dad is not what most would consider a ‘manly man’. 

He’s more of a giant, slightly nerdy goofball. Pretty absent-minded. And certainly not a tough guy.

It was our second day in Paris. We were getting on the metro, when my dad felt someone bump into him. That’s weird, he thought. Then he realized that the person had bumped into him from the wrong direction. From the platform where people were getting off the train, not on it.

He instantly reached down to his pocket and realized that his wallet was gone.

He immediately wheeled around, and saw a well-dressed woman standing behind him, about to jump back into the train.

13. This father who refused to tolerate bullshit.

My father is a taxi driver. Once, he picked up five men who were drunk all the way from their heads to their knees and  wanted to get in. 

However, his brand new Skoda Octavia vRS could only carry four people. 

He exited the taxi and apologized, though this wasn’t enough for the drunkards. 

One of them was already opening the boot of his car, undoing the supports which kept it suspended from going higher, and the other was beginning to shout.

14. This mother who changed herself so that she could change the lives of her children.

I was two when my parents got divorced. 

My mother left the town in the dead of night with two small children and the clothes on her back and got up to a major city, where we lived in a domestic violence shelter because none of our family would help her out, because of her addiction.

15. This mother who wasn’t afraid to call out a paedeophile. 

When my mom was about 10 years old, she had the displeasure of having one of the worst teachers imaginable. He used to punish his students if they didn’t know the answer or if they made a mistake. This wasn’t really all that unusual when she was younger, but this man took his punishments to a whole new level.

The boys had to stick out their arm, hand palms up with their fingers pointing upwards. The teacher would then hit their fingers with his ruler. His big, wooden ruler. And he pulled no punches.

When my mother was asked to answer a question, she admitted that she didn’t know it. The teacher told her to come forward to receive her punishment, but she refused. She said she didn’t want to be punished as a girl, but as a boy. So she stuck out her left arm, hand palm up, with her fingers pointing upwards. And I should add, my mother can only use her left arm. Still she requested the punishment that would result in her only usable arm to be hurt.

You see, the teacher was not only a cruel man. He was also, quite frankly, a pedophile. The punishment he reserved for the girls in his classes were nothing short of sexual harassment. He asked the girls to open their legs for him, so that he could pinch their upper inner thigh.

When the teacher refused to punish my mother like a boy, she asked him why. 

His only answer was that she was a girl and not a boy and should thus be punished as such. Again, my mother refused. By now, the teacher had gotten pretty upset with her, and was angrily demanding her to part her legs. And my mother, having had to stand up for herself since a very young age, did something awe inspiring.

The teacher, of course, felt less inspired by my mother’s choice of words and angrily shouted at her to go to the principal. My mother, head held high, walked out of the classroom, ignored his order to go to the principal, and waited in the hallway.

Like they say, children might get weak, but parents are always strong.