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Physical force in parenting
Obviously, or at the very least hopefully, no one here condones abuse. So let's not make any implications of such in responses - I would very much prefer for that to not be 'a thing'.
In your eyes, when it comes to parenting one's child, to what extent is physical force allowable? Can it be justified? |
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But that's a very clinical view, I think. Coloured by my own experiences and so forth. The point of this thread is for people to decide amongst themselves what they consider to be a breach of a parent's role. To talk about the differences between cultures or social groups or whatever, to weigh up what they consider justified and what is too far. What may be defined as abuse to one may be a way of life for another. |
I have a problem with this method of parenting for two simple reasons.
1. It's not that effective. Okay so you threaten your kid with corporal punishment and they overstep again and now you're forced into a position where you have to dole it out or you'll never be taken seriously again or w/e. So you give them a spanking. What else is left after that? There's nothing left to be afraid of once you've already experienced it. Ultimately it's just pain and eventually your kid is going to just take it and continue to bother you. Maybe it's just because my family breeds stubborn children, but it happens lol. It's much more effective to confiscate things or restrict privileges. That forces a change in behaviour eventually because the kid is going to want their shit back. Whilst if you smack them, they'll cry for an hour whilst playing video games and then just do it again. Then there's the issue of age. Good luck disciplining your child physically once they're bigger than you. 2. Considering problem 1, where do you draw the line? If the fear of the pain stops what do you do next? You either have to switch to the restriction method (so why not just start there?) or you need to make it hurt more. If you go with the latter you'll repeat the process and basically you either end up on a slippery slope to the unacceptable and keep going until you're a criminal or you get off that train and switch to the more effective method eventually anyway. I don't think it's exactly the evil it's made out to be to spank your child, but it's just not as effective as other options. |
I believe in peaceful parenting (not hitting, spanking, or screaming), and the research supports it. But I need to research and delve into it more before i make a solid conclusion.
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I'm not sure if there's any unified theory of parenting, tbh. My parents used to beat me quite a lot growing up. I don't think this compromised their love or concern for me in the slightest. At the end of the day, kids need disciplinary restrictions, and where I live that's usually cashed out via (among other things) beating. As long as parents love their children and feel themselves ethically responsible, beating as such can only cause so much damage.
Of course, if there are other elements to this, like if beating just becomes a way of the parents taking out their frustrations on their children, and if it keeps happening consistently- then that just becomes abuse. This is why the underlying intention behind disciplinary actions are so important. |
I honestly believe disciplinary beating is a good thing when justified. When I went way over the line I got it, and it looks like I turned out way better than the little POS kids I see now-a-days with no respect for their parents.
A little off topic but I think children need more fights in every aspect of life, like schoolyard fights and stuff is what I'm talking about. All I see is ever since that stuff was burned into the minds of children that it was the most wrong thing ever people have gotten way too sensitive . You call a kid ugly in today's world and they go home and blow their brains all over the wall with a 12 gauge, or they buy a hot coffee and sue the shop for all their money because it's hot but didn't say that on the cup. Anyways, I think that parents should start threatening the belt again. Not only does it toughen up the kid, if they have two brain cells they are less likely to do something that causes pain. This peaceful parenting crap just raises kids who take whatever they want from their parents and treat them like shit from my experience. |
There's a time for giving a beating to a kid, when the kid goes too far. The problem is that too many parents beat their children too often and sometimes with the wrong motivations, like beating the kid of anger or as an outlet for their own frustrations.
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No, child abuse is wrong. Also sets a rather poor precedent when you're trying to teach your child that hitting people is wrong. Instead they learn that you should hit people to teach them lessons. And this creates bullies. This is backed by science. Anyone who supports what I will only describe as abuse (no, I don't care that you only hit your child occasionally) doesn't deserve a child in my eyes.
That's my hard line stance for the day. |
A few people so far have said that research shows that physical force is ineffective for disciplining your child, but does anyone got any links or anything to said research?
I would think that use of physical force is occasionally warranted, solely just for the fact that there are some times and people where force is the only thing that will work. Don't worry Caaethil, I don't want kids anyway. |
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I think it's easy to judge others for hitting their kids when you don't have any kids of your own. I used to get hit as a kid because I was a little **** and misbehaved a lot. Did it work? Most of the time yes. I don't think taking my Gameboy or whatever would have stopped it either. It doesn't mean my parents don't love me and I don't love them. It's also a cultural thing with some. So believing that your culture's way of disciplining children is the only correct one is a little ethnocentric I think. All children are different.
