A 13-year-old girl was punished by her parents for her "disrespectful behavior" by being forced to hold up a sign at a traffic intersection for over an hour.

The sign, which was held up by the teenager for up to 90 minutes, read "I'm a self-entitled teenager w/ NO respect for authority. I'm also super smart, yet I have 3 "D's" because I DON'T CARE! [sic]".

The sign had disturbed many passing motorists, with one alerting the police after spotting it.

See phoot HERE.

Parents Gentry and Renee Nickell explained that they did not know what else to do so they forced their daughter to hold up the sign, according to the Northwest Florida Daily News. "We got to the point where we just didn't know what else to do," said Renee. "We just felt like she just kind of gave up."

Renee claims that their daughter's behavior had gotten out of control since the death of their uncle (Renee's brother), who had died in Afghanistan in 2011. While it was hard for the family to cope with the death, the Nickells explained that their daughter became increasingly disrespectful both at home and at school.

They said they had a hard time finding a punishment for the behavior and eventually settled on making her hold the sign.

However, their punishment sort of backfired when passersby took photos of the girl which quickly became viral.

"I wasn't even thinking about what the public was going to think," Renee said. "I was thinking about our daughter. It was for her to be in the public and recognize what she had done wrong. I asked her, 'Were you scarred? Traumatized?' She said, 'No mom, I knew it was coming.'"

Responding to the backlash that the parents received for the punishment, the Nickells issued a statement saying: "Walk a mile in someone's shoes. We are a family that has been (through) recent trauma and it took a desperate attempt to show our daughter we are not letting her go, just like our Lord did for us."

Gentry said the sign worked for her daughter and that she hugged him and apologized in front of the police officer who had come to the scene.