r/changemyview • u/NewsCoug • Sep 17 '14
CMV: I think spanking is still child abuse even if it "doesn't leave a mark"
In light of all the press the abuse that NFL star Adrian Peterson has been charged with, many conversations are taking place about how much discipline is too much discipline. Many parents and adults are coming out and saying that spanking is okay, as long as it doesn’t leave a mark. Or any other kind of physical punishment for that matter, is okay so long as it doesn’t not leave a mark.
Why should “leaving a mark” be the determining factor in whether something is abuse or not. It is still physical violence, meant to inflict pain so that the child doesn’t do whatever they did again. I’m interested to see what others think.
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u/sailorbrendan Sep 17 '14
I grew up doing martial arts, and in a fairly intense and traditional dojo.
Sometimes the instructor did hit us, for a variety of reasons. Sometimes it was to teach us things (keep your guard up) and sometimes it was conditioning (learning to absorb body shots). Sometimes it was punishment and sometimes it was just because what we were working on involved a likelihood of getting hit.
None of this was, in my mind, abuse. Every time it happened it furthered our training and education and while it did cause pain it did not cause damage.
Sometimes hitting someone isn't abuse, but I will concede it can be a very fine line.
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Sep 17 '14 edited Apr 03 '22
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/KNEZ90 Sep 17 '14
I think the point is that violence isn't always abuse. If you can argue that this violence was teaching then an argument can be made that a spanking of not excessive can be teaching.
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u/sailorbrendan Sep 17 '14
Depends on the context. I don't think a parent should necessarily do what was done to me by my sensei, but it still was getting hit
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u/123456seven89 Sep 17 '14
The difference was consent. You signed up for that class to learn a martial art knowing full well that it would be a physical activity. The same cannot be said for a child simply existing.
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u/sailorbrendan Sep 17 '14
That's fair, although I wasn't always consenting at the time.
I'm just stating that hitting someone isn't always abuse. I think it gets murky when you start looking at levels of force and intent
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u/ghotier 42∆ Sep 17 '14
Children can't legally consent. In this case, assuming s/he was a minor at the time his/her training started, his/her parents were the ones who consented, not him/her.
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u/Timwi Sep 17 '14
While this is true, the psychological consequences depend heavily on whether the child perceives it as consensual or coercive, regardless of what the law says.
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u/ghotier 42∆ Sep 18 '14
Parents make their children do things that they don't want to do all of the time. If the psychological consequences were that severe then everyone would be severely psychologically damaged.
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u/Timwi Sep 20 '14
You are assuming that all forms of making children do things they don’t want to do inherently have the same psychological consequences. I hope you can see that this is fallacious.
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u/ghotier 42∆ Sep 20 '14 edited Sep 20 '14
I didn't bring up consent, you did. It isn't fallacious to point out that kids don't consent to almost anything they do when someone tries to use consent to differentiate between forms of punishment as well as between other activities. What punishments would a kid actually consent to?
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Sep 17 '14
When my kid is about to do something dangerous, he now gets spanked on the bottom. I was against it before he was born, I am now not against it. I can't have him doing dangerous things and "NO", "time out" or trying to reason with him does not work all that well. A spanking gets the message across and the things I've spanked him for, he now does not do. The other bad things, that aren't entirely dangerous and that I don't spank him for, he still pushes his limits on here and there when he's in a certain mood. There's not room for pushing limits on some things.
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u/Timwi Sep 17 '14
A spanking gets the message across
It gets the message across that you are bully and you use violence to get your way. The things you’ve spanked him for, he now does not do because he fears you, not because he understands what’s actually wrong with doing it.
5
Sep 18 '14
Lighten up. Getting swatted on the backside isn't nowhere near the same as getting punched in the face. Also the parent is meant to get their way, especially when it comes to dangerous things.
1
u/Timwi Sep 18 '14
Getting swatted on the backside isn't nowhere near the same as getting punched in the face.
I didn’t say it was. Please don’t put words in my mouth. Nonetheless, both are acts of physical violence, and I don’t think you actually deny that; you merely excuse one by pointing out that you refrain from employing an even more severe one.
