For parents who refuse to ever hit their kids....

Great Debates
21

Tantrums: I’m a big fan of breaking the cycle.

  1. Prior to the store, we’d do a pre-emptive ‘putting Ben’s temper in the trunk’. Sometimes, we’d put it in some one else’s trunk and laugh about how surprised they’ll be when his temper flies out at them. He also had a Cabbage Patch Doll (Vincent) who apparently had temper tantrums as well, and Ben would ‘parent’ Vincent about it.

  2. Sometimes, in the midst of the temper trantrum, I’d throw something totally odd his way (kinda like a verbal bucket of cold water, which doesn’t work well in a crowded store). “wow, that’s a really interesting shade of red you’ve managed there. Did you work at it? have you seen it? now, tell me, is it difficult to get the action of the legs and arms going at the same time?” I’ve also (with older children) commented “Nice try, not gonna work, but I gotta grant you it’s a nice try.”

Generally, speaking, however, some of it I believe are unrealistic expectations of parents. It’s unrealistic to assume that a 2 year old will sit still in a restaurant for an hour and a half without something to hold their attention. They’ve got the attention span of the American electorate ( :smiley: ), so you need to bring things for them to keep themselves happy and appropriate.

For safety stuff - I really don’t know. My personal experience was that my son would ‘alert me’ to dangerous stuff. BUt, generally speaking the loud ‘no’ worked to stop him in his tracks on other things.

As a generalized principal, the way I look at it, either you’re trying to get their attention and let them know you disapprove of their behavior, or you’re trying to hurt them. If you’re trying to hurt them, well hell- seems to me it’s obvious abuse.

If you’re trying to get their attention and let them know you disapprove of their actions, withdrawl of attention (time outs ), removing favorite toys, denial of fun things etc. works better. According to my son (who’s father was a fan of the ‘scheduled spanking’), he preferred his dad’s 'cause it was over really quickly, mine, he had to think about it and suffer for a while.

22

Hitting or being somewhat physical has it’s place.

If you stuck your hand on a hot stove, and the stove just had a small conversation with you about it, do you think you are more likely or less likely to stick your hand on the stove versus the current method the stove imparts… which is to burn you so goddam fast that your hand leaps the frig off the stove before you go up in flames.

Wanna see a kid/person pay attention? - watch them follow the stove’s orders when it burns them. Wanna see somebody sear off their fingers? - invent a stove that puts the child in time-out when it plays with it.

23

Here’s a concept: Different children respond to different punishments differently. That’s why only one of mine has been spanked, and thankfully he responded (I was out of ammunition after that).

IMHO, corporal punishment is only to be tried after you’ve tried every other solution possible. What Philster says is true.

24

My somewhat limited experience has shown me that many problems can be avoided or eliminated by proper planning. For example:

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by JohnClay *
**You probably believe that you can raise nice kids without ever hitting them.
I was wondering how you’d deal with these situations:

  • a toddler that keeps on trying to stick things in electrical sockets, even after you’ve tried time-outs and saying NO! a lot.

Child-proofing an outlet takes away this oh so attractive “plaything.” In addition, the dog’s water and food bowls can be placed on a table or out of sight in general. A 15th month old is going to explore, heck, I want him to. My job is make sure that the exploration is safe and sound. Also, saying “no” gets old. By limiting the instances of having to use the word, it maintains its importance and, hopefully, its impact.

I will tap a hand that has been in the dog’s water bowl and say “no.” It is not out of anger, but more out of fear. Our dog is great, not a mean bone in her body, but most other dogs will go nuts if you mess with their water or food.

I think it is very wrong to hit a child when one is angry because it becomes more difficult to judge the appropriateness of the response; however, a physical reminder is not inappropriate, especially if it is the offending appendage (i.e., I have tapped a shoed foot to make it clear that a foot doesn’t belong in the dog’s food bowl). Also, the response for a toddler needs to be immediate, they seem to lack the ability to understand delayed enforcement.

