Spanking: Discipline or violence

Wyoming Tribune-Eagle ^ | 23 Sep | Ilene Olson

[Eagle Eye]

I also question whether multiple children raised under the same exact philosophy of spanking is a statistically significant population for you to rest your "more knowledgeable than thou" argument on.

You are simply ignorant of your own ignorance.

Do you think having a single child works tha same as having four close in age? It doesn't, and you don't even have a clue.

I believe that it is not necessary to cause physical pain to make a point. Okay, my son is younger than your child. Does that somehow invalidate my point?

You just don't get it, do you? First you still equate spanking with beating. You've never seen spanking done properly so you can't imagine anything other than some woman in the grocery store grabbing her child by the arm and swinging at the child's diapered butt with her bare hand.

Then you don't understand that your child raising experience is fairly narrow. You've got 7 years, I've got 19, 17, 15, and 13 years. Do you now see that maybe your single 7 year old experience isn't statistically significant enough for any general conclusions on child discipline and punsihment?

Let's face it, the ink on your parental credentials is still wet.

[savedbygrace]

I strongly recommend What the Bible Says About Child Training by Richard Fugate. The method he lays out in this excellent manual makes a lot of sense, and teaches the reader to keep anger out of the equation.

He clearly delineates between correction and punishment (they aren't the same thing) and between teaching and training, as well as between innocent transgressions and rebellion.

These are important distinctions for parents to master. Some of the points Fugate makes:

1. Never hit a child with your hand. Hands are for loving, healing, protecting. Use a rod instead.

2. The rod is used to correct rebellion, not as a punishment. As soon as the child agrees with you that his/her behavior was unacceptable, you withdraw the rod.

3. As soon as the child repents of the rebellious behavior, you immediately forgive unconditionally, and love him/her real good and close.

4. Punishment should fit the crime IOW, if s/he breaks something, s/he fixes it or pays with his/her own labor to replace it.

[Neckbone]

Let's face it, the ink on your parental credentials is still wet.

As is your logic. You raised all your children under the same philosophy- that is not a broad base of knowledge. I will not argue this with you any longer, because you will not hear my point any more than I see yours.

[two23]

"I have one of those children that throws temper tantrums. One of my suggestions to other parents is to go ask the parent if they needs help.

I don't think I could ever interfere in a family matter in public. It's difficult to tell who would welcome a round of support and who would punch me in the eye! But the little boy who was trailing behind his mother in the grocery store and having a whining hissy fit, got the "you better hush it, bud" look from me and his mother spun around FAST because it stopped. I just grabbed the canned pears off the shelf and put them in the cart! ("Who me?????")

[Sloth]

That sounds like a good approach... I'm not even married yet (will be by Christmas), but I think I will check that book out.

[Crusher138]

D: All of the above!

Which is what happened, sort of. My elder son, realizing the degree of his transaction, and the impending correction coming towards his butt in the shape of my hand, dropped to the ground and curled up in a ball!

Understand, this child has been spanked on his little rear like twice before. His reaction was so overblown, my wife and I just stood there google-eyed.

We stood him up, took away his TV priveleges for the remainder of the month, made him apologize to his brother, and were on our way.

My point is my son loves me, wants to spend time with me, is generally well-mannered (with occational age-appropriate lapses), and is considered by all who know him to be a really neat kid. I have only had to spank him on two previous occations, neither of which were anywhere near as intense as I received when growing up. Generally the threat of physical retribution is sufficient to make him fly right. I can bring up plenty of examples of our neighbors and friends who don't use spanking, who would never hit their child, and to a child they have insufferable brats. They don't think so, but it is obvious to everyone else.

To all of you who have such wonderful kids whom you have never spanked - I wonder what your friends and neighbors think of your kids?

[Eagle Eye]

I only had one child, but when she started screaming because she wanted to leave, the very last thing I was going to do was let her have her way.

Good for you! Parents are to be parents, not buddies or bestest friends.

One of mine decided to sit and refuse to walk in the mall. We left him where he sat. He couldn't see me duck into a store to watch out for him. When he realized that we weren't going to put up with his tactics he stopped. We also had several grand parent age shoppers who encouraged us to keep doing what we were doing.

Done right, spanking is a last resort and done very sparingly. As you can attest, it can be very effective.

[MEGoody]

“Spanking is just teaching a child another form of violence,” she said. “Kids are learning that it’s OK to hit. Mom and Dad do it, so it’s OK to hit someone to get what I want.”

This is such bull hockey. I was spanked as a child, and I grew up knowing it was not alright to hit other people (except of course, it was okay to spank My child.) My son was also spanked, and he doesn't go about hitting people.

It's the kids who never get real discipline and whose parents are obsessed with their child's 'self esteem' who have the self-control problems, Ms. Rubeck.