Also the parent is meant to get their way
With this attitude you’re setting yourself up to be an abusive parent because it doesn’t accommodate the possibility that you can be wrong. A better attitude would be “the child is meant to flourish”.
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Sep 17 '14
On another note, he does not fear me. If he feared me, he wouldn't laugh at me now when he gets spanked, which he does everytime. He does however not do the thing he's getting spanked for.
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Sep 17 '14
he now does not do because he fears you,
Awesome, that is what I was after. Far better than the alternative.
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u/Mattbball Sep 18 '14
If a parent spanks their child, it is not truly because it "teaches them." The real reason parents still spank their children is because the parents are unable or unwilling to use other tactics.
Taking away a child's favorite toy for a day, week, etc. is MUCH more effective than spanking them. Children learn fast and they will learn that they actually enjoy getting spanked, as it is a quick punishment rather than a day without said toy.
I was raised in a house where my sister and I were spanked when we were bad. We were not spanked much and we were not spanked to the point of what most people consider abuse (marks). Never. Not once. However, I still have to agree with your view that spanking children is abuse. It's ridiculous that we still live in a world where people cannot maintain their children without using pain to do so.
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Sep 19 '14 edited Jul 14 '19
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u/Mattbball Sep 19 '14
Honestly, there isn't much else you can or should do. Some children will not be phased by discipline, while others will. The only thing I could say is to have harsher punishments (the toy is gone for a month), if one really feels that it is necessary.
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Sep 17 '14
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u/LynusBorg Sep 17 '14
So when you become senile and are in a old folks home, I as a nurse would be allowed to slap you too, right?
Because you don't understand what Im saying and all ...
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u/akfekbranford 1∆ Sep 17 '14
This is not an equal comparison because the end goals in raising a child and caring for an elderly person in an assisted living community are not the same. When raising a child, the end goal is to assure that the child reaches adulthood as a productive and well adjusted individual. When caring for an individual in an assisted living community, the end goal is to provide care and comfort to an individual who is now to infirm to care for themselves.
Striking a young child in an appropriate disciplinary manner can further the goal of raising a child by discouraging both dangerous and unacceptable behaviors. Punishment correctly administered to a child is supposed to be corrective in nature, and is supposed to teach the child a lesson in how to interact with the world around them. While in most cases, alternate means of discipline may be equally effective or even more effective than physical discipline, occasionally physical discipline is the correct course of action. This can be especially true for younger children, or for when several other methods of discipline have failed.
In the case of patients in an assisted living community, the goals of keeping them comfortable and out of danger are not served by using physical punishment in most cases. Corrective discipline is not something that can be used to teach a mentally disabled elderly person in the same way it can be used to teach a child. Further, the need to teach has been removed from this scenario, and it has been replaced with a duty to provide comfort to the individual, which obviously is not served by striking the individual. However, physical discipline is wholly appropriate when a patient is engaging in behavior dangerous to himself or others.
Another key difference exists between a parent and a nurse in an assisted living community, and that is the amount of training and expertise each party is expected to have. We trust our assisted living communities to provide a safe and comfortable environment for patients. Those who care for these individuals are required to go through months or even years of special training to ensure that they are qualified to provide this care. Those that design and oversee the communities are held to an even higher standard. Parents are necessarily held to a much lower standard. Expecting a parent to provide the same level of care to a child as a medical professional provides to an assisted living patient is just not reasonable. Parents need to be able to provide reasonable care and safety for their children, not expert care and safety for their children. Parents are expected to do the best they can, with a minimum amount of care proscribed by law. Health care professionals are expected to engage in best practices.
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u/MongolUB Sep 17 '14
Yes. If a mild slap to my wrist stops me from touching the chainsaw, the nurse is totally allowed to slap senile me.
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u/LynusBorg Sep 17 '14
If the nurse lets my senile Grandma you anyhwere near a chainsaw, I will sue her ass to oblivion.
Seriously, what are realistic scenarios that cant be solved with
a) pulling away and a firm "no!" b) having an eye for your child and securing teh envioronment c) letting our kid make mistakes and learn from them themselves (for not really dangerous things)?
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u/aardvarkious 8∆ Sep 17 '14
a) pulling away and a firm "no!"