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Sadly you'll have to buy it if you're that interested in reading. The abstract is as follows: Whether spanking is helpful or harmful to children continues to be the source of considerable debate among both researchers and the public. This article addresses 2 persistent issues, namely whether effect sizes for spanking are distinct from those for physical abuse, and whether effect sizes for spanking are robust to study design differences. Meta-analyses focused specifically on spanking were conducted on a total of 111 unique effect sizes representing 160,927 children. Thirteen of 17 mean effect sizes were significantly different from zero and all indicated a link between spanking and increased risk for detrimental child outcomes. Effect sizes did not substantially differ between spanking and physical abuse or by study design characteristics. Quote:
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Personally, I don't want to use physical force to punish my kids. I feel like there are more calm and loving ways to discipline, but that's just me. I don't criticize people that do use physical force to punish their kids, it's just not my style at all. I got hit as a kid and it didn't scar me or anything but I didn't respond as well to it as being grounded or having things taken away from me. It just hurt, but it didn't really ever keep me from doing something I wasn't supposed to do.
I can see how it would be useful for some but it's not my thing. I want my kids to feel more secure than that and know that disobedience has consequences, but that consequence won't be getting beaten, slapped, hit, shoved, or kicked. *shrug* Not trying to offend anyone that does those things. (I use the word 'secure' because when I got hit or beaten as a punishment it mainly just made me scared of my parents and kinda distant from them. I want to be able to explain to my kids why what they did was wrong and offer solutions for next time while still giving them a consequence that will help them think twice about it next time.) |
Hitting children is pure stupidity. No rationality or reasonability just a deterrence through pain.
If I had children my goal would be to teach them to partake in critical thinking and discussion in order for them to LEARN critical thinking necessary to establish right and wrong, rather than PHYSICALLY program them to mindlessly adopt right and wrong. Also, someone noted ethnocentricism as a defense of corporal punishment. That is relativism. Right and wrong is not relative. Hitting a child serves a function that is against their freedom of consciousness. Some traditions of parenting suppresses individuality and personhood -- basically this is tyrannizing the most important aspect of being. Being guided by PURELY tradition without knowing why one follows traditions is pure brainwashing/false-consciousness. We need to value all people, and hitting and programming children is a mechanism that reproduces intolerance and rather promotes stunted ability to reason and empathize with others. Lastly, other punishments, including verbal abuse and taking away privileges are not necessarily good if the parent fails to have discussions of right and wrong in order to actually teach their children how navigate morality. For instance, bringing in the Bible is could be just as hazardous, if not more hazardous than corporal punishment. (especially when combined!!) |
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I'm just trying to understand in a bit more detail why are you drawing the line where you are. |
Verbal abuse = do something or be psychically abused.
Physical abuse = do something or be physically abused. These two methods emphasize avoidance of a proximate harm first and foremost. As such, I would argue that neither are beneficial. You cannot teach critical thinking skills when certain actions are met with a slap or verbal abuse; the fear of a proximate harm motivates behavior. One could try to argue that providing a reason behind the punishment prior to either form of abuse can teach good behavior; however, there is a pedagogy in the punishment itself which indoctrinates a child to learn that coercing others through threatening or implementing harm is the best method for addressing others. Moreover, the child is being coerced into accepting right and wrong rather than being convinced. No parent has complete moral knowledge. If the goal is to teach contemplation and reasoning to our children so that they are able to understand their own actions and belief with respect to others and continue toward progressing social knowledge, we cannot tell them what is right or wrong and encode them with this knowledge through conditioning them with proximate harms. As someone who lived in two households. One employed proximate harms and the other did not. I can attest to being better behaved and conscientious of others when I was in the household that did not employ those methods. The punishing household did nothing but make me do as I was told and accept a set of ethics that often led to conflicting practices in real situations. The reason why is that coercion itself is built into that system of punishment; it is diametrically oppose and NOT conducive with intersubjective ethics. Essentially, treating others with respect and understanding how people are coerced and assisting others and navigating a social circumstances to make the right decisions that do not contribute to oppression and coercion of others. In many ways, being an enforcer of coercion often means one is also being coerced. This chain of coercion is not built upon a foundation of intersubjective knowledge or right and wrong. Teaching morality and its practice requires individuals to understand principles and applying them flexibly as to navigate a complex social reality. The proximate harm method is often stringent and does not provide the ability to know right or wrong, but rather to just blindly execute right or wrong (without knowing whether or not it is actually is right or wrong.) Of course no