“All people have the right to protection of their physical integrity, and children are people too." Dr. Peter Newell (coordinator of an organization called “End Punishment of Children”)
If you saw an adult excitedly striking another adult in public, there is a chance you might spontaneously speak out or seek out a nearby police officer to aid the victim or at the very least be troubled by the unjust/uncivilized spectacle. But, if you saw an adult excitedly striking a child in public, would you bother to interfere or would you easily assume the child must “belong” to that parent and thus the adult has the right to physically assault the child? Would you walk away untroubled or maybe a tad troubled by the spectacle, but not deeply? Chances are the latter response, especially if you grew up in North America.
Jan Hunt is the Director of the “Natural Child Project” and a member of the Board of Directors of the Canadian Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. She lives in British Columbia and “envisions a world in which all children are treated with dignity, respect, understanding, and compassion.” Hunt has compiled a list entitled “10 Reasons Not To Hit Your Kids.”
Hunt points out that 37 countries around the world “prohibit” a parent, teacher or anyone to spank a child. In 113 countries corporal punishment is forbidden in schools. However, in North America physical discipline of children is often condoned as a “necessity” or even, Hunt mourns, encouraged.
Hunt advises parents: “Gentle instruction, supported by a strong foundation of love and respect, is the only truly effective way to bring about commendable behavior based on strong inner values, instead of superficially ‘good’ behavior based only on fear.”
Here is a summation of Hunt’s list of “Ten Reasons Not to Hit Your Kids”:
1. Hitting children teaches them to become hitters themselves. (Research reveals correlation between childhood corporal punishment and subsequent aggressive or violent behavior during teenage and adult years of children who experienced it.)
2. Often children who frustrate parents with “bad behavior” are reacting according to their age and experience to some degree of neglect of their important and/or basic needs. (Often parents are seriously distracted from offering children sufficient attention, patience and empathy.)
3. Punishment distracts and prevents a child from learning how to resolve conflicts in humane and effective ways. (Fear and/or anger disrupts learning -- the child is distracted from learning more effective methods of solving problems for future similar situations).
4. Punishment damages the parent/child bond since it is human nature not to feel loving toward someone who hurts us. Healthy cooperation is engendered from mutual feelings of love and respect and will be permanently lasting. (Punishment produces “superficially good behavior based on fear” which lasts “until the child is old enough to resist.”)
5. Often parents never learned there are positive ways to relate to and influence children and when punishment doesn’t accomplish the parent’s desired goal, the frequency and/or degree of punishment often dangerously escalate.
6. When a child is too intimidated to express anger and frustration around a physically punishing parent, those feelings become “stored inside.” Accumulated anger from teens and young adults can shock parents when their children begin to feel strong enough to express long buried rage.
7. Since the buttocks are an erogenous zone, spanking them can create an association in a child’s mind between pain and sexual pleasure. Also, such humiliation contributes to low self-esteem. These factors can sabotage future healthy intimate social bonding.
8. Spankings, even those assumed moderate, can be physically dangerous. Blows to the lower end of a spinal column can create enough shock waves to cause undiagnosed serious medical complications. (Lower back pain and nerve damage in adulthood may stem from early childhood punishments.)
9. Physical punishment messages “might makes right” thinking -- that “it is permissible to hurt someone else, provided they are smaller and less powerful than you are.” The child’s future capacity for empathy as an adult can be seriously reduced because of this messaging.
10. Children learn from what the parent models. Physical punishment messages that hitting is an appropriate way to express feelings and to solve problems instead of messaging that creative and humane ways should be sought. (Unskilled parenting thus gets carried forward into the next generation.)
[cross-posted on correntewire]
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Libby, I have strong issues with striking children, I have the same issues with striking animals. there ARE instances where it MAY be necessary. it may be the easiest way to quickly teach something. but it's a method - it's negative reinforcement which is a valid method of teaching. but you must know how and why are you doing it and what you hope to achieve. you also have to know what is acceptable and what isn't. what is abuse and what isn't. but that's "book learning". a lot of people, maybe the majority believe being a parent is intuitive and don't want to be "told" how to parent. I don't know what the solution is. children have zero rights in this world. zilch.
all of this makes sense
Libby, great points expressed here and in the context of thinking globally about nations vs. nations one can draw conclusions about the positive nature of negotiations vs. war making, etc.