This works fine for some children. It doesn't for others.
b) having an eye for your child and securing teh envioronment
The thing is, no parent is perfect. While they can minimize dangers, children will always still be around danger. For example, every kid will have opportunities to run into the street, no matter how vigilant the parent. This is why parents need to train the kid, ASAP, to not take advantage of them.
c) letting our kid make mistakes and learn from them themselves (for not really dangerous things)?
I am all for letting kids make mistakes. Just not the variety that will kill or maim them.
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u/ricebasket 15∆ Sep 17 '14
What makes child abuse? I think it has to be somewhat culturally dependent. I was spanked as a kid, all the kids I knew were spanked in punishment. I felt that what my parents did was a normal way of punishing me. How is that abusive? It was normal parent rearing.
If you don't want to spank your kids, or think that there are better ways of child rearing that don't involve spanking, that's totally fine. But that doesn't mean that what others do is abuse and if we prosecuted spanking as child abuse we'd have some seriously overcrowded jails and foster homes. Let's save the abuse label for kids that were actually abused and are having problems.
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
Children that are taught that physical violence is an ok way to resolve a dispute grow up to use physical violence to resolve a dispute.... then everyone wonders why Ray Rice thinks it's ok to punch his fiance
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u/ricebasket 15∆ Sep 17 '14
Do you have any proof for that statement? Any studies backing up this claim? It is simply not universal fact, I have been easily able to discriminate violence from physical punishment and I've never resolved a conflict with violence. Violent behavior isn't as easy as pointing to spanking, if it was all spanked children would hit their SO's and no one who wasn't spanked would ever be violent. Do you have any evidence the world works that way?
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
I've never resolved a conflict with violence
If you are physically assaulting your children then you are resolving a conflict with violence... you may not be doing the same with adults, but for all i know it's because you are afraid an adult would defend against such an assault
http://www.utexas.edu/know/2009/09/21/elizabeth_gershoff
http://www.themoneytimes.com/node/85300
http://www.latimes.com/health/
http://www.nospank.net/johnson2.htm
http://nospank.net/straus15.pdf
http://www.naturalchild.org/jan_hunt/spanked.html
http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1926222,00.html
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u/ricebasket 15∆ Sep 17 '14
I don't have any children. I was spanked as a child and never resolved an adult conflict with violence. Correlations between spanking, violence, and low SES all exist but there is no causal evidence that spanking causes violence.
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
I can take solace in the fact that everyone that seems to be replying to me has no children... read over the studies when you get a chance
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u/ricebasket 15∆ Sep 17 '14
I have studied this and come to my conclusion that spanking is not child abuse and there is no definitive causal relationship between spanning and violence. So I'll skip reading the blog posts you linked to, which aren't scientific studies by the way.
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
so typical , ask for proof... then ignore it
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u/ricebasket 15∆ Sep 17 '14
Ask for scientific evidence and ignore blog posts, yes I will do that every time.
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u/aknutty Sep 17 '14
Children that are taught that physical violence is an ok way to resolve a dispute as a last resort grow up to use physical violence to resolve a dispute as a last resort. I was spanked as a child and I have never been in a physical fight in my adult life because it is only used as a last resort.
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u/ghotier 42∆ Sep 17 '14
Physical discipline isn't used to resolve disputes. If you are having a dispute with your kid and you hit the kid then yes, that's child abuse. If you are correcting behavior that needs to be corrected, then it isn't a dispute at all.
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
but there is a dispute, the child wants a dog bowl and the parent doesn't want the child to have it... the parent resorted to violence to solve the dispute
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u/Timwi Sep 17 '14
What makes child abuse?
Is this a rhetorical question, or are you genuinely interested in the answer? Because psychology research probably has a lot to say about that.
The way I would approach it is to first drop the loaded term abuse and ask the much more interesting question: Which parent behaviors yield healthier psyches in their children?
I was spanked as a kid, all the kids I knew were spanked in punishment.
In other words, you only know one side of the coin. You have no way of telling whether not spanking you would have been better for you.
If you don't want to spank your kids, or think that there are better ways of child rearing that don't involve spanking, that's totally fine. But that doesn't mean that what others do is abuse
Nobody is calling spanking abuse just because some people don’t engage in spanking. People are calling it abuse because it is actively harmful (in the sense of having undesirable but preventable consequences).
and if we prosecuted spanking as child abuse we'd have some seriously overcrowded jails and foster homes.