person can ever completely know right and wrong, but we can at least be reflective of the principles we strive to abide by, for instance non-coercion and empathy. Empathy just means, understanding an other person's behavior. People with a coerced sense of right and wrong often are lacking the ability to get underneath to the nuts and bolts as to why someone is acting in the way they are acting. Without empathy, we resort to being coercive. In many ways, we cannot even understand or empathize with ourselves when we coerce others. Therefore, within this very pedagogy of coercion we lose our ability to understand right and wrong since we cannot even empathize with ourselves. As Foucault articulates in Punishment and Discipline, we get punished, and then we discipline ourselves, as such, we lose the ability to have any autonomy. Without autonomy, it is a pointless and meaningless exchange of coercion. Teaching coercion as a principle is self-defeating, period. For the most part, this principle is not practiced in the education of children by both parents and schools because of larger systems of discipline and punishment often devoid of meaning. Though, there are instances of resistance against these forms of coercion enforced through religion, traditionalism, norms, capitalism, and other things that coerce what things we value through proximate systems of punishment. We need to learn how these very systems are oppressive rather than implement them. We need to learn pragmatically ways in which we can resist such punishment, in order to balance navigating a punishing society and practically applying values of non-coercion and empathy. And before we can do any of that, we cannot be barbaric and hit our children. Societal norms oppress genuine human individuality and human collectivism by imposing value systems, often only a few people participate in establishing these norms. Thus, these values are highly subjective because the concern is of the few and not the many -- true meaning is derived intersubjectively or incorporating the human interests that apply to all persons universally. However, most people participate in being disciplined and punishing other defectors in a rather blind manner. Resisting these forms of oppression is often difficult and stressful, but actually gives an individual a sense that they are actually participating in creating meaning rather than having meaning coerced upon them. This is what I was taught in my other household. I literally never was grounded, hit, yelled at, or punished in any way. I had long discussions and was talked to as an adult rather than talked down to. It seems counter-intuitive at first glance, until you think through the pedagogy of punishing and why it fails to "teach" anything of meaning. Being able to create meaning with others is really what a progressing society looks like. In some ways, we see this happening more and more. As such, when society has meanings and values established though autonomous individuals we can actually be both collective and be self-disciplining rather than being disciplined. I'd rather assist my children in being able to discipline themselves rather than learning being coerced and disciplined by others is somehow to their benefit or livelihood. |
It's tricky, I was smacked as a kid a lot when I misbehaved, but it's not like my parents were abusive. It was never the face or anything, always the arm or arse. And I feel I probably turned out better for it. But at the same time, I could never do it myself to a child. It's a very grey area.
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Sometimes it's necessary. As a last resort a spanking on the rear end is more than enough. But the punishment itself should also have sufficient enough rarity that they don't grow resistant to the punishment or build up resentments from it.
But you gotta work up to it. I think the build up to the gentle paddling with a hand or something is kind of important. Good parents seldom need to spank their children; the threat is sufficient; and the mere existence of a possibility of a really painful paddling should often suffice. Physical punishment is unfortunately often applied wrongly. So I don't think that a parent choosing to avoid this altogether is at all unhealthy or problematic or weak. It's a right and valid path to parenting; as is choosing to employ physical punishments sparingly is. It's really only bad or lazy parenting if the parents start to rely on or overuse physical punishments. As parents; you should know your child well usually. If you don't; you're not spending enough time with them. If you can't create a non-physical punishment that will sting them enough to deliver your lesson to their developing but stubborn mind, then why aren't you seeking some advice or aid? If a parent knows they need to seek help but won't; then they're in the wrong. If a parent gives up, they're in the wrong. Physical punishment isn't a shortcut to good behavior. Overuse tends to harm the shortcut. |
Some of the phrases here I find somewhat troubling.
The idea that children who weren't beaten don't respect their parents / children respect parents who do beat them. Not only is the correlation here likely very weak but it also sets a disturbing tone for adult life. "Want someone to respect you? Beat them up, show them you're stronger, show them you're in charge" etc.etc. I don't support that view, therefore it makes no sense to hit a child to make them 'respect' you. I also find the idea of it being "necessary" awful. Hitting someone in general is rarely necessary - even in an act of self defense hitting someone back is a last resort. I can understand you might need to physically restrain your child if they were aggressive but otherwise no. When I have a child I hope I never make the silly choice to hit them :(. I'll give most parents the benefit of the doubt that they do it in the heat of the moment and regret it instantly. |
I agree with hitting your children as long as it's not done in anger, but to teach them a lesson and to show that they're the boss.
