I was raised in an era where corporal punishment (spanking) was much more prevalent, even expected, than it is today. While our present discipline with Katherine doesn’t include spanking, I think the occasional use of mild, non-injuring, non-bruising, non-welting physical punishment is an acceptable way of disciplining or punishing children.
But even in the context of the old “five swats on the butt with a wooden spoon” days, this kind of thing, from New Zealand, strikes me as — excessive, to put it kindly.
The Family Integrity booklet, written by Craig Smith, says the Bible and section 59 of the Crimes Act allow parents to use reasonable force to discipline their children. Family Integrity says it is an informal group of families and individuals independent of any political party or church. The group believes “it is right and wise to bring our children up with loving corporal correction” and is opposed to “unjustifiable government interference” in family life.
Children’s Commissioner Cindy Kiro said Family Integrity’s suggestion of a 10-15-minute discipline session was “completely off the wall”.
“The idea that children are sinful and that they need to be beaten in order to be moral beings is fundamentally wrong.”
Barnardos chief executive Murray Edridge said the discipline guidelines were tantamount to child abuse.”I’m just appalled to read the stuff they are advocating, and the scary thing is people might believe them, and that’s a very dangerous place for society to be in.”
Mr Smith said last night the brochure was written for a Christian audience and outlined the biblical philosophy of child punishment. Many Christians did not want to see smacking banned as that would take away parental authority, but he conceded the brochure would appear as “total nonsense” to non-Christians.
And, of course, it’s folks like this, spewing (in my Christian opinion) nonsense, harmful nonsense that will shift things over to the opposite extreme, where the state does end up micro-managing parental behavior and, yes, compromising parental authority. And, in the case of these guys, at least, maybe that’s not a bad thing.
(via BoingBoing)
I especially like the part where it says the parent must “win.” Make sure your child always loses! That’s just good parenting.
It is appallingly easy for child discipline to become a matter of “winning” and “losing” — when, in reality, that’s beside the point. The point being, of course, to get the kid to behave as needed/expected/desired. That could be considered a “win,” but that may be quite different from “winning” the immediate confrontation.
10 to 15 minutes?!?
10 to 15 minutes of spanking?!?
What the frell are you trying to accomplish with 10 to 15 minutes of spanking?
Beating the sin out of the kid. Obviously.
I dunno — I don’t think I have enough strength to beat on a kid for 15 minutes. Maybe it’s a physical training regiment for parents, too.
Simpson’s fans will recall that the superreligious Ned Flanders was raised by libertine beatnicks. When he became completely uncontrollable at age 8 (“Doctor, we’ve tried nuthin’ and we’re all out of ideas!”) he was treated using the “Spankological protocol” which added up to something like a full straight day of spanking. To this can be traced his simmering suppressed rage, and his tendency to sputter gibberish whenever flum-diddly-ummoxed.
“It is appallingly easy for child discipline to become a matter of “winning” and “losing” — when, in reality, that’s beside the point. The point being, of course, to get the kid to behave as needed/expected/desired.”
I’ll second that, but I only figured it out after my kids were grown. And I’m not even sure getting the kid to behave as desired is all that important, either. In many cases rules times relationship equals a constant. Kids don’t come with instruction manuals, and nothing written by James Dobson will take the place of one. Truth is, we’re all winging it or whistling in the dark, or just lucky.
“If the child is angry after the smack you have not smacked hard enough.”
I guess they want their children to fear them instead.
And the use of “smack”, with its alternate meaning of “kiss”, instead of “hit” or “strike” is oh so hypocritical.
It’s a New Zealand site, so I’m not sure that the mixed message is intended.