As long as it’s not a lecture.
We literally begged for spankings instead of lectures. Lectures lasted past next Thursday. Spankings ended. Both were about equally as effective at influencing our ‘being boys’ behaviors.
Christian Discipline, or publicity stunt? Hell of a way to drum up business for your company!
Its a fine line, I suppose.
I wouldn’t know, I never disbehaved as a child and my son never disbehaved until he started kindergarten.
Maybe theres a correlation as we are both only children?
Well of course not. You don’t associate hot sauce with a direct form of punishment. There is a world of difference between making your thumb undesirable as a chewtoy and putting hot sauce directly into your mouth specifically to cause you pain as a punishment.
I wouldn’t call a third of the population “rare”.
Capsaicin is the equivalent of Drano to some people, and is more likely to be so to young children. And you can’t know until you try it. Loving parents don’t gamble with their children’s well-being.
I’m pretty much on the fence about corporal punishment; I don’t like violence, but I have to admit that there have been occasions when I have felt it necessary to administer a smack to one of my two young children (usually only if it is necessary to snap them out of a completely inattentive tantrum that could lead to immediate danger, such as when we are walking alongside a busy road). But this hot sauce thing disturbs me - my overall impression is that the procedure is designed to inflict a level of pain that would leave bruises if it were physical and that the avoidance of bruises is for the benefit of the parent, not the child. (if you see what I mean).
Bravo. Speaking as someone who has punished his children in many different ways, always trying and not always succeeding to avoid the physical, chemical warfare never seemed to be the answer. I mean, how about a teaspoonful of Ipecac? Kids throw up all the time, and it doesn’t hurt them, right? It also smacks too much of “your words have offended me, so your tongue will suffer,” which is just (my personal reaction) creepy. At most, I could only muster up the much less biblical “knock it off or your butt will sting for a minute” position. Now that the Wombats are older, denying them various pleasures or requiring various forms of restitution seems to work, and it seems to reinforce the “Dad’s in charge” idea, rather than the “Dad can hurt us if he wants to” idea.
Punishing my kids is a problem I haven’t solved, and I’m in no position to condemn anyone. At one point, I even used the dreaded Cow of Shame. It just seems to me that forcing something unpleasant or painful into your child’s mouth would raise trust issues that might not arise with other methods.
Sheez… hot sauce.
We all know that if you want something that works you have to use the Maddox Method.
After your kid has experience the “one-two shut-the-hell-up” a few times they will come and ask for the hot sauce themself.
A friend of my sister’s tried hot sauce on her son’s thumbs to get him to kick his thumb-sucking habit. The first time he got a taste, he whipped his thumb back out of his mouth, stared at it in awe and confusion for a moment, then burst out laughing!
Thereafter, he’d come to her and present his hands, thumbs up, for another hot sauce application.
So much for that method. 
The reason time out doesn’t work for many parents is because they send the kid to their room! Hello? Its their bedroom. The place where their toys and books and stuff is! It’s their fun place, their safe place.
The child is 14 next month and I honestly can’t remember the last time a stern look didn’t work (yep, I’m looking forward to the fun teenage years, all that having to think of serious punishment stuff). When we still did time out it was sitting against the wall in the kitchen. Horribly boring. Timeout should be a minute for each year the child is. Seven minutes in your own bedroom is nothing, seven minutes sitting on the kitchen floor is an eternity.
Hot sauce is just smacking to the mouth.
Is there any definitive proof that less than 1 mL of garden variety Tobasco brand will cause the kind of ‘excruciating and long lasting’ pain to a significant number of elementary school aged (first to sixth grade) kids that some people in this thread are saying?
Obviously if it affects your kid that way, don’t do it to them. But can you really condemn another parent whose kid is only mildly and briefly uncomfortable because of the punishment?
I don’t think anybody here is advocating using a habanero to punish a kid who’s severely reactive to peppers.
They do so every day. They let the little tyke ride a bicycle, they let 'em play sports, buy them that skateboard they always wanted, choose whether or not to vaccinate, decide whether or not to breast feed, carry the little bundle over a patch of ice, put 'em in a car…
Life’s a gamble. The question, in my mind, is whether or not a drop of Tobasco is actually harmful to a kid who is not hyper-sensitive to capsaicin. Answer I’ve arrived at is ‘Might be temporarily unpleasant, but not harmful.’
What kind and how much of the hot sauce do you think people who use the method are giving their kids? My impression is that it’s designed to cause a few minutes of unpleasantness, the same as a couple of swats on the ass with a bare hand.
Which is why the drop of Tobasco should remain a matter of individual parental choice and not one of the child welfare department. The only way this is a matter for the authorities is if there’s some kind of actual damage done, like feeding the kid some raw habaneros knowing they’re hyper-sensitive to capsaicin.