Toddlers want to get your attention and push buttons, the key seems to be consistency in treatment and enforcement of the rules.

25

I personally don’t like the thought that there is one right way to raise a kid. Everone is different, how can you expect one way to be the right way for everyone? My parents had to take vastly different approaches to raise my brother and I, since what worked for me, seemed to affect him little.

26

Hitting a child means that you didn’t know the correct response. I don’t think that it’s EVER appropriate. Maybe smacking their hand away from something dangerous is ok but that’s because you don’t have time to think of what’s appropriate to stop them from the danger. However you have to explain to them that you were stopping them and didn’t mean for it to hurt.

As for smacking them when they hit, that’s about the most ludicrous idea that’s ever been presented. How can you teach a child that hitting is wrong by hitting them?

If your child keeps up with repeated behavior, it’s probably YOUR fault or else a problem like ADD or Autism, and physically punishing them for something that YOU did wrong, or that they don’t have control over is pretty cruel.

I would say that the bucket of ice water is a bit excessive as well, however, it’s not going to hurt them, and it shows control on the side of the parent, taking away two items from the equation. The third item, the torture aspect is still present however. All physical punishment is a mild form of torture. In otherwords using physical pain/discomfort to achieve a desired result from a person. I do believe that torturing children is appropriate.

Now I do not claim that I will know the correct answer to every situation, as it probably varies from child to child. However, not giving into their every tantrum will help avoid tantrums in the future. Something that always made sense to me, is that if an infant is crying, don’t always pick them up, but comfort them with a touch. That way they will learn that they aren’t being ignored, but whatever they are upset about is not necessarily something that needs coddling.

Now some children will just keep having inappropriate tantrums and that is a sign of a problem that needs to be addressed. There are a wide range of problems that a child may have, none of them requires torture to be settled. We decided a while back that shock treatment is probably not all that an effective therapy, so neither is hitting or splashing them with cold water.

Physical violence is wrong no matter what. There is no appropriate circumstance. Ever. Whether it’s with an adult or with a child. Kids are going to repeat certain behaviors their entire lives and people just need to deal with it. There is no quick fix and torture most definitely is far from a quick fix.

Usually a reasoned response will get the desired effect as most children are thinking creatures and want to work out the most efficient possible solution to lifes problems. This means that not only do you have to not give credence to things that DO NOT work you need to give credence to things that DO work. So if the child is polite you need to give them the proper respect, showing that politeness works. If you want your child not to lie don’t make them afraid of telling the truth. For instance my parents always told me things would be worse if I lied, but they never were, I got the same extreme punishment regardless of whether I lied or not, and sometimes lying let me get away with it, so I lied. If a child knows that you will be reasonable with them for telling the truth then they won’t lie to you.

Traditional time outs are not effective, a childs toys are in his room, so why would you send him where his toys are? Having them sit in the corner for an indefinite amount of time is a better idea. The indefinite amount of time being determined by when he is calmed down enough to come and talk it over with you. That is VERY effective in what I’ve seen with children. Usually it takes 5-10 minutes max for them to calm down enough to come discuss it with you. However if they come back with an answer you don’t like you can’t just send them back to the corner, that is also cruel, you need to reward their maturity in coming to you to discuss it by explaining it the way you see it. Also as was said before, never hesitate to let the child be correct when you are not. That is an immense award for maturity.

So IMO physical torture is never justified. Again, smacking their hand away from a socket is not done for the purpose of hitting them, it is done with the objective of preventing a catastrophe, and an appropriate explanation that you had to act fast or else they would have been hurt will make them feel alright about it usually. Just as stepping on their toe will not cause them any kind of mental trauma because they will know that you didn’t mean to hurt them.

Erek

27

It’s a slippery slope and children are often very different from each other even within families. Limiting corporal punishment to swats on the behind and meaningful talks works in some situations and not in others.