The primary reason for hitting children is, not so much avoided, as circled around in this essay. That primary reason is "punishment."
For thousands of years we have 'understood' that punishment - or rather the threat of punishment - is a deterrent to unwanted behaviour.
The notion of punishment has also been handed down to us via every Judeo-Christian-Islamic religion. Those having the power to punish another person are also seen as having the right to do so.
In both the above cases, we are wrong. Mistaken. In error. And this is true whether applied to children or to adults. The very term punishment seeks to diminish the real act that is taking place. That act is "harming another person." Reasons for wanting to harm another are multitude but never legitimate as an excuse to do so.
No matter what wrong has been done by any person, adult or child, it cannot be corrected by initiating another harm to someone, the person who did the first wrong or anyone else (parents, guardians, society, etc.). Two wrongs don't make a right and we adults KNOW that this old adage is true.
I will bet that as long as we maintain the attitude that punishing anyone - child or adult - is a good or useful thing to do, then that long will we have violence directed both towards and, eventually, from the children so harmed and the damaged adults they become.
R+++++++++++++++
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For thousands of years we have 'understood' that punishment - or rather the threat of punishment - is a deterrent to unwanted behaviour.
The notion of punishment has also been handed down to us via every Judeo-Christian-Islamic religion. Those having the power to punish another person are also seen as having the right to do so.
In both the above cases, we are wrong. Mistaken. In error. And this is true whether applied to children or to adults. The very term punishment seeks to diminish the real act that is taking place. That act is "harming another person." Reasons for wanting to harm another are multitude but never legitimate as an excuse to do so.
No matter what wrong has been done by any person, adult or child, it cannot be corrected by initiating another harm to someone, the person who did the first wrong or anyone else (parents, guardians, society, etc.). Two wrongs don't make a right and we adults KNOW that this old adage is true.
I will bet that as long as we maintain the attitude that punishing anyone - child or adult - is a good or useful thing to do, then that long will we have violence directed both towards and, eventually, from the children so harmed and the damaged adults they become.
R+++++++++++++++
.
@Foolish Monkey,
With the greatest respect for you, I must disagree with your statement that, "children have zero rights in this world. zilch." Please do not make the mistake of thinking that what goes on in North America is applicable the world over.
Children everywhere have all the rights of human beings. Those rights are not - in the US - enshrined in law, yet. Some are in Canada, most of European countries, and many South American nations also. Not all other countries are as backward as we North Americans in such matters.
.
With the greatest respect for you, I must disagree with your statement that, "children have zero rights in this world. zilch." Please do not make the mistake of thinking that what goes on in North America is applicable the world over.
Children everywhere have all the rights of human beings. Those rights are not - in the US - enshrined in law, yet. Some are in Canada, most of European countries, and many South American nations also. Not all other countries are as backward as we North Americans in such matters.
.
Hitting your child is a form of bullying. If you can't model good behaviour, at least use inventive non-physical sanctions as punishments. R.
Good piece. There was a similar discussion on "On Point" last week, inspired by the high-profile football-playing child abuser. And now that looks more likely to result in reforms to the NFL than to child rights in the US. When the radio presenter led off by saying that corporal punishment of children is decreasing in the US, I listened hopefully, but it seems that the number of Americans who believe it is OK to hit a child has dropped from around 85% in 1965 to 65% today, which is 65% too high in my opinion. Quite a few African-Americans called in to regretfully say that it has always been a part of their child-rearing culture. It was not part of mine and I am sure it won't be how my kids raise theirs either.
Lots of blanket statements in this post, but the one I find most objectionable is number 10: "Children learn from what the parent models. Physical punishment messages that hitting is an appropriate way to express feelings and to solve problems instead of messaging that creative and humane ways should be sought. (Unskilled parenting thus gets carried forward into the next generation.)"