[Dratlatl]

Corporal punishment may teach a child that the use of force is alright; it can also teach him that for certain behaviour there is an immediate and unpleasant consequence.

In later years, when a time-out is given for an infraction of the rules, it may most likely be given by a judge. (Of course, I suppose plea bargaining is always an option).

I wonder if there lives a bear whose rump was unswatted as a cub. I doubt it. Swatting the cub teaches it how to survive.

Just where did the phrase "smarter than the average bear" originate? It certainly doesn't seem to apply to all that many child psychologists.

[Texas_Jarhead]

I agree. When I was young and I hit my sister I might have been spanked and then I tell you what I didn't hit her again, pushed her maybe but not hit ;-). There is nothing like having to go fetch your own switch to really make you sweat.

Full disclosure - I have no kids but this thread really is interesting.

[MEGoody]

Good luck with your parenting experience. It's great to have a compliant child. Bless you.

[TXBubba]

I also want to put in a good word about men in this discussion. My husband backs me up when I have to discipline our son. Since I am the one home with him the most I get the most tantrums etc. I have one friend who when she does finally try to discipline her child her hubby doesn't back her up. Guess he had a step-dad that was a beater and he can't separate the two. It is really sad because he is hurting his daughter in the long run by not teaching her limits etc. This little girl responds to total strangers who take the time to correct her. I mean, she listens. Yet, she can be acting like a total monkey and Daddy just continues with his conversation like she isn't even around.

[exhaustedmomma]

Discipline: Etymology: Middle English, from Old French & Latin; Old French, from Latin disciplina teaching, learning, from discipulus pupil
Discipline connotes a teacher-student relationship. Parents teach children the way they should go through morals, values and rules. The ultimate goal is self-discipline. This is learned through personal responsibility. Personal responsibility is learned from consequences of one’s actions---positive or negative consequences. The emphasis on positive consequences is much more effective than emphasis on the negative. Parents should have an arsenal of disciplinary “tools” under their belts to draw on at appropriate times. The key is appropriate tool for the specific time.
Spankings should be used sparingly. A spanking is one tool, among many tools. Spankings are overused, & IMO often misused. Misuse and overuse dilutes the effectiveness of spanking as a disciplinary tool. Spanking is most effective among toddlers & early school-aged children. Spanking is an inappropriate method of discipline among teens, who are capable of logical reasoning.

[Eagle Eye]

You start by telling someone else that I like to hit children. Then you use your own limited experience as the benchmark for everyone else. Then you fail to see that raising a single might be different than raising four close in age.

Do we see a problem yet?

I've been much closer to your situation than you have ever been to mine. I've had a single child, but you've never dealt with a group of your own children.

You sound like a tutor who cannot understand why a classroom teacher would ever have to raise her voice.

[linemann]

There is another approach that doesn't work either...the child is acting up in the store...temper tantrum, whining incessantly or down-right screaming, and the perplexed mother just IGNORES the behaviour.

This, I believe, is called extinction technique. You ignore the bad behavior and praise the good behavior. If they get attention (spanking, making deals, giving in) for negative behavior. They get exactly what they want, attention. It is the catch them being good philosophy. Give them the attention when they are good. not when they are behaving bad. just 2 and a half cents!

[A CA Guy]

Spanking is not needed.

Just pull hair at the temple a little and you will get the same result.

[TXBubba]

You raised all your children under the same philosophy- that is not a broad base of knowledge. I will not argue this with you any longer, because you will not hear my point any more than I see yours.

This is the part of the discussion I don't follow. Were you supposed to raise your four kids by different philosophies until you found the one that didn't work?

[Eagle Eye]

I also want to put in a good word about men in this discussion.

Thank you. I are one, uh, I mean I be one.

A dad that don't teach and discipline AND punish ain't much of a dad. Love demands teaching, reproof, and correction.

[Spirited]

"So in conlclusion, while a pat on the bottom in anathema, pumping your child full of psychotropic drugs is a perfectly healthy way to modify your child's behavior."

Sterling post! There is (as many have said) no right or good way that applies universally. Each child is as different as each snowflake and requires individualized, thoughtful treatment to come to self-discipline and mature behaviour.

To those of you who have never had to spank (of which type our family has two, aged 18 and 10) I wish a few at the other end of the spectrum (of which this family has 3, aged 14, 11 and 6) and some of the middle of the gamut (of which this family has 2, aged 15 & 5).

Raising a child takes more grace, wisdom, consistency and adult example today than ever before but the rewards are equally valuable.
If the government will give us freedom of choice responsible parents will succeed. If not most will fail.

[TXBubba]

My thoughts on men who won't discipline their children are that they are real wusses. Is that the spelling? Anyway, they have been so feminized that it is sickening. Nothing like a man who acts like a woman to turn my stomach.