Spanking Has Existed for Centuries as a Form of Discipline
Parents have employed spanking as a disciplinary method for quite some time. Several thousands of years, certainly. Until the neo-parenting revolution of the late 1960s/early 1970s swept common sense from child rearing, most parents spanked. I was born in 1947. I was spanked. Not much, but each one was memorable. I cannot say that being spanked improved my behavior. I don't think it did. Nonetheless, I am a non-violent individual and have managed to conceal my private pathologies well enough to pass as a respectable member of society. When, as a child, I was spanked, I did not go out of the house looking for some smaller child to whup, as we say in the South. The worst consequence of being spanked is that I came to loathe my stepfather. But then, I am certain that I would have loathed him regardless. I talk to people my age who were spanked, some with belts20or other devices, by their parents. With very rare exception, they claim to love their parents. They also claim that they deserved the spankings and that the possibility of a spanking served to keep tighter boundaries on their potential for misbehavior. The social sciences research finds that today's kids are significantly more prone to violent behavior, directed toward both self and other, than was my generation, yet today's kids are not being spanked nearly as much. Correlation does not prove causation, but this says something, doesn't it?
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Children often continue to love their parents regardless how much abuse they experience while growing up. The question is, if spanking is not necessary... why do it? What or who's needs are being served by spanking?
Slavery also existed for centuries. So did racism, prejudice, and public executions. Hell, before indoor plumbing, "going to the bathroom" meant "squatting over a hole in the ground and ignoring the overwhelming stench". Does this justify suicide as an effective form of anti-depressant? I'm quite suicide has been along for a while ("Romeo and Juliet", anyone?)
What I'm trying to say is: just because people have been doing it for a long time, doesn't mean its right. People have been wrong before.
I'm 42 years old. I grew up in a home where my mother spanked me. When she did spank me I knew why.
I believe as long as spanking is done with the right attitude and love we cannot go wrong.
Correcting a child out of anger is when it becomes wrong.
Love is correction.
I'm in constant contact with family and friends who do not correct by spanking their children and their children are very disrespectful to others including adults.
Taking their favorite toy, game, or time away with friends does not always work. That has been proven.
I know people who spanked their kids and those kids grew up to be horrible mean people. I also know people who didn't spank their kids, and the children turned out to be respectful, well adjusted people.
Is spanking 100% effective? If we are honest, we would have to say no. I read where a retired school principal at one time used corporal punishment. Towards the end of his career, he had given up using it. Why? Because the same people were coming back to his office again and again and he realized that it just wasn't working. There is no place you can hit on the body without running the risk of injury. To a child there is no loving in a spanking, all spanking even if the parent is supposedly doing it in love causes pain and creates a bad impression in the mind of a child.If an adult does wrong, we cannot spank them for it. Why should children be any different? There are non violent ways of correcting out there. While they may not work all the time, they do work most of the time. Please give them a fair chance. If one doesn't succeed, try another. We have electric lights today because Thomas Edison failed 1000 times but never gave up until he discovered a light bulb that worked.
There is no form of discipline that is 100% effective. If it were, then just telling your child no and why no, would work. However, each child is different, they have different personalities, and are their own individual person. If you tell a child the first time no, and they do it any way, What then? "Now son, I told you not to do that. I see we have a problem here, lets sit down and discuss this a while. Do you know what you did that was wrong?" That may work the first time, but what about the second time? "Son, now this is twice I have told you not to do that. This is becoming a habbit and we have got to deal with this..." Or what about the 3rd, 4th, 5th time? See where this is going? When I tell my son no, and he does it any way, the first time he gets lectured as to why not to do it. The second time, he gets restricted from his computer, the third, well, he gets a swat. 9 times out of 10, the swat works where the lectured did not. However, not all things that they do wrong merrit a spanking . For example, you do not spank a child for getting into the cookie jar before supper. That is senseless. However, on the other hand, when the child is blatently defiant, such as, "No, I am not going to do it, and you cannot make me." that is a different story. One swat on the padded parts will not kill them, nor will it injure their mind for life. It will however, let them know that disrespect will not be tollerated.
Rosemond commits the "Traditional Wisdom" Fallacy in his post, something every first year college student should know not to do. He assumes that because something has been done for a long time, it must be good. If that were true, then slavery, wars of conquest, and no votes for women would also have to be good things.
He also points out that he was spanked and turned out alright, as if that showed that spanking is not harmful. By that reasoning, if someone drives home drunk and doesn't have an accident, it would have been shown that driving drunk is not harmful.
Lastly, he blames lack of spanking for violence in society despite the fact that all the evidence shows the correlation runs the other way - that kids from spanking households are much more likely to be violent adults.
Children were hit throughout most of human history by whoever was stronger just as slaves and other vulnerable adults did.
Our violent human past (let alone present) is hardly a reason to continue hitting anyone if reason, science, true Christianty (following the actual teachings of Christ) and a growing respect of human rights shows us these things are harmful, unnecessary, and thus wrong to do.
At least Rosemond seems to know that the New Testament does not teach anyone to hit anyone. That's a start.
Not only does the "state" in the US not prevent parents from hitting children's buttocks, it actually performs routine ritual abuse itself with public school paddling in 21 states.
I guess Rosemond was joking when he said he hid his fetishes enough to pass as "normal," but many Christians hold deep dark fetishes related to spanking. I believe "Promise Keepers" found some 65% of church men attending had hidden problems with porno.
Its time to end the sick abuse.