In my personal middle class to upper middle class cohort of acquaintances, there are families I know whose parents have raised their children with a low to no physical punishment methodology (per DDG’s description) and relied mainly on reason and restraint (when young). Most of these children turned out fine, however, a minority are in lockdown institutions or are free on probation of various kinds for violence, theft, drug abuse etc. and the parents are beside themselves in that they did everything in the gentlest and most reasonable manner and this is what they got for their efforts.

There are other families in my cohort of acquaintenances that are similar to the Pkbites methodolgy of enforcing physical discipline into and past adolescence and insisting on direct and quick obedience and politeness (and the mother is the main “enforcer” in a surprising number of these families) without a lot of handholding and extended explanations. Most of these children turned out fine, however, a minority are in lockdown institutions or are free on probation of various kinds for violence, theft, drug abuse etc. In this case the parents are typically less soul searching and simply shrug their shoulders in that they felt they did the best they could to raise well behaved and responsible children and this is what they got for their efforts.

There is no perfect solution and some kids probably get gentle discipline when they could benefit from a more direct and authoritative approach and some kids probably get paddled when a conversation would have worked better for them. Over the top abuse of physical discipline is horrific, but no less horrific is an out of control teenager bent on self destruction that the parents are afraid to confront and discipline and who fears no authority. There are no easy answers and anyone promising that one method works best for most kids is generating an opinion, not a fact.

28

I just feel the need to say that my parents never once hit me (well, not since i’ve been forming memories anyway), and I – retrospectively – think of it as somewhat of an injustice.

I like to consider myself a decent guy…I’m not a complete asshole, but I do have some deep-down selfishness that I’m usually not aware of until I reflect on it after the fact. I just kinda do what I do without thinking about the repercussions it might have on that person or myself later on, and I feel this might have something to do with the fact that my parents were so lax in the punishment/responsibility department.

Come to think of it, this probably has much less to do with hitting than it does discipline in general, but I did type this whole 5 sentences up so I’m just gonna post it anyway.

To get back onto the topic somewhat… It may just be my perception, but a lot of the kids I knew growing up who had parents that hit more often than others were very polite and all that around their parents or most other authority figures, but complete assholes around peers. This made for some very irritating predicaments.

29

Let’s also not forget that children enjoy the same kind of free will that we posess, and they realize more and more as adults that they can make their own choices, and they choose to sell drugs, or rob a convenience store or even to kill someone. Those children made those choices.

I think many people are coming at the issue from the wrong direction as if we are raising our children, NOT to be criminals. How about we go from the idea that as a baby they won’t ever be a criminal and raise them so that they can have the best life that is possible for them, one that did not include torture as a means of coercion as a child. Now, they may still end up in jail, we may still make mistakes in raising them, but that doesn’t justify physical coercion necessarily.

The end result should be to give the child every leg up they can possibly get, whether that be better social skills, or a unique skill that sets them apart, not to “keep them out of jail” not to mention, not everyone IN jail is a lost cause. I am sure most of us have broken a law or two in our lifetimes that could have put us into jail had we been caught. I certainly have, and while I can blame it on my parents all I want, it’s not their fault even though I do believe they did a horrible job of raising both me and my sister. I STILL made the choices that I made. The good AND the bad. I can’t think of a single time that I broke a law that was a jailable offense that I wasn’t distinctly aware that it was, whether it be driving way too fast, or smoking a joint, or shoplifting when I was a teenager.

Erek

30

IMHO, this “touching a hot stove” thing is getting kind of ridiculous. I mean, this is so often used as a cliché reason to strike a child that it’s lost all meaning. If you let your toddler near your stove, YOU need to be punished.

I’m sure you can make up MORE circumstances in which it’s acceptable to strike a three- (or four-, or nine-, or ten-) year-old. But the fact is, there’s no evidence that it works and plenty of evidence that it can be harmful. It’s simply not NECESSARY to use violence to get your own way as an adult.

If you want to teach your children that you’re weak enough to resort to violence against a tot to get your own way, then I suppose within certain limits, that’s up to you. But don’t expect your children to respect you when they are adults.

