I don't think we disagree so much as in degree. I am not advocating treating a 12 year old as an adult. I am promoting that it's a great time to begin training them to be an adult, giving them more responsibility for their own choices, and letting them learn the consequences of their own bad decisions. They won't get it perfect, they won't do it exactly as you would, but they will learn. They're usually smarter than all those hormones would have us believe.
Twelve years old is old enough to have a say-so in what the repercussions should be if he fails in some set discipline. This engages his mind and will in his own well-being and takes away the misdirected wrath at the disciplinarian. It allows him opportunities (not completely, he's still a boy) to become his own master, a skill that few over-dominated, over-disciplined, micro-managed boys acquire.
At twelve years old a father should have already established a loving dominance and begun to train a young man instead of a boy.
I agree that they are not mini-adults and shouldn't be burdened with the world's woes and responsibilities. They should be prepared to meet them, however, when they are of age. That doesn't happen overnight, as many parents dream it will. It's a long process, and if one waits until they are 18 to begin it, it's too late.
I'm sorry, too, that my home situation was abnormal. I don't use it as a negative gauge, else I would become like so many psycobabblers who think that everything is emotional and sensitive. I don't think a good butt-whupping at the age of twelve can scar a kid for life... and I don't think abnormal home situations are all that abnormal, unfortunately.
Nor do I call into question your child-rearing. I am only using this one example to posit other strategies that I think could be engaged because I will state it again: every child is different, because every parent is different.
In the posted article, it just seemed too rigid. Plus, it shows he had no real knowledge yet of his recently custody-acquired son's heart, perception, or upbringing in his absence--because it did not bring the respect or discipline he intended, it only brought wrath or fear, and a desire to punish in return.
I have no overt desire to win a point in this discussion, however. I do like the process of thinking through and discussing with others the particulars of a scenario.