Spanked & Thriving

No surprise, this (thanks to Judy Warner), but it raises a question: nations that forbid spanking, will they experience a downturn down the road, and will they be able to reverse policy ever? How do you teach the unspanked to spank properly when they've never seen it? Fund a government program? (What would you call it? Leaving No Child...never mind.)

Comments

[Peter J. O'Leary]

At least two things in the photo fta would go on my never list. First, if at all, spanking should be on the buttocks only. Two, spanking should not be done with the hand.
Also on this list would be:
Never in anger
Never in public
Never more than a few minutes after the infraction (less if younger)
Never un-prayerfully
Never without a talk afterward
Never often
Never never

[Matt]

And ... Never over the age of 6, according to the study.

If we're talking about spanking being only beneficial to little, itty, bitty kids, it goes without saying that very little physical force should be used.

[Christopher Hathaway]

spanking should not be done with the hand.

I have a friend who reacted in horror at the thought of an instrument like a paddle being used instead of the hand. I'm amazed by all the "rules" some see fit to regulate spanking, rules that don't come from anywhere, certainly not Scripture.

I was spanked more frequently by Mother than Father. When my Father spanked me it was when I came home, hours after the offense. I waiting in fear. I only remember it happening once. That was pretty sufficient.

"Spare the rod and spoil the child"
Lay out a bunch of rules how and when parents should spank and you might get the same result.

[PDeverit]

Child buttock-battering vs. DISCIPLINE:

Child buttock-battering for the purpose of gaining compliance is nothing more than an inherited bad habit.

Its a good idea for people to take a look at what they are doing, and learn how to DISCIPLINE instead of hit.

I think the reason why television shows like "Supernanny" and "Dr. Phil" are so popular is because that is precisely what many (not all) people are trying to do.

There are several reasons why child bottom-slapping isn't a good idea. Here are some good, quick reads recommended by professionals:

Plain Talk About Spanking
by Jordan Riak,

The Sexual Dangers of Spanking Children
by Tom Johnson,

NO VITAL ORGANS THERE, So They Say
by Lesli Taylor M.D. and Adah Maurer Ph.D.

Most compelling of all reasons to abandon this worst of all bad habits is the fact that buttock-battering can be unintentional sexual abuse for some children. There is an abundance of educational resources, testimony, documentation, etc available on the subject that can easily be found by doing a little research with the recommended reads-visit www.nospank.net.

Just a handful of those helping to raise awareness of why child bottom-slapping isn't a good idea:

American Academy of Pediatrics,
American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry,
Center For Effective Discipline,
PsycHealth Ltd Behavioral Health Professionals,
Churches' Network For Non-Violence,
Nobel Peace Prize recipient Archbishop Desmond Tutu,
Parenting In Jesus' Footsteps,
Global Initiative To End All Corporal Punishment of Children,
United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

In 26 countries, child corporal punishment is prohibited by law (with more in process). In fact, the US was the only UN member that did not ratify the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

[PDeverit]

The vast majority of professionals agree that child buttock-battering isn’t healthy. A marginal few (mostly religious fundamentalists) think that child bottom-slapping is good. They use the same selective literalist interpretation of the Bible as was used to justify “witch”-burning, depraved torture methods for those accused of sin and heresy, slavery, racism, wife-beating, oppression of women and a host of other social ills.

[Peter J. O'Leary]

@Christopher Hathaway

"Spare the rod and spoil the child"
Lay out a bunch of rules how and when parents should spank and you might get the same result.

Agreed. The point being is that they're my rules, for my child, that I love and am responsible for. They're also all stated in the negative. They are not immutable. I'm not hard set about never never. Our 2 1/2 year old is in the throes of typical concupiscence and libido. There is not a bright line between the two. We have not seen it appropriate to spank him yet; we may never spank him. Not to boast on my kid; the point is only the parents know how to not break the child's spirit, yet set boundaries for behavior that are definite.

Liberals don't want to admit that boundaries are set throughout the life of a person. When these are crossed, some form of force will be visited upon the person, whether by physical violence, threat of imprisonment, or simply getting fired from a job, for example. Go to the playground and listen to the kids curse and treat each other disrespectfully. You are witnessing a generation raised on Dr. Phil.

Dr. Phil got his degree from the same dollar store that is selling Nobel prizes. They also have a UN department, and some discounts for Academies of Professional pop psychologists. These are people who endlessly spout off pronouncements and theories without having to show any results. And they get paid handsomely for it. Still no cure for cancer.

And what is bottom-slapping? Is it the same as buttock-battering? Is there a scale somewhere that calibrates this?

The reason I give for not using the hand is that the open hand represents giving and nurturing. My hand was the first thing that touched my child's head when he came into the world. Neither I, nor he, can or will associate it with violence. If I were to spank my child, I would probably use a rubber spatula from the kitchen drawer. The association then would be discipline with cake frosting. Mmm, frosting.

[Robert Espe]

And James Dobson and John Rosemond (his "Parenting by the Book is excellent by the way) would both argue that the hand should be used because it feels the same force you are using, and acts as a gauge. A wood spoon or rubber spatula does not (they actaully provide increased leverage). That being said, my mother broke three wood spoons over my behind over the course of my childhood, probably because her hand was sore and I wasn't learning... Anyhow, I still love both my parents, and I'm not particularly violent. Children aren't nearly as delicate as some people seem to think.

@ PDEVERIT
Pray that the US never does ratify the UNCOTROTC. In addition to prohibiting spanking, it places nearly every other facet of a child's life as equal with their parents, including their "right" to not be taught any religion at any age, and to be educated publicly (which is why countries like Germany and Sweden are now seizing children from Christian parents who were home educating their children).

[Christopher Hathaway]

The reason I give for not using the hand is that the open hand represents giving and nurturing. My hand was the first thing that touched my child's head when he came into the world. Neither I, nor he, can or will associate it with violence.

I was pretty sure that was it. I have heard it before. But has it occured to you that your child may not be as sophisticated as your argument and that when you give to and nurture him with your hand he doesn't see it as coming from your hand. He sees it as coming from you. And no matter what instrument you use to punish him he still sees it as you punishing him. Children are simple that way.

Plus, you don't want him to spend hundreds of dollars in therapy later in life trying to figure out why he hates cupcakes. :-)

[David Gray]

>The reason I give for not using the hand is that the open hand represents giving and nurturing

But the Christian should understand that discipline is a form of giving and nurturing. It is a perverted understanding that would assert otherwise.

[Peter J. O'Leary]

@Christopher Hathaway

... your child may not be as sophisticated as your argument.

Good point. I would hope he would see it coming from me or mom.

As to sophistication, we could get into some deep stuff here. I may be a little biased as to my kid :), but there is little I assume with him. Less each day.
You are right, kids are simpler and more physical beings than adults, generally speaking. They are also extremely sensitive and extremely quick. Call it morpho-genetic fields, spiritual entrainment, or just love, very young kids can have their own type of wisdom, often deeper and less corrupt than their parents'. It is a good argument for infant baptism.

Maybe my wife and I did a few things right. We started with elimination communication from birth. This can be more like toilet training for the parents; it helps attune the relationship with non-verbal communication. It's also more optimal economically and environmentally. Co-sleeping for 18 months also helps with mutual entrainment. Lovingly teaching table manners from 6 months was another great investment of time and effort. Teaching ASL from about 10 months has further empowered the family with enhanced communication. We just say no to television

So the child's basic needs are addressed in very practicable ways; sleeping, eating, peeing, pooping, and making his needs known to mom and dad. We now are blessed with a 28 month-old who is a fearless, assertive, polite, little-big-man.
Then again, I might be biased a little.

Most of this stuff was done in traditional cultures, free from government intervention and UN resolutions. And it's free for the taking.

[Peter J. O'Leary]

@David Gray

But the Christian should understand that discipline is a form of giving and nurturing. It is a perverted understanding that would assert otherwise.

This.

[B CODY]

Proverbs 13:24 actually says,
He who withholds his rod hates his son,
But he who loves him disciplines him diligently.

The point clearly being: Do what it takes (within reason)to discipline your children.
And yes, that means that spanking is not out of the question. It also means that if the discipline is diligently achieved without spanking, then so be it. One important consideration is the dynamic of the child. Every child is different and there is not a hard and fast list of rules to apply to every child. There is an important principle that applies to every parent/child relationship and that is: Discipline your child diligently--even if it takes spanking. (And, of course, most importantly, raise them in the admonition of the Lord.)