I was physically, emotionally and psychologically abused by my parents and teachers and school administrators for 17 years. I finally persuaded my father that physical abuse was not a good idea when I threatened to crush his skull with a 2x4; but I never struck my step-son in anger or frustration, in fact I can only remember smacking his butt once when he was about three years old. He didn't want to come in for dinner and decided to try to bite my arm.
I was nearly forty years old before I understood that my anger, anxiety, quick temper, rebellion with authority, substance abuse and hyper vigilance were symptoms of undiagnosed PTSD. With that comprehension and my aunt's undiluted tales of how my sainted grandparents were not so sainted, I understood how the dysfunctional family dynamics of physical abuse were handed down to me through the generations. That understanding was the beginning of my long on-going recovery.
But here's the twist, some kids who have never been physically disciplined or emotionally deprived or psychologically abused suffer from mental illness that causes them to be violent even pathological. Every family and every child is different and good intentions, generalities and truisms do not necessary apply. Nonetheless, R&R.
I was physically, emotionally and psychologically abused by my parents and teachers and school administrators for 17 years. I finally persuaded my father that physical abuse was not a good idea when I threatened to crush his skull with a 2x4; but I never struck my step-son in anger or frustration, in fact I can only remember smacking his butt once when he was about three years old. He didn't want to come in for dinner and decided to try to bite my arm.
I was nearly forty years old before I understood that my anger, anxiety, quick temper, rebellion with authority, substance abuse and hyper vigilance were symptoms of undiagnosed PTSD. With that comprehension and my aunt's undiluted tales of how my sainted grandparents were not so sainted, I understood how the dysfunctional family dynamics of physical abuse were handed down to me through the generations. That understanding was the beginning of my long on-going recovery.
But here's the twist, some kids who have never been physically disciplined or emotionally deprived or psychologically abused suffer from mental illness that causes them to be violent even pathological. Every family and every child is different and good intentions, generalities and truisms do not necessary apply. Nonetheless, R&R.
Hunt, and by implication you libby, are making the strong case here and while I agree with the conclusion that children shouldn't be spanked or elsewise struck, I noted that a few commenters on Tom C's post, including me, had been occasionally spanked at an early age and suffered no lasting trauma.
The analogy I made there was like capital punishment, it's bound to go wrong in too many cases and there were alternative ways of achieving the same end.
The analogy I made there was like capital punishment, it's bound to go wrong in too many cases and there were alternative ways of achieving the same end.
"Gentle instruction, supported by a strong foundation of love and respect, is the only truly effective way to bring about commendable behavior based on strong inner values, instead of superficially ‘good’ behavior based only on fear.”
I think it's a great pity this is the only alternative she gives parents instead of hitting kids - it doesn't work and parents only go back to hitting their kids again.
The problem with this advice is that it doesn't take account of a child's developmental trajectory. Children don't develop the capacity for abstract thinking or inner values till age 12-13.
As a child and adolescent psychiatrist who spent 35+ years teaching parenting, I have to agree with the behavioral specialists. Prior to developing abstract thinking, children need to be rewarded for good behavior. And provided the parental relationship is strong, the absolute most powerful reward is their parents' approval. Up until adolescence, children will do almost anything to please their parents.
Among other problems caused by physical punishment, 50 years of study show that punishment is totally ineffective in changing behavior - in any vertebrates, including human beings. If you want behavior to change, you have to reward appropriate behavior.
I think it's a great pity this is the only alternative she gives parents instead of hitting kids - it doesn't work and parents only go back to hitting their kids again.
The problem with this advice is that it doesn't take account of a child's developmental trajectory. Children don't develop the capacity for abstract thinking or inner values till age 12-13.
As a child and adolescent psychiatrist who spent 35+ years teaching parenting, I have to agree with the behavioral specialists. Prior to developing abstract thinking, children need to be rewarded for good behavior. And provided the parental relationship is strong, the absolute most powerful reward is their parents' approval. Up until adolescence, children will do almost anything to please their parents.
Among other problems caused by physical punishment, 50 years of study show that punishment is totally ineffective in changing behavior - in any vertebrates, including human beings. If you want behavior to change, you have to reward appropriate behavior.