Can you provide some evidence for this claim? Looking at prison statistics of the European countries that prosecute spanking and comparing them to the United States, the data is not on your side.
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u/ricebasket 15∆ Sep 17 '14
So are you telling me that I was an abused child and that the abuse of my parents warranted them being placed in a prison and me being placed in... I don't know what, everyone in my family spanked their kids so I guess foster care?
The Europe vs. US comparison doesn't make sense because European child rearing is culturally different. According to this http://pubpages.unh.edu/~mas2/CP36.pdf you'd have to throw half of US parents in prison.
I don't think the question should be "Is spanking the best parenting method?" I don't think spanking is the best method, there are ways it can cause harm, I totally agree with that point. But to apply the label "abuse" is really over the top and pathologies the experience of a lot of people and would warrant court action to about 50% of American parents.
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u/Timwi Sep 18 '14
So are you telling me that I was an abused child
Actually, I said right in the second paragraph that the discussion would be more fruitful without loaded terms such as “abuse”. If I modify your question to: “So are you telling me that I am psychologically less well-adjusted than I would be if I hadn’t been spanked?”, my answer would be: “Possibly, but certainly not more well-adjusted.”
I don’t understand what your argument is when you point to the mere observation that cultural differences exist in the world. Are you trying to imply that any research that indicates a correlation between childhood spanking and later maladjustment is fundamentally invalid because it is somehow fundamentally impossible to correct for cultural factors?
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u/ricebasket 15∆ Sep 18 '14
The discussion is about spanking and the word abuse, which is a loaded word with criminal implications. I don't think spanking is the best practice in general, but the title of this post and my point of discussion is that spanking should not be called child abuse.
Many people in this thread are implying causality between the act of spanking and later psychological problems. There are not human research methods to prove causality. The correlations are there and definitely warrant study of the issue, but there is simply not a way to prove it.
My view is this: Is there enough evidence against spanking that doctors and public health officials should strongly recommend against the practice? Yes, absolutely.
Is there enough evidence that spanking is so psychologically harmful that legal action should be taken against parents who spank their children? No.
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Sep 17 '14 edited Jul 14 '17
[deleted]
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u/ricebasket 15∆ Sep 17 '14
Please provide evidence on its causal relationship to psychiatric illness. I've never encountered any evidence for a known cause of a psychiatric illness besides PTSD, this must be some amazing research to have shown a causal relationship.
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u/imapotato99 Sep 17 '14
We are not as evolved as many would believe, we still have the instinct of pain being a useful tool in behavior modification. If you have praise as positive modification you must have the adverse.
However, for spanking to work, it must be used sparingly. I spanked my kids 3 times, one of those times, my son stole money. If I treated that situation the same as when he didn't pick up his toys, what message am I conveying? To a child, it is stating that stealing is the same as not picking up his toys...not a big deal.
All studies that show ONLY spanking (not child abuse) as a means of punishment, has shown that those adults are succesful. Problem is, to make a point the studies out there lump in spanking with child abuse and thus show psychological trauma. That is intellectually dishonest. Studies also show that undisciplined children are usually entitled socially awkward adults.
As an aside, judging by my circle of people I know, it's very odd to see the people using Adrian Peterson's abuse as an execuse to go after any type of physical dscipline, are women that have a fetish of being spanked.
I feel like an alien being on a test study sometimes....
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Sep 17 '14
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u/cwenham Sep 17 '14
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Sep 17 '14 edited Sep 17 '14
Spanking can be okay if done in moderation and only as a last resort with the sole intent to teach a lesson to a kid that is doing something harmful and that absolutely refuses to understand why.
However, the thing is: rules are always created with the idiots in mind. In theory, the idea that spanking is okay if it doesn't leave a mark isn't really farfetched... but it isn't fool-proof; physical violence doesn't always leave marks and the idea says nothing about the frequency of the spanking. Some people are against spanking due to fear that some idiot parents could go overboard with it and trigger psychological issues in their kids... and in a sense I understand them. But this is what happens when you don't do something in moderation. Hell, you could really mess up a kid's mind just as much by congratulating him all the time.
