Fish - surely I am advocating reason rather than anger.
You were the one who hit your kids from anger not me.
Peter - You say “Yes I have smacked them, yes in anger, yes at the end of my tether, and yes, just once in a blue moon have I done it for ‘discipline’ whatever that might mean.”
I’m only arguing that you should only have smacked your children once in a blue moon!
The rest of the time you were probably smacking then un-necessarily and I agree with you that it is a violent and abusive act to smack children because “You always lose control, you always act with a level of irrationality.”
Peter you also say "Mykle sees a good parent as someone willing to force physical pain and possible injury upon a child" - when it is obvious that you are much more likely to do that in you fit of temper!
Sadly you admit you can’t control yourself (some parents can't) but luckily many parents can and for the Christian and other enlightened parents it is a rational, not irrational, rod that should not be spared.
tho what i WOULD like to know is ... where do you get a good argument these days??? ... i mean a really good even handed argument where both parties are well matched???
too many messages to read on this thread, and the scrolling is so slow.
when I was a kid we used to physically fight a lot and it was mainly because we learnt it from our parents.
i smacked my son once when I lost my cool and he still remembers it , he was two at the time
i've never seen he and his friends fighting, I've heard them bickering, it never comes to blows.
when my father hit me or my brother or a teacher at school caned someone they looked degraded, out of control
smacking a kid is degrading to yourself look- makes you look vulnerable and out of control
Kids need you to be strong. Not reasoning with them at any age is patronising. you should give them the benefit of the doubt. if they're too much to handle put them in a room alone to break up their behaviour pattern
put them on a special chair you only put them on if they've misbehaved
if you make a habit of smacking it has less and less effect
@!#$ they might even learn to look forward to it!
refers mykle to earlier post:
"Do I take it that you have had a change of heart now that your children are big enough to fight back or have you just grown out of the need to hit them?"
Fish - I have to admit you are right - I'm not sure what your arguement is :o(
Is it that you smacked your kids but now you think it's wrong,
or you smacked them because you couldn't help it - so its alright, or you tried it but it doesn't work?
ooops ...
*puts giant hoover down*
if the above isnt an example of personal attack then i am not sure what is mykle ...
or is this another case of Mykle World Reasoning?
It's very difficult to argue with people who keep changing there position - Fish. Since mine has been fairly consistent - I have, mostly, been trying to find out what it is that annoys you so much about it. I am merely re-iterating a Christian maxim that actually has it’s roots in the Old Testament and has probably been the basis for billions of up-bringings. The past 20 or 30 years has seen us throw away many traditions in favour of modern thinking and Heaven knows - we are paying for it!
Fish hasnt changed her position Mykle.. you just seem to fail to grasp what she is actually saying. There are only so many times a person can go over the same point again and again... you simply dont appear to be listening to her?
Interesting reading this thread...
As a parent of two little children (oldest nearly 7) I can recall perhaps one occasion when I delivered a light smack to the elder one.. yes it was end of tether.. yes it was to indicate how exasperated I was feeling at the time and no I am not proud of it and think it was wrong..
Until fairly recently I would have fully accorded with the views
of Liana, Fish, Peter etc that smacking/violence is wrong under any circumstances..
However, as we are coldly and rationally discussing the disciplining of children and youth.. and in the light of the world we live in where violence is and will always be a fact of life and is perpetrated by some of these very kids when they grow up.. sometimes on behalf of the state (police, soldiers)..
Is the above view not, well, iconsistent, with the real world that our kids grow up in? How do we go about disciplining children who start to behave in a cruel and violent way towards others.. eg those who endanger themselves or others; by behaving recklessly in front of cars; throw stones over bridges etc, where other methods have failed to produce the required result?
The question is, coldly and rationally, are there any circumstances where you think that the child might actually benefit from being subjected to physical punishment to give them
the 'emotional experience' of what it feels like when they do it to others? And the important lesson that if they do it, chances are, someone bigger will come along and do it to them? Yes, it is
a power lesson.
Fish, if someone were to hit your younger son, would you not think it right if his bigger brother were to intervene on his behalf so as try to stop it from happening again?
I am toying with this idea and even perhaps with corporal punishment in the justice system for crimes of violence..