If a 9 year old says ‘fuck’ at school and the school can’t cope with that and punish it appropriatly it’s the wrong bloody school! You think that 9 year old invented the word? School and home are separate places and often have different standards. Schools are not new at discipling children
Hot sauce or smacked bums what does it matter? All you are teaching kids is that “big” people can hurt you when you don’t do what they want. Isn’t it better to teach them that they need to manage their own behaviour? Shouldn’t we give them skills that translate to life? Don’t argue the small shit, talk to your kid when something goes wrong so they learn to negotiate and listen to others, take something away so they learn that not fitting in with societal rules will have a negative effect on them.
As adults they can’t smack someone elses bum or apply hot sauce to their tongue if they don’t agree with them, swear at them or refuse to do what they are told but they can “send them to time out”…it’s called ignoring them and it is something that is an actual skill. Learning how to protect your arse or tongue from abuse won’t help you at all…unless you are escaping your parents
You raise your kids the way you want. Other parents will raise their kids the way they want.
No convincing case that a drop of Tobasco constitutes child abuse has been made, so I’m still considering it a matter of individual choice.
Interesting this should come up - I have seriously revised my opinion of a co-worker who told me a “funny” story about how he and his wife hot-sauced their three year old after he stuck out his tongue at his mother.
I think the whole hot sauce idea is awful, but to use it to punish a three year old child for sticking their tongue out seems indescribably harsh.
Horrible mom checking in, I guess.
When LilMiss was younger (5ish), she had a spate of being a horrific brat. Mouthy didn’t begin to describe it. Fuck You was commonly said (thanks to Dad’s friends who taught her that phrase, thinking it was “cute”). Telling her it was not okay didn’t work. Putting her in the corner did not work. Soap did not work (she would lick a bar of soap and smile at me). She was rude, disobedient, and I was at my wits end.
Out came the pepper shaker.
One shake on her tongue of your usual black pepper. She hated it. I told her if she kept up with her mouthiness, the pepper would be punishment- with warnings first (of course). After two incidents of getting pepper on the tongue, she said it didn’t bother her anymore, so eff-you mom! I threatened with the tobasco. She went and got the bottle, opened it, and took a whiff. Made her eyes tear up. She asked that I not do that to her. Luckily, I never have had to.
And now she likes pepper in her food, likes salsa and relatively spicy foods. She remembers the year of the pepper very well, and knows she was being a brat.
Flame away.
I shall and it’s working very well so far (dreaded teenage years yet to confront).
I would like to see the day when individual choice didn’t offer the choice of inflicting physical pain of any sort but I acknowledge that thinking that puts me in the La-la land camp.
Does it show I was bought up in a “we will nag you death but never lay a hand on you” family?
We do what we know. All I know is if smacking worked a child would not need more then one. Much like the death penalty.
Alas kids are kids. There will always be new situations and challenges, I just prefer to show my child that violence is not an option to any situation, anything can be talked through, conseciences will always be a factor and we don’t hurt those we love.
True, schools are not new about disciplining children, they’ve just been nuetered about it. Which leads me to another point.
Some of you are saying that if we have to resort to using something like this then it’s because we must be horrid parents. Well, maybe, but society has led us to look for punishments that actually work. Time-outs are great, I use them myself for certain situations, and they are somewhat effective. There are however offenses that require more than just a time-out or a scolding. It’s the parents that are against any form of physical punishment that I see that have children that feel like they can do no wrong, do not have to listen to anyone in authority, and usually end up being arrogant, self-indulgent pricks. Think about it people, how were we treated when we were children? Do you hate your parents for it? Did it help to form you into the person you are today?
I am firmly anti-corporal punishment.
But on first impression, tabasco sauce seems to me a perfect solution, because I associate it with unpleasantness, not pain. I am, however, willing to admit I’m wrong, and the testimonies in here have (mostly) convinced me.
I wonder how many parents who use this method have the same impression I do?
I never said anyone that used physical discipline was a horrible parent. I said that wasn’t my choice.
It wasn’t my parents choice either so no I don’t hate them.
I don’t think my child is an “arrogant, self indulgent prick” but then what parent would cop to that?
I believe I learnt that violence was not an option for my conflict with others. I believe my child is learning the same. I believe I learnt respect for my parents, elders, teachers etc. I know my child has a good grip on that…so far (teenage years are where we see if what we have done comes to fruition, no predicting that)
I am happy that I have raised a child who is polite and respectful and I only ever slapped his hand once (at 2, he was about to put said hand under the hot tap) what has worked with this child in this house might not work somewhere else, I accept that. I don’t believe physical punishment works, I don’t think what I believe should influence how others bring up their children.
I do think a non-physical way of discipline is worth thinking about though.