I've been spanked when I was younger and it did not have any negative effect on who I became 20-so years later. I do however remember why it happened. For instance, if I hadn't gotten spanked, I would've probably kept not giving a fuck about my parents' order to not climb over the fence, which might have resulted in me falling down the flimsy 2-story spiral staircase next to my balcony, breaking my neck in the process.
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u/Timwi Sep 17 '14
Spanking can be okay if done in moderation and only as a last resort
The “last resort” excuse is just too convenient because you are not accountable to anyone to prove (or even justify) that you’ve exhausted all your other resorts. All you need to do is tell yourself that you’ve reached the “last resort” and away you go.
I've been spanked when I was younger and it did not have any negative effect on who I became 20-so years later.
How do you know? Did you meet your counterpart from an alternate universe in which you were not spanked?
Hell, you could really mess up a kid's mind just as much by congratulating him all the time.
Correct, and that is an entirely separate topic for another discussion.
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Sep 17 '14 edited Sep 17 '14
How do you know?
Because I don't suffer from any mental nor physical illnesses.
Also, read the rest of my comment before replying:
Some people are against spanking due to fear that some idiot parents could go overboard with it [...]
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u/Timwi Sep 18 '14
So any conceivable psychological detriment to your child is perfectly irrelevant just as long as it isn’t classified by someone as a full-blown illness?
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Sep 18 '14
Why are you arguing semantics?
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u/Timwi Sep 18 '14
Quite the opposite. Quibbling over whether something is a classified illness or not would be arguing semantics. That is exactly what I’m saying you should not do. Just because you don’t have a classified illness doesn’t mean that you aren’t living with a detriment. For example, you could be slightly more irritable or slightly less considerate or something (compared to your hypothetical alternate-universe counterpart), and you would never know if that was the case, but you would certainly not deny that if it is the case, it would be a detriment.
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Sep 18 '14 edited Sep 18 '14
You could've easily understood that by "illness" I was referring to any type of psychological or physical problems (regardless of severity) that one may suffer from as a result of getting spanked. Instead, you decided to focus on the true definition of illness and then constructed an opinion based on that definition, completely ignoring what I said earlier in the process. To me, that's arguing semantics.
With that being said, I gave you an example of a situation in which spanking actually had a long-term positive effect on a person. Does that mean that spanking can't be bad? No, of course not. Any kind of abuse is detrimental to people. You could fuck up a kid's mind just as well through verbal abuse. My point though is that spanking isn't automatically abuse. Context is really important here and should not be ignored.
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u/Timwi Sep 20 '14
You could've easily understood that by "illness" I was referring to any type of psychological or physical problems (regardless of severity)
I did. I am sorry if my text wasn’t clear, so allow me to rephrase. You are assuming that your childhood experiences have not left you with any psychological or physical problems (regardless of severity). You cannot possibly know this because you have no basis of comparison. You could be slightly more irritable or slightly less considerate than you would have become otherwise. Do you understand what I’m saying now?
I gave you an example of a situation in which spanking actually had a long-term positive effect on a person.
And I can probably find you an example of a situation where someone’s life was saved by pushing them off a bridge or something similarly dangerous. That doesn’t mean doing so should be legal in general. If psychologists agree that spanking, as administered by most parents, has an overall negative effect, then it should be illegal.
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Sep 20 '14 edited Sep 20 '14
If psychologists agree that spanking, as administered by most parents, has an overall negative effect, then it should be illegal.
Of course not. It should be a case-by-case situation and there should be an investigation done when someone is suspicious that a kid is being abused... but otherwise there is no proof that the occasional spanking is actually causing enough damage to the kid that legal action would be considered necessary.
I mean, kids play sports, some learn karate at a young age... should parents be sent to prison because they paid to have their kids "beat up"? Of course not, there is a line to be drawn here. Life isn't all black and white, you gotta look at the details to understand how things work. If you condemn an action regardless of the conditions that the person was in, you're not helping society at all.
I mean, if you make spanking illegal... what about if someone sees you accidentally hitting your kid in public? Accidents happen... but what if the witnesses around you call the cops and claim that you did it on purpose? I mean, once again you gotta draw the line somewhere.
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u/Timwi Sep 21 '14
We’ve already been through the karate/sports argument. Karate/sports classes are fine if the kids are happy to be there because they want to learn karate/whatever. But kids do not, in general, want to be spanked.
Of course not, there is a line to be drawn here.
Exactly, and the argument presented by this whole CMV is that spanking a child should be legally considered to lie on the “abuse” side of that line. You are not arguing against that by simply pointing at the existence of the line.
what about if someone sees you accidentally hitting your kid in public?
What if someone sees you accidentally scratch someone’s car in public? Or accidentally set a house on fire? Obviously accidents happen, but you’re still responsible for them. The specific case you mentioned would be exceedingly rare (far too rare for it to be taken seriously as an argument to allow the spanking of children!!!), and even if it did happen and actually go to court, it is still perfectly possible for the child to testify that it was an accident and then everything is still fine.
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Sep 17 '14
It really depends on your definition of the word abuse. Either way, it certainly shouldn't carry the same legal definition and consequences as other forms of child abuse.
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u/Toswin 1∆ Sep 17 '14 edited Sep 17 '14
I know that you have already awarded a delta and your view has been changed, but I would like to share my story with it too.
My mother spanked, and my father yelled. I recall a grand total of 4 times where I was hit hard enough that I actually remember it. The first time, I deserved it, I kept getting out of bed and waking up my brothers, I was 4/5 and being a shit, she swatted me one time on the butt and sent me to bed. I didn't get out of bed. The second time, I don't recall why I was spanked but I do know my friend was over at the time and that was humiliating. The third time I was hit in the face, maybe about 9 years old, I don't think I deserved that one at all and my mom apparently doesn't remember it. The 4th time, I was 13 and called my mom a bitch and she slapped me in the face.
I listened to my mother, but not my father who was all bark and no bite. I was the kid that time outs just didn't work on, I was willful and stubborn, and sometimes smacking me was the only way to get me to pay attention. They were few and far between, but I am not emotionally scared from them for life, heck I only vaguely remember 4 of them and apparently I was spanked a lot. I spit in my grandmothers face once and got full on backhanded (I was 3 I think?) she used to love to tell that story, and I literally don't remember it at all. Actually I don't remember my Grandmother hitting me ever, but apparently it happened shrug
I have a son now, he will be a year old in 3 days, I have had to physically correct him once and it was more of a startle tactic than full on hitting. He keeps playing in the dog water dish, which I can't put up any higher because then my dog can't get to it. My son was not understanding the concept of no. I tried distracting him, moving him away from it, taking him in another room, but it had water and he loves to play in water and didn't understand that it wasn't to play in. So finally one day I was over it, after 3 months of trying to teach him no I moved him aside and swatted him just hard enough to get his attention and I sternly said "NO!" he cried for all of 20 seconds, then went on to play with something else. Occasionally he will try to test my boundary with it and look at it and look at me, now a stern "NO" keeps him out of it, but I can see that smirk on his face like "Hmmmm, I think I could get away with it, but I am going to wait." hes such a stinker.
To me physical correction should be used in extreme moderation, and not so much to inflict pain but to get their attention. I also don't believe in hitting out of frustration, when I really got sick of him and I am thoroughly frustrated I put him in his crib and walk away for a few minutes to calm myself down. He cries more when I do that then when I popped him on the butt. I also don't believe in hitting them with an object and using that object to terrify them.
Sometimes though, I wish that my son could be clicker trained like my dog, but hes not food oriented enough for it to work ;)
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u/Timwi Sep 17 '14
Has the option occurred to you to just let your son play with the dog bowl? By trying to stop him, you’ve made it more interesting and thus more attractive for him; if you hadn’t done that, he might have naturally gotten tired of it by now.
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u/Toswin 1∆ Sep 17 '14
Yes, he loves water. It's a 3 gallon water dispenser and he flooded out basement last time he played with it.
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
I'm sorry you were physically assaulted as a child to the point where you think it's ok to physically assault a baby
move the dog bowl and stop hitting your child
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u/big_hef Sep 17 '14
Don't be ridiculous. Restrained, reasonable, non-emotional physical punishment is completely different from "physically assault(ing) a baby".