L

31

As a small hijack, I would like to mention that Sweden in 1979 banned the use of corporal punishment.

While some people find it to be good thing:
http://silcon.com/~ptave/durrant.htm

others feel it borders on folly:
http://www.nkmr.org/english/smacking_and_the_law_a_european_perspective.htm

As I grew up after this law was passed, I am obviously biased - one is generally informed of this law while growing up, and I can’t say I spent much time considering why it was this way, it just seemed right to me. We’ll see if and how my feelings change when I myself have children.

Bom

32

Cliches very often are based in reality.

I take it you don’t have kids. I don’t have kids, and I know that kids are going to have the opportunity to get near a hot stove.

You’re preparing dinner. Spouse is not at home (or there is no spouse):

  1. Locking the child out of the kitchen while you are preparing dinner will very likely result in a screaming fit on the other side of the door. I’m no psychologist, but I really don’t think that preventing your child from being with you when they haven’t done anything wrong will be seen by the child as anything but punishment/abandonment;

  2. So you break down and let the kid in the kitchen with you. When’s the last time you prepared dinner? Hint - you don’t spend the whole time hovering over the stove. And if you spend the whole time you are chopping vegetables watching your kid to make sure they don’t go near the stove, you have a pretty good chance of taking off a finger - using a knife and not watching what you are doing is a bad example to set for your kids; or

  3. If you turn off the stove every time you step away from it, the result is that dinner won’t get cooked, and your child will die of starvation. :rolleyes:

So, the result is that every child is going to have the opportunity to approach a hot stove. So, what are parents supposed to do about it?

Sua

33

You don’t have a hi-chair in your kitchen? You don’t have a spot the child can sit on the floor and “help” you? You can’t think of something else to do besides slap the kid? Well, by all means…have at it.

L

34

I don’t have kids, but I used to be one.

A few times in my life, I was on the receiving end of a sharp little smack from mom or dad for something I did wrong. And what I did was wrong.

I was an unruly little hellion on many occasions, and on a few of those no level of ‘time out’ was going to make me reflect on what I had done wrong. One particular time-out that was designed to get me to come ‘talk to Mommy’ about what I did wrong lead to me dismantling a chair and seeing how many pieces of yarn I could rip out of an afghan before she came back and found me out. Discussion never quite worked out to be one because I would stand and scream until I had outscreamed Mommy. There were times that, as I destroyed everything around me, nothing but a smack got any response at all from me.

I needed it.

And there were a couple of things that got me smacked that I never did again. Like choking my sister while screaming that she was a ‘FING BH’ at the top of my lungs. No amount of ‘No Honey, don’t yell at her like that! Do not choke her!’ was gonna stop me. (She had taken a dump and knocked my retainer into the toilet with it. I was 8 years old. I was MAD.)

I thank my Mom for every smack she gave me. They worked.

35

I do have kids. There are all sorts of dangers for todlers in the home and you watch them like a hawk. It is demanding but it isn’t the impossible task you make it out to be. Running around slapping them whenever you feel they are near peril isn’t necessary.

36

  1. No, I don’t have a hi-chair in my kitchen. Then again, as I stated, I don’t have kids;

  2. If you think a kid is going to stay seated in one spot on the kitchen floor the entire time you are preparing dinner, you obviously don’t have kids;

  3. If you think a toddler can’t climb out of his/her hi-chair, once again you obviously don’t have kids;

  4. If you think hi-chairs are safe if the child isn’t being watched - say it with me - you obviously don’t have kids. I have witnessed the aftermath of more than one failed escape attempt by a nephew, cousin, etc.

  5. I didn’t advocate slapping the kid in that situation - I expressed no opinion whatsoever on the subject. I was criticizing your absurd assumption that it is possible to prevent a child from approaching a hot stove.

Take it as a fact that the “cliche” is real - kids will have the chance to harm themselves with a hot stove. Take it as a fact that kids will also have the opportunity to make a break for it out the front door and into traffic. In short, take it as a fact that children cannot be protected from every risk in the world. You are avoiding the issue of how children should be deterred from exposure to those risks by pretending that the risks can be avoided.