The lesson is this: violence begets more violence towards you. How do you teach this without being prepared to resort to violence??
Now no attacks on my person (violent or otherwise) for trying to confront head on this difficult societal problem.. ok perhaps, just a light spanking...
ok. the point is, mykle.. that to smack a child when you are calm, is less understandable - not less acceptable, than when you do it in anger... because doing it calmly is a very strange thing to do to a child. I couldnt make my kids wait until they saw their father for a smack.. that adds extra, prolongued fear into the equation as well as pain.
What you have to remember Mykle, is that nobody is saying that you are a bad parent - just that violence against a child - and whether you like it or not, smacking a person that is smaller and weaker than you, is a violent act - is not acceptable behaviour.
Fish didnt say at all that when she snapped and smacked her child that it was a form of justice.. she never said that. You said that she did.
Here, she says: "i am not advocating smacking as "justice" at all mykle ... smacking isnt JUST ... it is the abuse of physical power by a parent ... it is violent and wrong ...
i dont agree with getting control of a child via the use of pain whether it is meted emotionally or coldly ... you have entirely misunderstood my argument ..."
Is it clearer now?
Why on earth should those that think smacking is wrong have to provide an alternative? and, just because they admit that there is no hard and fast answer you claim they have shot themselves in the foot. I think the proof should be the other way round. You need to show us that smacking works.
You mention the unruly boy who cannot be controlled and perhaps need a smack to control him. well, it clearly doesn't work since he re-offends. The solution for him is something else, and no, I don't have to offer one, I just have to illustrate that smacking him or using violence on him does not work.
gerry (spider) is hoping to prove that smacking can be effective by trying to show that "violence should begat violence" as a deterrent. he has a long way to go to have me convinced. Singapore may well have a lower crime rate. that may be more to do with culture than corporal punishment though. America has the death penalty and that doesn't seem to stop premeditated murder. American police are amongst the most vicious in the world from what I have seen on various documentaries yet the crime rate in the states is very high. they chop peoples hands off in saudi yet people still steal.
I cannot see anyone giving up violence just because there is a threat of greater violence or corporal punishment out there. Some of us here would do simply because we can look forward and weigh up the consequences of our actions. Criminal and violent minds tend not to work that way. they simply get on with it and worry what will happen to them only if they get caught.
you seem to think that no one understands you clever point gerry. I think we do. I suspect that you can't see the point being made back though that your stance is contradictory. follow this logic:
If you say violence should be met with violence and an adult smacks a kid for being naughty, who has comitted the violent act here? the adult. So, next time I am walking in the high street and see a woman, for example, thwaking her 3 yr old on the bum I will do the same to her so she feels sore and humiliated. Her very large husband then arrives and does the same to me. my mates turn up to teach him a lesson so he pulls a knife since he is outnumbered. If we were in the states the cops would turn up and shoot him the minute he puts his hand in his jacket (to get his phone) coz they think he has a gun.
I know that is silly but I hoped to show the escalation that can ocur and how to met with your tenet we would have to be violent to the perpetrator of the violence ie the smacker.
finally, pioden, yes all those other things you mention such as mental torture are cruel as well. just because you keep finding things that are worse than smacking does not justify it.
by the way spider, I took a look at the last thread on smacking. you thought then that a light smack might be acceptable but the threat should be enough. when vicky pointed out that if you never carry out the threat you thought bribery was best. your remark about the type of people that are violent to children was interesting as is your acknowledement that escalation will not work:
Author: 1legspider (---.uk.ibm.com)
Date: 01-24-02 13:11
There is a difference between a little discipline meted out by parents to discourage bad, malicious or destructive behaviour in kids (who understandably are always stretching boundaries) even perhaps extending to the threat of a smack or a little smack, not necessarily to inflict pain, but just to indicate brevity of a situation.
.. and parents who routinely use physical and mental abuse against their children, not recognising that it is their self hate that is driving them to do so.. and having failed to take responsibility for themselves and their lives.. now project their own hopelessness and failures unto their children..
Author: 1legspider (194.196.100.---)
Date: 01-24-02 16:25
Good point about the smack, Vicky.. if they suss that you will not go beyond a certain point.. then it may become becomes useless...
However, bribing with chocolates.. now that always works with kids.. for misbehaving partners too..
How many times have we had this argument before? I have no children, but have worked with child abuse for seven years.
There is a broad spectrum of acceptable parenting, and yes, I believe that that can include smacking in a certain situation. No, I don't believe it is a good thing and that in my view what it teaches is that might makes right. I fully understand why some parents lose their temper momentarily and smack a child, I don't like it, I don't agree with it, I wish they wouldn't do it, but I don't want to make it illegal. I'm not crazy about the idea of smacking a child calmly at a later point either.
I think anyone who has ever been hit as an adult would realise how frightening and powerless you feel - much more so if you are a child who is not physically able to fight back and much more so if the person hitting you is also the person you live with and who loves you. I think it is a punishment that is not only wrong, but is unnecessary and doesn't work.
BUT - that is my opinion and I don't think that people who have other opinions to me are bad parents. I know a bad parent when I see one, because I have seen about two thousand. There is a substantial difference between a smack and a beating - all I would say is that a lot of the really nasty beatings I have seen have taken place long after the behaviour in allegedly the calm punishment approach, but equally a lot of the skull fractures have been caused by a slap or a bang against a wall in a quick flash of temper.
There is not an easy answer to this. I have my own opinion, but I don't believe that it is the only valid opinion.
but spider... you are saying with one breath that violence begets violence and then that you are toying with the idea of corporal punishment for violent crimes!
where does it stop???
there is a big difference between a child who is physically assaulted by a parent who is at the end of their tether or loses their temper .... and one whose parent meters out a smack not an assault because the parent has control and is used solely for punishment or warning ...
a parent who has 'lost it' can do far more damage physically and mentally to a child than one who knows what he or she is doing and a child who knows why it is being done
I asked my daughter how she felt about this issue ..... she is currently on a CACHE Fondation Caring For Children ... she disagree with smacking but can understand the reasoning behind parents taking such action but pointed out after reading what you have all put that it would seem that some of you have come pretty close to being guilty of child abuse because you didn't have control and therefore could have cause damage to your child without knowing it at the time
I have a friend who as a social worker works with abused kids perhaps you'd best ask him .... whan I did he pointed out that there is not excuse for a adult to lose their temper and to assualt a child but there is ever reason for a parent to teach their children the difference
Religion has little to do with it and to use it as means to defend your arguement show the weakness of your point
I go with 1legspider on this ... not sure if I should give you a light spanking though
I have to say that I am in broad agreement with 1Leg.
I'm pleased that things seem to have cooled down a bit and we can debate more calmly!
Liana, thanks for you simplification - here is my reply :
1 I agree that waiting for punishment adds fear and prolongs the suffering but in the "once in a blue moon" that smacking was even contemplated that was deemed as a fair part of the punishment.
2 Smacking a person that is smaller and weaker than you, is a perfectly acceptable behaviour under the law - if it is your child and you deem it necessary for the child’s welfare.
3 I never said that fish’s form of smacking was any form of justice. Quite early on I said:
“I agree with you Fish... your form of smacking is not a form justice - I made that point earlier.”
4 I argue that smacking can be just if it is done for the right reasons - and the law of the land agrees.
5 I think smacking your children is far preferable to them being uncontrollable.
Am I clearer now ;o)))
As far as waiting for Dad to come home and meter out some form of punishment ... the Father figure was often used as the figure of authority .... to which you learn respect ....
my father was often away due to his work but when he was ..... we knew we were in trouble if my Mother referred us to him ..... we we're never smack by either parent ...
my Mother had a tone of voice which we knew not to cross but if my Father was referred too we knew we we're in trouble .... this is how we were taught respect ....
Where is the authoritive figure in your arguments and as there is none then perhaps its understandable why there is no respect for others anymore
re have any of you been beaten and grown up to beat your children
my mother was viciously beaten by her nanny. She beat me often because she "couldn't stand the sight of my face". I have no children, am unlikely to have any.
I found Jay's and AJ's tales very comforting
I think your point is well made Liana, and uner normal circumstances hard to disagree with..
However violence SHOULD begat more violence.
This is a valid lesson for anyone to learn..
It is why police carry truncheons and guns, and we have soldiers and an army.