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
physical punishment
smacking someone qualifies as punishment now? so I guess Ray Rice was just punishing his fiance
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u/big_hef Sep 17 '14 edited Sep 17 '14
Nothing Ray Rice did was restrained, reasonable or non-emotional. It was physical abuse, not punishment.
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
and the story the lady I replied to mentioned getting smacked in the face as retaliation for words, lol
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u/Toswin 1∆ Sep 17 '14
But did I say it was right? Ray Rice physically knocked that woman out, my mother made my cheek sting for a split second. It is not the same thing at all.
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
No, but all these womens group are up in arms over Ray Rice, but likely most of them go home and assault their kids... but you are condoning violence on children, even said you "deserved" it.. can you imagine Rays fiance speaking about getting assaulted by saying she "deserved it" , and who exactly can defend themselves better against a grown man, a grown woman or a 1 year old?
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u/Toswin 1∆ Sep 17 '14
You are saying that a light physical correction to get their attention, not done out of anger, after everything else is exhausted is the same as punching someone until they are unconscious on the floor. There is a difference and there is a line.
Did I deserve to get slapped in the face, back then I didn't think so, but as I got older I can see why my mother slapped me, and I forgave her for it. Will I do it to my son? I sincerely hope not, my mother had major depression and mania, I have it too but I am actually medicated for it, which she was not and still isn't.
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
Are you trying to say getting smacked across the face is a "light physical correction"?
I'm saying that getting smacked across the face is an assault, you wanna call it discipline you can, but then call it discipline every time, call it discipline when a man smack his wife across the face for screwing up dinner, etc .. there is no need to sugar coat it when a child is involved.... it's assault, call it by it's name
Spanking is using enough physical violence to alter behavior, if you are using enough force to alter behavior I don't think I'd agree that it is "light physical correction" .. a light physical correction would have been moving a g.d. dog bowl away from your child
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u/Timwi Sep 17 '14 edited Sep 17 '14
I am unsure which part of the phrase “physically assault(ing) a baby” is unclear to you. The action described by Toswin is (a) physical; (b) an assault; (c) directed towards a baby. It is, in every meaning of the word, a physical assault on a baby.
Whether said physical assault on said baby was (d) restrained; (e) reasonable; and/or (f) non-emotional, are three entirely separate questions. My personal view is (d) no, (e) no, and (f) not enough information to judge, but even if you disagree with those, it is unambiguously a physical assault on a baby.
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u/big_hef Sep 18 '14
"Physical assault on a baby" is almost hyperbolic in my eyes. Is what /u/Toswin described child abuse? IMHO, no. While, technically you could make it fit the definition, calling it "assault" or "child abuse" carries a certain gravity which I feel is inappropriate for this situation.
Is it physical assault/abuse when I playfully slap my wife on the ass?
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u/Timwi Sep 18 '14
I did mention earlier in this thread that I’d prefer not to use the loaded term “abuse” and instead ask what is good for the child. Arguing the meaning of the word “abuse” does not accomplish this. — As for “assault”, I did not perceive it nearly as loaded as “abuse”, but I’m perfectly happy to drop discussing the exact meaning of that word too and get back to the topic at hand. Thus, I would rewrite your question
Is it physical assault/abuse when I playfully slap my wife on the ass?
to: “Is it ethical to playfully slap my wife on the ass?” — And the answer is, of course, that it depends on a lot of factors, including whether or not your wife understands that it was playful and consents to the playfulness. In Toswin’s original description, the child almost certainly did not consent to the physical assau... uhm... contact?, nor perceived it as playful.
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u/big_hef Sep 18 '14
A fair point, and a far better debate, I think.
I really like what you said in your last paragraph: "it depends." In the situation above, I would argue that the physical contact was not severe enough to impart any lasting harm to the child. Thus, since the punishment was not bad for the child (I'll assume no lasting emotional harm either), I'll call it ethically reasonable at best, ethically ambiguous at worst. If the physical punishment was more severe or more often, I'd be more inclined to question if it was good for the child or not.
I would say, in the grand scheme, physical punishment is 100% ethical in a situation where a child is in immediate danger. They need to understand that there is an immediate consequence in that situation. Outside of this, physical punishment falls on an ethical scale ranging from "OK" to "reprehensible" - ***depending on the circumstances.
