Corporal Punishment - Yay or nay?

Great Debates
121

Ha! Well, that’s true, I guess. Thank goodness my gods aren’t vengeful and angry. :wink:

Yeah…that technique? Worked for 24 hours. Then she intentionally pooped in her underpants three times in one day. When I asked her why, she stamped her foot and said, “I don’t want to use the toilet, because you’re making me ANGRY!” So I was angry and she was angry and I flip flopped back to my former position, that this was just not useful for any of us. So yesterday I woke up inspired to try something new: bribery. I told her that obviously things weren’t working out so well, so we were going to try something different, and that if she stayed dry and clean all day, she could open her new set of paints and paint before dinner.

Not the directest of consequences, I grant you, but she was so excited and happy all day as we periodically picked up the clear bag with the paints and brushes inside and looked at them and talked about how fun it would be to paint if she used the toilet like a big girl.

I couldn’t keep the girl OUT of the bathroom after that! :smiley:

We’ll see how today goes. I’ve found a bunch of things that work for one day. Nothing that works for a week.

I learned, through that and other life lessons, that it is important to consider WHY you are lying*, and that there are acceptable lies and mean ones, and that if you don’t know all there is to know about a situation, maybe it’s better not to lie and complicate things. It made me begin to understand the power of words - even the words of a “powerless” kid. A pretty complex lesson for a six year old, but yes, I do try to stop very deliberately to consider the ramifications of my words. Not always successfully, mind you! And that wasn’t the end of the lesson, but it was a big beginning.
*In that case, I was trying to hurt my mother. Not about the infidelity, which I didn’t know about, but because I had been asking her to see this movie and she had been saying no. So my telling her that Jane took us was meant to be a dig - a “nyah, nyah! You can’t stop me!” which was, and I can’t stress this enough, a complete fabrication. I hadn’t seen the movie. Jane never came over that night.

[Dryly] Oh, please, no…don’t ask me to talk about me![/D] :wink:

Nah, I don’t mind answering questions and exploring things when the intent is to actually learn and understand. I just stop replying to posters who seem intent on attack, not illumination.
ETA: Oh, and just so we’re all clear? I didn’t spank her. It was actually words, not physical punishment. I don’t spank her, much less beat her, in public OR in private. I spanked my son twice - once as a “running into the street” warning and once a flick on the cheek when he bit me while breastfeeding. Spanking is not part of my current parenting repertoire; I’m just careful as a parent not to say “never”. The power of words, you know - sometimes the thing you rule out is the thing that you have to resort to in the end. I doubt it in this case, but I’d rather not tempt fate.

122

Stuff and nonsense. Maybe in your interpretation of what you simplistically want to reduce my argument down to I’m equating anything with anything else, but in my posts, I think I’ve made clear (at least sometimes) that I think there are many, many, many sharp and clear differences between various gradations of hitting, swatting, punishment, child abuse, discipline and so on and so forth. I might have a different view from you on how any or all of these gradations could be handled by the individual parent, by our legal system, by our cultural view of children’s rights generally, but please don’t reduce me any further than I’ve reduced myself in these posts to a cartoon of an absolutist nutjob.

What benign swatting and vicious child abuse have in common is only this: they each involve a parent striking a child deliberately. In the smallest cases, I’m in the “No harm, no foul, no big deal” category, at least as far as any legal remedy goes. (If I were talking to a friend who’d swatted his kid, I’d try to find out if there were other, more effective methods available that were overlooked in the heat of the moment, but that’s me. I don’t recommend it to people who feel otherwise.) In the larger cases, I want legal justice for the victims of these crimes, if only to serve as frightening examples to parents who might otherwise be far too liberal in meting out physical remedies to child/parent confliicts.

123

It’s generous of you to acknowledge that beyond a basic physical description, the two acts are distinct.

The trouble is, you determinedly and hyperbolically equate them in just about every other post in this thread, undercutting your own effort at being reasonable.

124

Good for her!!

Finding her words to express her anger at such a young age is a great accomplishment (at any age). I hope you’re proud of her.

Of course, pooping might not be the best way to show her displeasure, but I’m sure I’ve seen worse from some adults.

For me, the difficulty is this: Yes, there’s a difference at the polar extremes. But it’s very rare for people to operate in the polar extreme of a light swat. In most cases, because of all the emotions involved, generally people are working in the gray area where it’s much too easy to swing toward the worse polar extreme. And I’ll generalize here to say that my experience is that many people are not very introspective and not able to notice that they’re operating in one end of the spectrum while thinking that they’re operating toward the other extreme.

That’s where PRR’s analogy of going to a police station to confess “crimes” makes sense to me. It’s asking the question of whether someone else were watching, would the behavior be acceptable. That creates a level of inspection where the introspection is lacking.

125

I don’t buy it. The word of discontention is “most”. A "rare few’ would be acceptable.

