Spanking & Corporal Punishment - Time for a Return?
Let's take a quick look at the facts as I see them. I find the large majority of kids today, all ages, not just the teenagers, to be disrespectful, mean-spirited, rude little brats and that I not something I lay entirely at the feet of their parents. Certainly, you see a lot of public unruliness go unpunished or outright ignored by parents and that sets up a lot of the rotten behavior we see today and those bad eggs will rub off their behavior to other kids at school where that sort of nonsense goes even further unpunished. I am going through it at the moment with my seven year old son and it is something that my wife and I have nipped in the bud pretty quickly. He is now well aware that just because other kids behave that way, doesn't mean he can.
The problem seems to be that kids know that there is no real threat of any type of punishment at home or school. Time-outs to me are a total joke. "Get to your room and make sure to stay off the computer, no calling your friends on your cell phone, no video games and absolutely no watching TV on you Hi-Def 42" wall-mounted plasma". By the time parents get done issuing that sentence they've probably already forgotten what is was the kid was getting punished for in the first place. Groundings have pretty much the same effect as children are forced to stay indoors for a week....tough love for a kid living in Wisconsin in the middle of November. The worst that can happen at school is detention or a suspension which the average miscreant youth would actually welcome.
Back in my youth, and I'm sure adults of a similar age to me can agree, spankings and corporal punishment at school were the order of the day. Growing up in Scotland was an absolute nightmare for kids. Adults were to be respected and any kind of misbehavior or backchat got you a spanking from the closest grown-up regardless of whether you knew them or not and God forbid your parents found out. My Mother has a plastic bottomed slipper, which I can only assume she purchased at an S&M type store that was used to dispense punishment on any exposed part of the skin below neck level. School was equally as bad as you were belted on the hand with a split leather strap for the horrific crime of forgetting to wear your school tie.
I'm still friends with a lot of people from back then, some who were subjected to much worse than I, and the common theme is that we are all very well adjusted adults who have a good sense of right and wrong and have a large amount of respect for others. Same applies to people I have met in Canada and the US, most of whom were laid into by their parents when they were younger and all of whom have a great love and admiration for said parents and are still a normal functioning member of society.
Can we really believe that a spanking on the butt can lead to severe psychological trauma? I'm sure that repeated, over the top beatings will have that effect, but a bare handed slap on the legs? If that is the case then why are psych wards filled with thirty and fortysomethings who are full of self-loathing and flagellate themselves with belts and slippers at any sign of wrongdoing on their part? Instead, we have kids claiming that their human rights are being violated and divorcing and suing their parents. As it stands at the moment it's the inmates who are running the asylum because I believe all these kids are crazy......like a fox.
Published by John Watson
Born and raised in Scotland, moved to Calgary Canada at age 19. Now living in metro Atlanta, GA. View profile
A Gentle Parent's View of Corporal Punishment - Calling Spanking Out fo...If parents want to raise non-violent respectful children why does the parenting community at large still embrace corporal punishment? - Should Corporal Punishment Be Considered Abuse?Should spanking be considered abuse?
- Corporal Punishment in Schools Whips Down American ValuesA fable reads that the state of Mississippi was originally named Mispi. The process by how the name eventually evolved into its current alias was through school children being forced to say the name while being paddle...
- Why Corporal Punishment in Schools Should Be OutlawedSome parents say they hit their kids out of love. Do teachers strike out of love, too? Teachers must really love black boys, because black boys are more likely to get hit than any other student demographic.
- Corporal Punishment: Why Not to Spank Your ChildWhen I tell people that I don't believe in spanking as a form of discipline I get a wide variety of responses. Some people agree, some disagree, but it seems everyone has an opinion.
- Corporal Punishment in Schools
- Preserving Childhood: The Detrimental Effects of Corporal Punishment
- Best Argument Ever Against Corporal Punishment in Schools
- Corporal Punishment in Schools
- Alternatives to Corporal Punishment
- Corporal Punishment in School
- Corporal Punishment: Does Hitting Really Solve the Issue?
8 Comments
Post a CommentDisgusting,disgraceful, ugly, horendous, sick...there are so many words I could use to describe this. I will never support violence,ecspecially violence toward children, no matter how many people tell me I am wrong. Any form of violence agaisn't any child I do not support. It is wrong to harm anybody,but a child? Even more appauling. They are smaller. Don't be surprised when they grow up and bully other children,when they grow up and hit their children, hit their wives, hit their husbands,when they grow up needing counselling,when they are recluses and feel they can't cope with society,when they become like mush, quick to fall apart. Don't ever be surprised. You taught them first.
s hurt you. You know that it is not discipline,people just put this because it sounds appropriate. It is violence and violence is an abusive action. Violence means to abuse. So please enough with the lame excuses, we all know it is wrong. Time for a return? NO, because it is violence and violence is unacceptable. Here we have police picking up people for assault and yet somehow it is seen as acceptable to assault people in schools, just because they happen to wear a uniform and not hold the same position as teachers and principles. So it is somehow different. Well there is no difference,and it is time for more people to get some courage and make a stand.
'spanking' and corporal punishment, mean the same thing: violence. It is sickening to even think about bringing violence into schools when there already is violence. If teachers and principles are allowed to hit their students in the future, they are bullies,because if a student was to hit another student,they would be labelled as a bully. It is no different and is just so unfair. It teaches nothing but violence. Parents ecspecially shouldnt be smacking their children,because violence is meant to be free from all households, and everywhere. We, adults, are the people who these young ones look to for teaching,even when they come across not interested,inwardly they take on everything.Only when you are being attacked is it acceptable. We all know it. Violence is never the answer. Some of these comments below mine disgust me. Christie,you are full of it I'm sorry,anyone who states that they've turned out fine are lying. Deep down you know it is wrong, you know it was wrong that your parent
John,
You'll like this (but Christie Silvers really needs to read it)
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/468083/best_argument_ever_against_corporal.html?page=3
I am on the fence on this one. Not sure that spanking would be the solution. More so, I find that parents are just letting their kids do whatever and say whatever just to keep them happy for whatever reason. Could be that mom and dad work too much and are trying to over compensate. Or maybe mom and dad are split up, ya know?
John,
The problem, as I see it with spanking, is that most of the time it does not work. That is, one spanking does not stop the behavior, so it happens again and again. No moral judgment here - only pointing toward the need for each parent to discover by trial and error what really 'works' for their own child. It's an important issue to have raised and I am glad that you did so.
David
At the beginning of each school year we had to bring home spanking permission slips. You are 100% right when you say there are no repercussions. A former neighbor of mine had a teen con that called her the "C" word (the really, really bad "C" word); her punishment for him? She wasn't going to take him to Taco Bell for dinner. If I would have said that I would have been trying to figure out how to pick my my teeth off the ground after my father busted my kneecaps ...
Good stuff John! I, too, was spanked--with bare hands, belts and hickory switches--as a child and I'm perfectly fine. Or at least the people around me think I'm perfectly fine and that's all that really matters, right?. LOL! I don't feel like I've been scarred or have any sort of psychological damage because of it. As for time-outs, my children don't have comps, tvs, video gams or any of that jazz in their rooms and won't until they pay for those items themselves. I'm an evil mother, I know. LOL