I did dumb crap as a child and I needed to be punished. |
I don't condone abuse. However, I do condone discipline. Those, for me anyway, came in the form of spankings. I learned from those that if I did such a thing again, I knew the consequences.
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They're also smarter than we give them credit for a lot of the time and will use examples of things you have done against you. On top of that, an upset and/or scared child isn't going to see any reasoning, they'll just see and angry parent beating them and even if the reasoning is explained later when they're calm, as a general rule what image is the one that's going to stick in the kid's brain? |
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I think there is a fine line between abuse and just a harsh punishment. I see abuse as unjust physical/emotional harm. A spanking or discipline is deserved. I'm not saying that a parent should ever beat a kid senseless, but a few hits on the back or rear is just. I notice lots of kids nowadays that believe they can get away with anything with no consequence, which I find troubling. If there could be a small physical consequence to reprimand a child, I think that is good for a kid in the long run.
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Excuse this mini-long rant about this topic; I stumbled upon this thread and fear I may never get out...
Alright; I don't honestly think Physical Force should be used in parenting AT ALL. Let me delve into this a bit from my own history; and history of my little brothers, etc. I've grown up in such a household where very little wasn't known by the children/teenagers/young adults. We knew everything that went on because our parents were very bad about hiding some of their actions. They weren't always bad people, but as life kept beating down on them and as they kept making 'mistakes' as we were called, they got more and more disassociated with reality. This in turn led to a lot of physical and mental 'abuse'. Naturally, you've got those kids who take all of that in stride and become great people, and those of them who don't. However; part of that process when growing up can cause uncalled for fears; for instance -- I am a person who is unnaturally confident in things that other people get scared about; quite often, and yet; I was very stunted when it came to taking a really huge step into adult-hood which was getting my license and car. Let me iterate this; I am a very experienced Driver by this point and I was even before getting my license, HOWEVER; a lot of mental abuse and arguments happened in the Car for me; it happened whilst my Dad and Mom would be driving and they'd often break at least 15 different laws while doing so, this caused me to have an unnatural fear of the Road because of paranoia and flashbacks of those incidents every time I was driving USUALLY with the same people. On that same line of topic; I also had a lot of physical 'punishment' in the same scenario for being stubborn. Kids don't like being yelled at; it's a common fact, and when I would retort with something smart, i'd usually get my face slapped or a hand slammed into my Thigh; this type of Physical Force was always deemed acceptable by officials in South Carolina; and for some reason, every time one of us growing up ever tried to report it, it was dismissed with no further investigation. I can vividely recall an incident where I was 14 years old and I got written up at school for leaving my School I.D. at home because I was in a rush and forgot it; I came home that day and got a spanking from my Dad. I was FOURTEEN -- He used a lot more force than was necessary and by the time he had done the first 'lick' as it was called, I was in so much pain that I swung my arm behind to cover myself and I guess at the same exact time he had gone for the second lick because the belt wrapped around my arm and left a long purple lash mark, he stopped after that; but when people questioned it I said NOTHING because it never worked; nobody ever listened. My case is obviously way out of the ballpark as opposed to normal families of course; but let me put it like this; I was often punished with material items as well, for instance, when a new game had came out for a console that I wanted; my parents would buy it and tape it to my ceiling so that i'd be motivated to work for it; this did WAY more in regards to my work ethic and attitude than anything they could ever do Physically, and it actually stuck with me. It is of my opinion that the type of treatment that we deem as acceptable really isn't anymore; spankings have never done much for most people in the long run except instill proper behavior through fear of pain. That's wrong. Completely. I learned how to work hard by myself; I got out of my former-household at the age of 16; and nothing my parents could ever do taught me anything about being responsible except that Smoking, Drinking, and Substance Abuse could ruin a person; and obviously it holds true when you look at a lot of my Generation. (I count 1990-1999 as my Generation.) All i'm going to say is this; resentment is born through pain, I resented my 'parents' for a really long time; it's been two years since I got out of my household and it took me that two years to really and truly figure out how to not hold that anger towards them so close to my chest and be a different person. Physical Force isn't a necessity in raising a child; children are very perceptive and can easily learn how to act responsible if they see their parents/role-models doing what would be deemed responsible by society. Tl;DR - Physical Force comes in varying qualities but is never necessary, coming from someone who came in a very Abusive household, it was never safe and always something to fear, going home that is. Think about that before Mentally or Physically making that child fear you as a prospective parent. |
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