Dr Bramhall, I hope I have misread your comment above, because you seem to suggest that until age 12 or 13 children cannot comprehend love and respect and simple instructions that might be conveyed at the same time, and that they have not internalized values that allow them to know wrong from right. Of course this is not true and I doubt that you believe it. If "it is a great pity" that Hunt did not give any other alternatives, what other alternatives to love and respect do you counsel?
Oh, I am guilty of not carefully reading your comment, but is parental approval all it takes? I would think that could lead to a lifelong pattern of seeking praise from one''s superiors, flattery, obeying orders to the letter, etc.
Since punishment seems to be the general medicine for adult misbehavior and the world never seems to rid itself of crime I wonder if second thoughts on punishment in general might be effective. The concept that a certain amount of time in prison becomes an education seems to me a rather over simple solution to complex misbehavior besides being a rather expensive procedure. Nevertheless I cannot offer a simple solution since people differ in multitudinous ways and what works for one person is ineffective for others. What is probably needed is intensive psychological examination and corrective procedure and this is way beyond the financial and scientific capabilities of current civilization.
FM - thanks for commenting. Negative reinforcement is a tool for teaching but how much more powerful is positive reinforcement -- in a perfect world. But the more we are all mindful of what is healthy for kids and working at empathy will make a difference.
Stress makes people narcissistic and we sure are living in stressful times and this collective stress-induced narcissism of the adult world impacts negatively the worlds of the children.
jonathan, thanks. yes. simple and straightforward and empathetic.
designanator -- thanks for commenting once again! I too was surprised that once again our supposedly exceptional and civilized country falls short with this compared to other countries we automatically can feel superior to.
Years and years ago in NYC I once witnessed a suddenly enraged twenty-something male at the next table from me SLUG a 4 year old boy in the face in a crowded noon-time Burger King. It was teeming with people, especially a large group of construction workers. Everyone gasped and froze for a minute or so. Then resumed their activities. The other person at the table with the child and man was an older woman, maybe a grandmother. She did nothing to protect the child or comfort the child after. The child did not cry but was obviously frozen with terror.
I ran out onto the sidewalk and got a cop and explained what had happened and offered myself as a witness for the abuse. The cop came in and talked to the man, older woman and child. It turned out I heard from a social worker who called me that afternoon that the little boy was out with his mother's boyfriend and his mother. I had a series of phone calls from social workers over the next year or so asking me about what I witnessed and to reconfirm or retract it. I just repeated what I had witnessed. It had been a SLUG not a slap or a hit. I wondered what happened especially in the future of the little boy.
On another day and maybe with a less dramatic degree of abuse I may have let a serious incident ride, too. There have been instances where I wish I had said something or done something. Even to just comment when I saw something inappropriate coming out of a parent, and I know that kids can be downright exasperating and enraging. But in some of those occasions, maybe though I couldn't have changed the parent's consciousness and would have risked their anger coming at me, I could have testified to the child that the abuse coming at him or her wasn't right and that his parent was jumping the shark in terms of decency and appropriateness. Helped his or her evolving self-esteem at a critical (in both senses of the word) moment.
I know kids can be a serious handful, and I don't have kids but I have taught them and worked with them a good part of my life and I have watched myself morph into a crazed bully trying to assert control, though have never touched anyone in that state but regretted angry words that poured out of my frustrated mouth. Other times I have been too passive and helpless around disrespectful kids and should have asserted more forcefully on my own behalf. One can be firm and assertive without resorting to inappropriate verbal or physical aggressiveness. That's easier said than done.
I remember in college I did some tutoring in a Catholic school near the college. One day after hours I was walking down the corridor and heard a woman's voice blasting someone. Attacking their self-esteem mercilessly and stridently. I was stunned at the cruelty. When I peaked into the room I saw it was a nun shrieking at what looked like a first grade boy. I was astonished. I had visualized a much older person being addressed from the level of verbal sophistication in the vicious criticism. And no, I did not speak out. The fact that it was a nun and I was young factored into that failed moment. Shows the extra protection that religious authoritarian role models have in acting out against children and not being called out for it.
best, libby
Stress makes people narcissistic and we sure are living in stressful times and this collective stress-induced narcissism of the adult world impacts negatively the worlds of the children.
jonathan, thanks. yes. simple and straightforward and empathetic.
designanator -- thanks for commenting once again! I too was surprised that once again our supposedly exceptional and civilized country falls short with this compared to other countries we automatically can feel superior to.