[R.C.]

"Buttock battering." *snort*

Folks, how long has humankind been on this planet? Homo sapiens sapiens? In something resembling civilization and culture? Tens of thousands of years, minimum, with known history going back about six thousand?

When asserting that spanking (rarely, not in frustration or anger but as a rebuke intended to create strong and instinctive associations with a particular bad behavior) is bad, some folks submit to all kinds of histrionics, predicting children who grow up as quivering balls of neuroses or anger-filled sociopaths.

I would ask these folks to keep the following in mind: Until very recently, and only in the wildly eccentric culture the mid-20th century West, probably 99.9% of all human beings had been spanked as a child.

Most of them more often than the kids who are spanked today.

Many of them with belts, paddles, switches.

Most of them in cultures where the phrasing "the boy was beaten for disobedience" had an air of utter normalcy about it.

Many of them by schoolmasters and even neighbors' parents, not just their own parents.

And you know what? 99.9% of all human beings until now were not detectably quivering balls of neuroses, etc. In fact, those of them who were raised in intact two-parent homes -- a far higher percentage than in our day, and THAT'S a matter to cause concern about the psychological health of children! -- generally looked back on their loving parents with fondness, and no little amusement when recollecting that they'd been spanked over some outlandish childhood prank or defiance.

That is the NORM. For tens of thousands of years, the norm of humanity.

The fact is that the new accepted truth of "thou shalt not spank, for it renders the child a psychological wreck" comes from exactly the same source as the accepted truths about what you should and shouldn't eat, what you should and shouldn't drink, how to stay thin, how to live long, how to have good sex, how to get a raise, how to find your dream job, how to unleash your hidden potential, how to win friends and influence people -- and also, the same source which regularly gives us new interpretations of Jesus: The Marxist Jesus, the Revolutionary Jesus, The Pacifist Jesus, The Middle-Class Jesus, The Jesus Who Learned His Theology On A Lost Trip To India, and The Jesus Whose Apostles Consensually Hallucinated The Resurrection. These are the same folks who periodically announce that colonial Americans did not own firearms, that the 1990's were the hottest decade in human history, that Shakespeare's works were really written by Anton Chekhov, that Napoleon was a latent homosexual, that Aristotle was Belgian, that the central message of Buddhism is "every man for himself," and that the London Underground is a political movement.

Ahem.

Apart perhaps from the last few items, the common theme is book sales.

For nobody's willing to write a book which tells everyone that the conventional wisdom of its selected topic is merely correct, and that there's nothing much new to be learned about that topic.

You can't sell many copies that way.

No, no, no. You have to completely overthrow the conventional wisdom, to say something new and exciting, something modern, something progressive, something daring, something controversial. (Any damn thing in the world but TRUE.)

That's the way to the bestseller list, my friend! That's the way to tenure, to interviews!

And that's why on every subject of importance, and not a few that aren't important, we have the conventional wisdom freshly overthrown, to be replaced by a new conventional wisdom at intervals of about every twenty-five years, based on the most tenuous kind of nonsense billed as "modern research."

And this dynamic, which is selected for (in the evolutionary sense) throughout the publishing industry and academia, is the reason why snake-oil salesmen with utterly meritless PhD's are able to sell millions of books -- I'm looking at you, Benjamin Spock you charlatan! -- telling us how the child-rearing skills of every previous generation were horrifying mistakes bound to produce monsters and misfits, in contrast to his own, which he claims will produce well-adjusted shiny happy sheeple. And we are conditioned to buy these claims, and the books which contain them, and not to notice the vastly higher proportion of heroes in previous generations, and the gradually inflating proportion of monsters and misfits in our own, raised under Rasputin's tutelage.

Buttock battering, my eye.

[Gene Callahan]

"The vast majority of professionals agree that child buttock-battering isn’t healthy."

Yes, these would be the professional psychologists, right? The people whose "medicine" never cures anyone, right?

[Peter J. O'Leary]

@R.C.

These are the same folks who periodically announce that... Aristotle was Belgian

You mean Aristotle wasn't Belgian?!? Oh noes!

/at least they have nice waffles

[Margaret]

Buttock battering? Bottom slapping? Where is this salacious vocabulary borrowed from?

[angel]

spanking is a no no to me. Case Dismissed.