Not to make light of this subject, but my wife and I were still teenagers when we got married. And she was very, VERY naughty!:smiley:

126

I’m sorry, I’d love to debate this point, but I am fundamentally incapable of supposing, even for the sake of argument, that humans as a whole are child abusers. I’m sure you don’t want to put it that way, but I am unable to even fathom what your point is if I don’t interpret it this way: we’re prone to child abuse across the board, so we should not spank. This is just… I mean, I don’t even have words to describe my level of incredulity.

127

Precisely.

Personally, I find it a bit weird that I was getting such wildly contradictory (but uniformly hostile) reactions in the two Pit Threads I was in several times yesterday. In one thread, people were telling me how threatened they found it that I would suggest that they beat their kid, as per their own preferred personal style of discipline, in front of a cop or social worker and see what kind of feedback they’d get, because they were convinced that I was suggesting that they volunteer to serve a long term in federal prison, the frequent outcome of any interaction between parents performing conscientious discipline and the legal authorities, while in the other thread, I was being mocked mercilessly for suggesting that parental disciplinary measures have ever been found illegal in any court in the United States.

I’d go into one thread and it was like “Spanking is totally legal, you asshole, so shut up and die for suggesting that it’s ever a problem!!”, and then I’d go into the other and it was, like, “Why should I answer your stupid questionnaire, you fucking idiot, and get the cops all up my ass and get hauled off to prison for admitting to a crime that these nosy busybodies are prosecuting by the paddywagon-load!!” I wanted to connect both threads up after a while, and have them direct all their anger at each other, and eliminate the middle-man, but I lack the technical know-how to do that. Also, I didn’t want to spoil everybody’s fun in telling me how to post, and what I can say, and how, and why, and when, and in which tone.

128

Only cowards and a-holes beat their children.

That’s all I’m ma say about that.

129

This needs to be emphasized. Spanking has as much to do with child abuse as lying does with fraud. It can be part of a larger problem, but often it isn’t. You’ve been talking as if one was always a sign of the other.

I suppose one way of looking at it would be, what is the child afraid of? If he’s afraid of a spanking, then the punishment is working as intended as a disincentive to misbehave. If he’s afraid of the parent, then there’s a problem. That doesn’t mean that spanking is always the best solution, nor should it be the preferred one, but always equating it to child abuse is stretching the argument beyond the core issue.

130

FEDERAL prison? Uh, no.

131

You are going to cite a pit thread as evidence of weirdness? In GD? Have SDMB standards sunk so low in the last few years???

Your hyperbole knows no bounds. We ask for a cite, for your claim. It is bizarre to construe it this way.

Oh, I see, you were actually being calm and reasonable the whole time! Silly me for misinterpreting your statements.

Now, I suppose, the debate can begin in proper. I notice Jack Batty has left our discussion off, but now that it is clear you are prepared to debate in earnest, let us discuss the issue. Only, first, can you state clearly what your position is?

132

I’m thinking you meant contention there. Otherwise, the meaning is less clear.

If so, I think you’ve made my point. When people dismiss the issue as only pertaining to a rare few, they’re more likely to excuse behavior that others might not. It’s not an objective assessment.

Too bad. Serious debate requires words.

Too bad also that you felt the need to resort to a fallacy for your non-debate strategy.

:thumping fist on table: More substance, less fallacies. :chug:

Since your imagination was lacking in its ability to understand why it seemed to you that I was saying that all human beings are child abusers, perhaps it would help you to think about all the human beings on the earth who have never and who will never physically punish their children. They’re human beings also.

When come back, bring words.

Saw that. Interesting stuff.

That’s an interesting and perhaps apt analogy.

So are you pro-lying?

The analogy seems apt to me because on one side people think that lying can be pretty harmless but that fraud is such an awful thing. I don’t believe lying is as harmless as many people think it is because in the same way that people are not the best arbiters of their own actions, lying can lead to more serious actions than they realize. The same goes for spanking.

133

Fallacy? I’m incredulous that you actually think that way. There’s no debate in how you do or do not think. What could the debate possibly be? “You do think that way!” “No, I don’t!”?

I have several unanswered questions left from page 2, if you believe that we shouldn’t spank, in part, because it teaches children that it’s ok to hit people. If you do not, then I will continue with my “non-debate strategy”.

134

No.

I’m discontent (definition: not satisfied) with the word/term “most’”.

135

Ok, here’s what I think: I don’t think children should be hit. I think that with patience they can be taught to toe the line without adults having to resort to physical punishments.
My daughter is not yet two but she understands that if she plays with the cat’s water bowl, drinks it or spills it all over the floor, she has to go out of the kitchen and wait until I am done in there. Yes, she cries and shouts if I put her out and close the baby gate, but it hardly ever happens anymore. I certainly don’t need to slap her to teach her a lesson.
There have been times I have wanted to, but they were because I was upset/angry/frustrated by her behaviour. It didn’t seem right to smack her becuase I was having a problem with her behaviour, so I had to take a deep breath, remind myself she knew no better and then explain to her what the problem was - stop kicking me when I am changing you, it hurts and makes it difficult to do this quickly. After the 3rd or 4th time, pulling a sad face and having her think she was going to make me cry made her stop straight away.
Yes I was upset when she drew all over the wall, but I gave her the crayons and left her on her own for 5 minutes. So, we cleaned the wall together and then I directed her to the paper where she now colours happily without graffitting the furniture.
I’d rather she learn that her actions may hurt someone and she should think about what she is doing, than learn that lashing out is an acceptable solution.
I’m not saying I will never smack her, it might happen, but I would rather it didn’t.

Also, I am a teacher with 16 years experience, mostly with children aged 3 - 8 years. I can confidently tell you that the children who have the most behavioural problems are those who get a smack or slap at thr drop of a hat. Firstly, they have learnt that when someone makes you angry or does something you don’t like, it s ok to hit them becuase that is the example they are following. Secondly, they have no other straegies to deal with how they feel. Thirdly, they get hit, there’s nothing else left, the bar can’t be raised, now what are you going to do to me when I mis-behave?
I can’t give a cite, it’s anecdotal, but there it is.

136

Too funny.

So now you’re incredulous that I pointed out your use of a fallacy? :smiley:

Perhaps you should have said in your first post that you’d love to debate but all you have is an opinion. That might have worked.

Ah OK. So you have a feeling about a word.

Oh.

137

The trouble is the “sometimes”. Yes, sometimes you talk as though you think mild disciplinary swatting is fundamentally different from child abuse. And then sometimes you seem just to lump them both together under “beating”.

This seems like a rhetorical trick, to enable you to covertly accuse parents who use corporal punishment of “beating their children”, but then to deny that you meant to imply that they’re child abusers. It doesn’t seem to serve any useful purpose, and confuses the issue unnecessarily. Why don’t you just say “spanking” or “swatting” for mild corporal punishment, and reserve terms like “beating” and “abuse” for the stuff that it’s actually illegal to do to a kid?

138

Thank you for correcting me, Baldwin. All this time I’ve been mistaken. :smack: When you say that you lost respect for the authority figures, do you mean you logically made that progression when you were younger? Do you believe that those who decide to use physical punishment do so entirely for any “pleasure” involved, or is it a subconscious by-product?

Yes, I remember being “beaten” very viscerally. I still don’t associate all the feelings with it that you do, but perhaps I am approaching the memories the wrong way. Why do you believe someone has such a hard time recovering from the experience?

A few more questions: How old is too old, or how young is too young? Those that are anti-corporal punishment, do you draw a hard line even if it involves someone getting popped upside the head just to let em know they’re acting wrong? Surely there’s no physical or mental anguish associated with that. Lastly, what are your opinions on getting into fist fights with your kid (I’m thinking like when a teenager decides he wants to have go of it with his old man).

139

Parts of our culture that were once considered the norm can change to such an extreme that the next generation finds that norm unfathomable. Both Northerner whites and Southerner whites looked upon slavery as normal. Can you imagine such a thing? And only a generation ago, women were discriminated against in the fields of law and medicine when they applied to those schools. (Even in high school, some classes were open only to boys and some only to girls.) We accepted that as the way things were supposed to be..

When I was growing up, it was not unusual for parents to use a belt or a switch on children. And it may not have been all that unusual to slap them. No one thought of it as abuse. But we’ve been made more aware of the harm that slapping and whipping can cause.

I was taught later that hitting a child in the head can cause all sorts of problems including hearing loss. I have a lot of ringing and roaring in my ears. I don’t know if it’s because of the slapping or not.

We also don’t really know the full physical or mental problems of the growing child that we might be hitting. Some injuries or illnesses are dormant for a long time. We might be aggravating a problem. Should we hit a child that is genetically predisposed to depression (and, therefore, low self-esteem)? How much do you hit him? How often? What happens when the parent ignores the rules for hitting and continues to whip the bare flesh of a seventeen year old girl when the parent is in a rage and her daughter is depressed?

Once you start hitting, it’s hard to draw the line.

There are ways to force or compel or cajole kids to do things without hitting them.

If I can figure out a way to get a high school football player out of my classroom and into the hallway without touching him, surely you can handle an eight year old.

Pax

140

My point was that prr often talks as if all spanking is child abuse, which I think we can both agree isn’t the case. I’m not pro-lying in the general sense (I’m pretty bad at it actually, it’s against my nature) but neither do I think honesty is always the best policy. If a woman asks a man ‘does my butt look big’, what man is going to say ‘yes’? The same with spanking–I’m not saying it’s a good idea, but neither am I saying that it’s never appropriate.