Spanking is not child abuse, but spanking should be carefully regulated.
What Adrian Peterson did is NOT spanking....it is indeed child abuse. Just because a switch was used on him doesn’t make it anything less. Being beaten with belts and spoons and switches, leaving welts and scars ALL over the body of a FOUR year old is beyond ‘spanking’
Do you break the skin and leave you child with bloody wounds which will leave scars when you spank?
I spanked both of my kids when they were growing up. One male and one female...
I have the best kids (and grand kids), BTW, in the world. Both are with their original spouses, one is a senior VP of a corporation and and the other is the CEO of his own Corp.
It seemed to work out pretty good. For all of us...
Nope. It isn’t. And when done properly once or twice (ie FOLLOW THROUGH WHEN YOU SAY YOU WILL DO IT) the mere mention of it is enough for most kids to get in line.
My parents spanked me less than the fingers on one hand. They didn’t have to. If they said stop or else, I knew they would. So they didn’t have to.
This is why spanking works. My parents didn’t want to spank me. They were much happier the threat of being spanked worked.
If you saw the Peterson child’s pictures, you know that what he did was child abuse. Drawing blood is child abuse.
Spanking isn’t child abuse. Child abuse is the attempt to actually hurt the child like A.P. clearly did.
Watched the Beverly Hillbilly’s last night on TVLAND and Granny was talking about taking a switch to Jethro.
“Jethro Goes to School” episode Nov 1962
A normal spanking is not child abuse. But spankings can ... when taken too far ... become abusive.
Does anyone care what GOD thinks on the subject?
PROVERBS 23:13 & 14 “Do not withhold correction from a child, for if you beat him with a rod, he will not die.
You shall beat him with a rod, And deliver his soul from hell.”
We have on child, a daughter. In her childhood I believe I used corporal punishment 3 times; but whatever her infractions were, I demurred from punishing her, merely promising her a paddling if she didn’t cease and desist; until it reached the point that I HAD to do it.
The first 2 were administered with just several firm swats on her clothed backside with my opened palm. The last, at about age 12, was administered with a yardstick on her clothed backside because her snotty, belligerent backtalk and disrespect had reached “juvenile delinquent” levels.
The punishment was immediately followed by a warm and loving, fatherly, up close and personal discussion as to how many times I had “promised” the punishment, and how it had finally reached the point where it could no longer be left unaddressed; to which she expressed agreement and understanding.
She is now 50 years old with 2 daughters of her own.....along with a fine upstanding husband. All four of them know the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal Savior. I believe she would tell you herself that the punishments were “earned”.
This whole discussion is just stupid. Physical punishment is on a spectrum from a light swat to get the child’s attention all the way to severe abuse resulting in death.
Quite obviously, at some point on that spectrum it crosses the line between discipline and abuse. Where exactly to place that line is a matter of opinion and probably varies greatly by culture.
There are also two separate arguments here.
1. Is physical discipline right or wrong? Can it ever be right? If so, at what point of intensity does it start being wrong?
2. Is physical discipline effective? Can it ever be effective?
Mixing up the arguments, as with the similar argument over torture to gain information, just confuses the issue.
I do find the whole issue amusing, since the “antis” proclaim that physical punishment is always and eternally wrong, while still thinking of themselves as “moral relativists.”
I was spanked both at home at at school. I was a handful and deserved them.
The last one at school was when I told a girl her living bra died of starvation. I was called into the principles office and he asked where I heard that. I told him last night on the Carol Burnett Show.
He was laughing pretty hard but he used the wooden paddle, the one with the holes drilled in it, on me just the same.
I don’t think anybody is arguing the spanking concept here Steve.
They are arguing about whether its OK to take a tree branch and beat your four year old child til he has open bleeding scratches all over his body.