Start over again. Take as fact that children can do things that may expose them to harm. From that factual premise, discuss how toddlers should be deterred from taking such risks.

Sua

37

This is what I get for (apparently) posting in Swahili. I didn’t advocate hitting a child. I took no position on the issue.

And I didn’t say it was an impossible task. Note that I never said that it is inevitable that a child is going to burn him/herself on a hot stove. I do submit, however (and I’m sure that your experience is in accord with this), that it is inevitable that a toddler is going to get into a situation where he/she could get hurt unless you stop them. That is all I’m trying to say.

The question is - how do you stop them? Is corporal punishment effective? Do the negatives of corporal punishment outweigh the benefits? Etc., etc.
I have no opinion on those questions, because I don’t have kids and haven’t thought about the subject.

Sua

38

My feeling is that there is something tremendously hypocritical in teaching a child that it is all right for big people to hit little people.
My kitten knows that Mommy is no pushover. If he whines he loses privileges. And that has worked since he was three. I tell him" If you dont stop then I will turn off the TV, not read you a story, put you in you room…" or whatever it is that he wants to do at the moment. He knows ahead of time at stores that if he has a tantrum he wont get anything. And I have carried him out screaming often enough for him to know I MEAN IT!
I dont embarass easily so I dont mind telling him no and sticking to it in public. I have actually had people applaud me in a store:D
As far as when he was a baby, I put plugs in the outlets or furniture in front of them. I used a baby gate to keep him in safe areas; used an Evenflo exersaucer when he was with me in places that he could potentially get hurt and took the responsibility of an adult to put dangerous objects out of reach. As he got older I explained to him( talking to your child intelligently! what a concept) about why I did not want him to do such and such. All he had to do was feel the heat coming off the oven and he has kept his distance ever since. Fortunately he has never been a get into things child so maybe I had it easy.
However it does seem to me that consistancy is the best teacher. No means no and removal from a situation is far better than hitting.

39

Well, Sua, you may be surprised at how seriously you end up taking parenting if you make that choice. Prevention is the best cure. It’s also a complete lifestyle change. I get my child’s food prepared and then fed in a safe manner. Whether I get fed, whether the food is “fancy”, whether China bambina is unhappy about being straped into a high chair, is immaterial.

My priority is her safety and happiness. She’s not going to burn herself on the stove because a) the kitchen door is always shut and she can’t get in by accident b) when she is in the kitchen, she is never alone, c) when there is something potentially dangerous in the kitchen she doesn’t go in or she’s strapped in a high chair/stroller.

What to do? I’m not an expert. But my limited experience with one pretty good kid is that a scarified “no”, pretend panicked (sometimes not pretend) picking her up and getting out of the way, ends up with her concerned and rarely in tears, and then some hugs and explaining the situation works just at least as well as smacking her hand. I think smacking her hand has the unintended consequence of causing anger. Both ways get her immediately out of harms way. YMMV

40

I don’t see what is wrong with spanking a child, to tell the truth. It isn’t like we can incarcerate them, and younger children aren’t exactly champions of reason.

Nature gave us the gift of pain to let us know when something is wrong; why anyone would pass up such a wonderful tool for teaching is beyond me. We don’t have to slit the kid’s skin, but a quick spanking shouldn’t be ruled out so quickly IMO.

I learned not to play with knives when I cut myself. I learned not to drink my mom’s beer when I got spanked for it. I learned not to throw tantrums when I wrote “I will not throw tantrums” 500 times (it was suppoed to be 1000 but my mom felt bad after a bit ;)). There are various ways to punish a child, and using pain doesn’t have to be the one true way, but I think there are times when it is completely appropriate.

I will not get punihsed for holding a match to my hand. And yet I do not hold a match to my hand. This isn’t out of fear of seeing a chimpanzee grin, or worrying about being incarcerated (grounded).