My argument is this.. If someone chooses violence (makes a rational choice eg criminals, terrorists etc) as a means of achieving their aims, dealing with their frustrations etc... surely a rational debate is pointless.
The only real lesson is an emotional one, a power one.. That is,
chances are it will happen back to you... until you desist from this means of trying to achieve your ends..
What has this do to with smacking children.. very little normally.. but in special cases where children as I have said before start to exhibit dangerous, violent, antisocial behaviours (mentionold ladies mugged for their pitiful pensions here Gerry just to ram in your point)... then rational lesson is ineffectual
and a violent one should be used.. ...I am beginning to think.
But convince me otherwise..
I have three very different children .... and have had to smack on of them but for a good reason not because I lost my temper ... which is the most acceptable ..... allowing my son to run into the road or stopping him or my pushing him under the wheels of a car ?
I don't think we should extend the debate to law and order Gerry - pehaps you could start a new thread for that ;o)
I think this has been a very powerful debate on an extremely emotive issue - the biggest surprise for me has been the lack of support for the Christian view point! I'd like to thank Fish and others for their honesty - very brave under the circumstances.
so, smacking a child calmly and coldly is not child abuse then pioden?
being at the end of your tether is entirely different to 'losing control' and beating the crap out of a toddler or tying a child up and locking them in a dark cupboard for several hours. The last two, IMO, fall into the abuse category.
what is being discussed in this thread doesn't.
my kids are 12 and 13. I cannot remember the last time I smacked either of them. It was a long long while ago and and consisted of a single slap on the back of the leg after being utterly sick and tired of the of trying to deal with the tantrum at the time. my wife has only ever smacked once. that was when our daughter, aged about 5 at the time, told her to fuc.k off during a tantrum.
neither of us have smacked since but neither of us was guilty of child abuse either.
the people you and your daughter are talking about are an entirely different issue and live in a world of family violence that, without doubt, requires intervention from the social services. the people on this thread do not. They are trying to calmly discuss the issue and the last thing required is accusatons of child abuse.
good grief.
Mykle - you abuse my words by applying them within your predetermined agenda. Let me make things a bit plainer to you. It is no better to smack out of anger than to smack out of an (imagined) controlled urge. Both are acts of violence upon a child and both are (equally) wrong. Do I make that a bit clearer for you, or will you, (yet again, I fear) attempt to present your theological presuppositions as a form of pretend logic and then attempt to reinvent my hermeneutic?
A comment upon your theology. An allegorical consideration for you. I have a garden, which I tend, nurture and make beautiful. Within that garden I sit in my deck chair and watch as I let my little children play. I notice a man appear at the open wicker gate (left open, I should add, by me). I watch as this man, whom I recognise to be a known sex offender and paedophile, grabs my little child from my garden, and runs off with her. I watch as he then proceeds to commit the most atrocious acts of physical and sexual violence upon that child, and I watch (still doing nothing to stop it), as that child is slowly and horrendously killed, as she begs for me to intervene. And through it all I do nothing. I sit in my deck chair. I watch. I do nothing.
Now any sane individual would consider me morally repugnant for doing nothing, for choosing to let these events happen, even though my intervention might have prevented such an act from happening. But I am am, after all, only human. I am not God. I am not omnipotent. I am not omniscient. I am just a human. But I am still morally indefensible for having failed to act. I am certainly no moral figure upon which someone might dedicate their life.
So how much more morally repugnant, then, is your God, whom you claim to be so loving and kind? Upon what sort of moral basis does your Christian ethic rest to claim your rights to use violence on children? The God of Auschwitz, Dunblane, Srebrenica and Janin smiles upon you and gives you the moral authority of the man in the garden...watching, doing nothing, becoming morally reprehensible.
Follow your God if you feel that is right. I reject that theological vision, and I reject the notion of a God worth following. Your Christian values stem from this moral turpitude, which leaves me feeling nothing but revulsion for the idea of your God of compassion and love.
If God exists he sits in his deck chair, watching, doing nothing. In which case (pace 6 million Jews of the gas chambers) he is to be rejected as morally reprehensible, or ultimately, and perhaps more sensibly, rejected as an ontological idea, as existing. I therefore reject also any claim you make to place value on smacking children because it is seen as divinely inspired.
blimy, there were 7 posts made while I was typing that. I had only just caught up on the thread and wasn't going to contribute since my story was pretty similar to that of others who have admitted smacking in the past but understand why it is morally wrong. but to drag the debate into theology and child abuse is ridiculous.
