Woman let's a snake bite her baby to 'teach her a lesson'... Thoughts?

The mother of this child explained that the reason why she did this was to teach her baby not to play with snakes.  She explained that the snake she used was small, non poisonous, and didn't break the skin.  Do you think this is ok?  I don't know, seems kind of extreme.  I don't know if teaching your child to be fearful of something is the way to protect them but I guess every one has different parenting styles...