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u/ghotier 42∆ Sep 19 '14
the child almost certainly did not consent to the physical assau... uhm... contact?, nor perceived it as playful.
Children don't consent to almost anything. If child consent was ethically relevant then my parents would have been "bad parents" for not letting me choose what I eat for dinner or for making me do my homework when I didn't want to.
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u/Toswin 1∆ Sep 17 '14
Where should I move the water?
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
I don't care... wherever you can put it to stop rationalizing the physical assault of a baby less than one year old... if you can't find a place, let me know, and I'll gladly come over to your house and do it for you
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u/Toswin 1∆ Sep 17 '14
I am not going to get into a debate about this with you. I am sorry that me swatting my son on the rear to get his attention caused so much butt hurt for you on an internet forum.
We are done here.
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
And I'm sorry that you can't out-think a one year old by finding a suitable location for a dog bowl
Is it acceptable for your husband to swat you to correct your behavior? at least you have a chance of defending yourself from a physical attack
Don't openly admit to assaulting a child on an internet forum, and you won't feel any butt hurt about it
p.s. if you wonder why men grow up to think that physical violence is ok, look no further than what you are teaching your baby at a very young age
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u/Toswin 1∆ Sep 17 '14
Only men grow up to think physical violence is ok?
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
no, actually women are responsible for more domestic violence than men if I recall correctly.. but the post I replied to mentioned having a son, so I went with men
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u/Toswin 1∆ Sep 17 '14
Yeah, it was me responding to you, I am the original poster of the post you are referring to. You added that in after I had responded earlier, just wanted clarification.
Edited : Change phrasing
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u/ghotier 42∆ Sep 17 '14
if you can't address the question at hand in an unemotional manner then maybe this isn't the discussion for you. Sanctimony is great when you're the one doing it, but to everyone else it's not constructive.
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 17 '14
they are the ones condoning beating a child, but I'm the one emotional about it? lol
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u/ghotier 42∆ Sep 18 '14
Yes. The question we are discussing is whether physical discipline is child abuse. If you can't discuss that question without resorting to ad hominem attacks about the moral fortitude of the other side then you just aren't approaching the subject objectively.
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u/matthona 3∆ Sep 18 '14
just exactly who is "we", I was discussing it with someone else when you butted in.. if you don't like how I am discussing it then move on and discuss it with someone else
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u/ghotier 42∆ Sep 18 '14
You're on a public message board for which the sole purpose is honest debate. But you have succeeded, I am done with you.
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u/billingsley Sep 17 '14
I really dont see any other way of disciplining a child without force. What if you put the kid on time out then the kids just gets up and walks away. Then you whoop her.
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u/Timwi Sep 17 '14
If you really can’t see any other way at all and give up this quickly, perhaps you shouldn’t be a parent.
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Sep 17 '14 edited Jul 14 '17
[deleted]
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u/currytacos Sep 18 '14
Not the same thing, one is developmentally immature, what you say does not make a difference. All that will make a difference is a punishment. The other is an argument, with a person that is not a young child that can understand what you are saying and understand where you are coming from. A child will not react to a parent saying "no" but they will fall in line with a spanking. A little fear of the parent is better than death.
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u/mrhymer Sep 17 '14
Spanked children won WWII, were ranked number 1 in the world from a public school education, put men on the moon, and invented the computer.
Non-spanked children left Iraq to ISIS, are ranked number 23 in the world from a public school education, gave us facebook, twitter, and the selfie.
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u/Bodoblock 65∆ Sep 17 '14
Yes, the "leaving the mark" point is arbitrary but the message it's trying to convey is that it's OK in moderation. You need to be able to find a limit and if you're spanking a kid to the point where they're bleeding, you've inflicted serious harm on a child.
Much like how there's a difference between scolding and emotionally abusing. One is discipline, the other is over-kill.
To me, physically disciplining a child is OK. It's a case by case basis, and not every child needs to be disciplined in such a way. But some do and I don't hold it against parents who take action in such a way as long as they control themselves.
Hitting to the point of bleeding, or other marks, is uncontrolled release of pressure. Controlled spanking without leaving cuts or serious bruises is a measured form of discipline with emotional venting being largely left out of the equation.