Re: Child Raising - Discipline issues
 

(she) Raised 8 boys only I turned bad,
didn't get the whipping's that the other ones had.

Re: Child Raising - Discipline issues
 

26, spanked (hand/belt on butt/legs) until the age where grounding became more effective. I will probably spank my kids.

Re: Child Raising - Discipline issues
 

I was never spanked, and don't approve of spanking children(then again, I'm 27 with no kids). However, I also don't think it's THAT big a deal.

Slapping young kids in the face, on the other hand, I have a big problem with. Not necessarily due to the risk of physical harm - although I think such risk exists and shouldn't be taken lightly -- but the message of "I can hit someone when they upset me or do something they shouldn't" isn't one I think kids should get.

-McGee

Re: Child Raising - Discipline issues
 

[ QUOTE ]
the message of "I can hit someone when they upset me or do something they shouldn't" isn't one I think kids should get.

[/ QUOTE ]
I dunno, I think the message of, "If I do something I shouldn't, I'm going to get hurt" is a message most people could use more of. I acknowledge the argument that mental pain can be worse than physical, but there's plenty of evidence of all kinds that physical punishment can be deterrent without being debilitating.

Re: Child Raising - Discipline issues
 

I think this issue is blown way out of proportion to its importance. When it comes to discipline I think by far the most important thing is that the punishment fit the crime. Kids know what is fair. Unfair punishment (basically abuse), whether its spankings or groundings or yelling or whatever, I think leads to messed up people.

Re: Child Raising - Discipline issues
 

[ QUOTE ]
This is coming up because we just started a psych. unit in medical school, but I started discussing this with several colleagues/friends and was kinda of interested by the results.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not a doctor. I don't play one on TV. I didn't even stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. But here's my thoughts:

I was spanked as a child. Never hit in the face, but belts, hands, wooden spoons, "switches" ("Boy, go cut me a switch to spank you with!"), and even a 1/4" thick plastic paddle my dad made especially for tanning my rear-end when I screwed up.

I'm not scarred, and I'm not a sociopath. I have a close relative my age who was never spanked, and he's the one who ended up as a drug dealer and in prison for assisting with hiding a body after one of his buddies executed someone.

I'm an IS professional, and I think you'll learn the same thing that I learned not too long after I got out of school -- reality and theory are very often mutually exclusive. The theory is that spanking kids will cause them to become violent, aggressive, out-of-control psychos. Reality is a different story, however.

Take a good look around at one of the most visible segments of society -- the celebrity. You have people like Paris Hilton and Britney Spears who have probably never been disciplined at all showing their ass (both literally and figuratively). Now look at people like country music stars. I'm not a fan of country music, but you pretty much know that these people were disciplined as kids, simply because of the culture they're part of. Very rarely do they do something incredibly stupid. Paris and Britney? Stupid on a daily basis.

As I said, reality and theory differ wildly, and I think you are smart enough to be able to separate theory from reality.

Re: Child Raising - Discipline issues
 

I was never unfairly spanked, but I was often unfairly grounded/sent to timeout. There was nothing more aggravating than being unfairly punished. My parents usually did the grounding thing, but sometimes it did not work (I would destroy proporty in my room while grounded... dragging a comb back and forth over wooden dressers and digging rivets into the side of the piano with the comb), and I was spanked.

I'm 24, and I'll spank my kids if they deserve it.

Re: Child Raising - Discipline issues
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
the message of "I can hit someone when they upset me or do something they shouldn't" isn't one I think kids should get.

[/ QUOTE ]
I dunno, I think the message of, "If I do something I shouldn't, I'm going to get hurt" is a message most people could use more of. I acknowledge the argument that mental pain can be worse than physical, but there's plenty of evidence of all kinds that physical punishment can be deterrent without being debilitating.

[/ QUOTE ]

RDH, I'm not sure you've understood the point I was trying to make.

Let's say you whack a kid for doing something he's not supposed to do. Maybe he learns that he's not supposed to do that. But now he sees his younger sister do the same thing. Can you really blame him if he smacks her?

In my opinion, it is very difficult to use corporal punishment to deter kids from misbehaving without giving them the idea that it's okay to hit others who make them upset.

-McGee

Re: Child Raising - Discipline issues
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
the message of "I can hit someone when they upset me or do something they shouldn't" isn't one I think kids should get.

[/ QUOTE ]
I dunno, I think the message of, "If I do something I shouldn't, I'm going to get hurt" is a message most people could use more of. I acknowledge the argument that mental pain can be worse than physical, but there's plenty of evidence of all kinds that physical punishment can be deterrent without being debilitating.

[/ QUOTE ]

RDH, I'm not sure you've understood the point I was trying to make.

Let's say you whack a kid for doing something he's not supposed to do. Maybe he learns that he's not supposed to do that. But now he sees his younger sister do the same thing. Can you really blame him if he smacks her?

In my opinion, it is very difficult to use corporal punishment to deter kids from misbehaving without giving them the idea that it's okay to hit others who make them upset.

-McGee

[/ QUOTE ]


I think kids are smarter than this. I know there are people who don't want to use anything they consider violent, but they still use techniques that if an adult used them would be considered violent. I mean a time out given from one adult to another is called kidnapping or false imprisonment, it is a crime. Forcing somebody to stay in their room is kidnapping if one adult does it to another. The important thing is context. It is OK for one adult to lock another one up if he is a jailer and somebody is lawfully sent to jail. It is not OK to lock somebody up just because. Likewise it is more than OK to use violence to defend yourself and kids. What if somebody tried to forcibly kidnap a kid - would a parent not use violence to resist it? Well, violence is pretty damn good in that situtaion in response to something that horrible.

So, IMO context matters and I agree with Boris. A good parent who smacks a kid justifiably is not creating a sociopath. A bad parent using emotionally abusive but physically non-violent means can screw their kid up. And I think kids can tell the difference and can learn when physical force may be OK. IMO it isn't hypocritical to teach a kid he can't hit people unjustifiably while smacking the kid occasionally. He knows the difference between what you as a parent can and should do and what he can do to/with peers or siblings. The kid can't give his sister a timeout if she upsets him, just as he can't hit her anytime he's upset.

This is also not to say discipline has to be physical. But as Boris said, it does have to be reasonable coming from a parent who loves the kid. If those things are there the particular technique is less important IMO.

Re: Child Raising - Discipline issues
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
My friends are floored. They cannot believe my parents raised me this way

[/ QUOTE ]

a shock response really blows my mind, and i have to think that these people are out of touch. people still hit their kids.

[/ QUOTE ]

I've learned that a few of my close friends were hit when they were little, and every time it shocked me.

I wasn't shocked because of the fact that parents hit their children, I was shocked because kids who I think turned out really well were hit when they were little.

I guess this is probably just because my parents told me a ton of times when I was little that hitting kids is wrong, and it's not a subject that comes up often enough for me to have really come to my own conclusion.

So I don't really have an opinion on the issue, I just have a gut reaction that it's a bad thing. I imagine a lot of other people are the same way.