Years and years ago in NYC I once witnessed a suddenly enraged twenty-something male at the next table from me SLUG a 4 year old boy in the face in a crowded noon-time Burger King. It was teeming with people, especially a large group of construction workers. Everyone gasped and froze for a minute or so. Then resumed their activities. The other person at the table with the child and man was an older woman, maybe a grandmother. She did nothing to protect the child or comfort the child after. The child did not cry but was obviously frozen with terror.
I ran out onto the sidewalk and got a cop and explained what had happened and offered myself as a witness for the abuse. The cop came in and talked to the man, older woman and child. It turned out I heard from a social worker who called me that afternoon that the little boy was out with his mother's boyfriend and his mother. I had a series of phone calls from social workers over the next year or so asking me about what I witnessed and to reconfirm or retract it. I just repeated what I had witnessed. It had been a SLUG not a slap or a hit. I wondered what happened especially in the future of the little boy.
On another day and maybe with a less dramatic degree of abuse I may have let a serious incident ride, too. There have been instances where I wish I had said something or done something. Even to just comment when I saw something inappropriate coming out of a parent, and I know that kids can be downright exasperating and enraging. But in some of those occasions, maybe though I couldn't have changed the parent's consciousness and would have risked their anger coming at me, I could have testified to the child that the abuse coming at him or her wasn't right and that his parent was jumping the shark in terms of decency and appropriateness. Helped his or her evolving self-esteem at a critical (in both senses of the word) moment.
I know kids can be a serious handful, and I don't have kids but I have taught them and worked with them a good part of my life and I have watched myself morph into a crazed bully trying to assert control, though have never touched anyone in that state but regretted angry words that poured out of my frustrated mouth. Other times I have been too passive and helpless around disrespectful kids and should have asserted more forcefully on my own behalf. One can be firm and assertive without resorting to inappropriate verbal or physical aggressiveness. That's easier said than done.
I remember in college I did some tutoring in a Catholic school near the college. One day after hours I was walking down the corridor and heard a woman's voice blasting someone. Attacking their self-esteem mercilessly and stridently. I was stunned at the cruelty. When I peaked into the room I saw it was a nun shrieking at what looked like a first grade boy. I was astonished. I had visualized a much older person being addressed from the level of verbal sophistication in the vicious criticism. And no, I did not speak out. The fact that it was a nun and I was young factored into that failed moment. Shows the extra protection that religious authoritarian role models have in acting out against children and not being called out for it.
best, libby
sky, what an absolutely brilliant and beautiful comment!!! I particularly appreciate this passage you write:
"No matter what wrong has been done by any person, adult or child, it cannot be corrected by initiating another harm to someone, the person who did the first wrong or anyone else (parents, guardians, society, etc.). Two wrongs don't make a right and we adults KNOW that this old adage is true."
Thanks so much!
best, libby
"No matter what wrong has been done by any person, adult or child, it cannot be corrected by initiating another harm to someone, the person who did the first wrong or anyone else (parents, guardians, society, etc.). Two wrongs don't make a right and we adults KNOW that this old adage is true."
Thanks so much!
best, libby
Lyle! Well said!! Thanks!!!
Joe -- thanks for your comment. It is good this is in the news, but when I hear people defending spanking it makes me cringe. Spanking is violent and humiliating and cruel and TRAUMATIZING. And can you imagine the shock when it is done to a trusting little ones, toddlers getting ambushed by an angry adult Mr. or Mrs. Hyde? And granted primal urges from toddlers test patience for sure and they need to learn boundaries but TRAUMATIZING them is not the way to go. "Spare the rod and spoil the child" should be totally retired. What was the old "rule of thumb" adage, where a man couldn't beat a wife or child with a switch larger than a thumb? Something like that.
From 85% to 65% is disappointing to hear, but it is going in the right direction. