Spanken Strengst Verboten!

     Canada's equivalent of the 700 Club, a show called (I am not sure why) 100 Huntley Street, recently featured a Christian psychologist who has come out strongly against das Untersspanken.  (I have no idea what the word for it is auf Deutsch, so please pardon my guesses.)  It leads not to violent children, says he, but to children so afraid of a confrontation that they'll back down from everything.  Ah well, to one or the other, I guess.

     In place of das Heinespadeln he recommends, naturally, those chic punishments of the weary left, das Eckesitzen und das Spielenhalten (basically, "timeout").  Christopher Lasch long ago saw through these up-to-date dodges: the narcissist believes (since the narcissist cannot get out of his own skin) that all forms of competition are dangerous and are secretly aimed at the annihilation of the opponent.  The narcissist shies away from direct confrontation, preferring psychological manipulation, soft cruelty, and guile.  One of the disadvantages of das Hinterschlapfen is that once it's over, it's over, and the child can breathe easily and get on with slopping the pigs or whatever he's supposed to be doing.  But the methods of guile and guilt cast that delightful pall over the child's day, and even last well beyond the day, so that he always believes himself to be mysteriously in the wrong.  And the parent can sigh and smile and say, "I was always gentle with my children."

     Anyway, the psychiatrist quoted Scripture in support of his Widerspankenheit.  "To me, 'Spare the rod and spoil the child' means that we have to use the measuring rod to gauge the child's growth.  That's what the rod is."  For which he ought to have been taken to das Holzhaus, na ja!  And the producers of 100 Huntley Street, for letting the silly exegesis go.  Especially now: it seems that a Candadian legislator has introduced a bill um das Druntersdrummen in der Canada durchaus verboten zu machen, schnell schnell!  Unless it's a part of certain parades in Toronto.

     I laugh -- but to see a once noble nation degenerate into the tawdry and silly is nothing to laugh about.  Nor is America any healthier.

     PS: I promised blogger Beth another touch of the love poetry we have lost:

Was it the work of nature or of Art, / Which tempered so the feature of her face, / That pride and meekness mixed by equal part / Do both appear, to adorn her beauty's grace?

For with mild pleasance, which doth pride displace, / She to her love doth lookers' eyes allure: / And with stern countenance back again doth chase / Their looser looks that stir up lusts impure.

With such strange terms her eyes she doth inure, / That with one look she doth my life dismay: / And with another doth it straight recure; / Her smile me draws, her frown me drives away.

Thus doth she train and teach me with her looks: / Such art of eyes I never read in books!

Edmund Spenser, Amoretti 21 (1595)

Comments

[Wolf N. Paul]

Now can we please have a translation of the "German" words in your post?

But it reminds me of this old sign in American university computer centers of the sixties and seventies:

Achtung!
Alles touristen und non-technishen looken peepers! Das machine is nicht fur der fingerpoken und mittengrabben. Is easy schnappen der springenwerk, blowenfusen und popencorken mit spitzen sparken. Das machine is diggen by experten only. Is nicht fur gerwerken by das dummkopfen. Das rubbernecken sightseeren keepen das cottenpiken hands in das pockets. Relaxen und watchen das blinkenlights.

[Matthias]

I tried both timeouts and spanking with my eldest son. Timeouts worked. Spanking didn't. So I don't spank. I don't understand the objection - timeouts end just as definitively as spankings do.

[Beth]

Ah, I really must dust off my Spenser! Thanks, Tony. How lovely. I just ordered a book of poetry by Scott Cairns. I hope it was a good decision . . .

Beth

[Jill]

I wasn't aware that they were speaking a lot of Deutsch in the Great White North these days -- then I realized that maybe you were bringing a little Freud into the picture. Ja!

I had no trouble deciphering your German phrases. I do have trouble with so-called Christian psychologists who say that spanking is wrong. There are times when children need a firm hand, and a wise, discerning parent who knows when to administer the rod of correction.

Even if someone uses the analogy of a rod and staff in sheep-husbandry, the rod wasn't used to measure the growth of the sheep, as far as I know.

[Tom Gilson]

Probably the funniest blog I've ever read--and you managed to be thoughtful and relevant at the same time.

It reminded me, though, of the scolding I once received from a far more advanced German language student than myself (ohne das Druntersdrummen, thankfully):

"You sollst nicht zwei Languages zusammenputten!"

[kate]

You didn't exactly ask, but I'll tell you anyway. The television program 100 Huntley Street was for many years broadcast from a studio located at, you guessed it, 100 Huntley Street in Toronto.
It is now broadcast from an evangelical complex located off the Queen Elizabeth Highway (QEW) in Burlington, Ontario, a city west of Toronto ("The QEW" would have made even less sense as a name!).
This is the extent of my knowledge of the program since I don't watch television.
I haven't read all your posts from the Great White North nor do I know how long you will grace our land, but I hope you find/have found some things that cheer you before you leave. We who live here take heart from little things, like Father Raymond de Souza's columns in the National Post newspaper.
Blessings.

[Gene Godbold]

In contrast to Matthias, I did *not* spank my two oldest boys until they were 6 and 4, and they were the worst for it. (They are now 13 and 10.5 and I hardly ever have to raise my voice, much less spank them. They are delightful.) I have spanked all of my next four boys, but, since I started earlier, I haven't had to spank them as much.

[James Kabala]

It's interesting to note that the criminal justice system long since moved from physical punishments (like whipping) to prison terms (which are sort of like timeouts in concept, albeit much longer in duration). Is there any hard data on which is more effective? Once the idea that physical punishment was degrading and cruel became widely accepted for adults, it was probably inevitable that it would fall out of favor for children as well, even if it did contradict the Bible.
Of course, Hinterschlapfen that leaves welts and bruises lasts just as long as guilt.

[James Kabala]

I don't mean to imply that welt-spankings are done by more than a minority of spankers, however.

[Curious]

Welt-spankings? There is actually a term for that? Sounds fetishistic ... a hunch confirmed by doing a Google search for the term ...