I can understand why there is a lobby to outlaw smacking to prevent the 'abusers' beating kids up but I do not agree with it. there are laws in place already that deal with violence. and a smack is not necessarily an act of violence. so much depends on the circumstances.
look what happened to that poor french bloke in scotland when he had to deal with that snotty brat of his. he nearly had a criminal record for that which would have put him on the offenders register. pathetic.
please continue with the debate. I shall watch with interest and glee as those that cannot argue logically resort to verbal abuse.
as ever.
Out of synch postings..
Reply to your last post, Liana.
"but spider... you are saying with one breath that violence begets violence and then that
you are toying with the idea of corporal punishment for violent crimes!
where does it stop???"
Violence SHOULD begat violence!
That is the correct lesson to be learnt.
When does it stop? When both parties realise that this is a stupid way to be sorting out their differences.. and should devote their energies to solving their problems creatively instead!
(the picture I have in mind is two people with clubs alternately wacking each other on the head until they tire out and sort out their differences or agree to disagree)
I think this applies to the Middleast as well as on the street..
However, where there is law and order we should expect society..
in the form of our justice system to enforce this for law abiding
citizens..
As I said, no amount of rationalisation can 'cure' the violent person from this behaviour.. he has to learn the twofold emotional lessons of
1) what it feels like to be physically beaten.. the experience of power loss and sheer humiliation of it..
2) Deterance.. He will not get away with it.. someone bigger and more violent than him will come along (in a cold and rational way)..
And in the home, Parents, Guardians and Schools are figures of authority are they not? And should teach this very important life lesson to our children if they start exhibiting such behaviours..
Am not for capital punishment though (not yet).
no I don't believe any of you have been guilty of child abuse I apologise if this is how you read what I wrote .... but can you honestly tell me that a person who does abuse a child is in control ....
Also consider this many people have been hurt through someone 'losing it' and a child has less defenses nor understanding over why it happens therefore it can be argued that the damage is not just phsyical
I have myself been at the end of my tether many times but have not felt it necessary to hit my children and I would never dream of using it as a excuse for such behaviour
I have a close friend whose father regularly took a cigarette to burn her legs ....she will never be able to wear a swimming costum nor a short skirt that is pure abuse ..... slapping a child in temper can lead to a broken limb think about it .... again I ask simply ..... would you
a) allow your child to run into the road
b) stop him from doing it
c) push him/her under the wheels of the car
Peter - I only mentioned Christianity because we are supposed to be a Christian country - I'm beginning to think I might be mistaken about that. I can't really see why you feel the need to attack God and not Tony Blair who is just as responsible for the law concerning smacking children.
Since you admit that you smack your children but very rarely when you are in control of your emotions -
are you are now trying to say that because you can’t control yourself then nobody else can?
I assure you that you are mistaken!
Where is the authoritive figure in your arguments and as there is none then perhaps its understandable why there is no respect for others anymore
The authoratitive person in my family is ME pioden,and my children have a great deal of respect.
glad to hear that Liana .... as a responsible adult you do us other adults proud ..... no sarcasim meant .... I too have been a single parent by the way
*bangs head against wall*
Dont worry guys.. its my own....
Leg, your argument, with all due respect is laughable. Violence should begat violence, until both sides realise its pointless?
Well thats worked well over the years around the world hasnt it?
gawd...
Mykle - I think it is more honest of you to say that you mention Christianity because you take that mode of thought as your basis for your moral life. I merely highlighted in very simple terms why I think to do so is morally reprehensible.
In relation to your comment "are you are now trying to say that because you can’t control yourself then nobody else can?", I can answer as follows:
I cannot control myself (emotions, sexual and physical life, violent and peaceful thoughts and acts) because, like the rest of you, I am a human who is subject to shifting and imprecise change, psychology, development and decay. Because we are all human and subject to that humanity, we are liable to be imprecise in our control and emotions.
Nobody can properly control themselves, and therefore, obviously I can't control myself fully, either. It's not the other way round, Mykle, because that would be daft. I am not God, old boy, thank gawd...
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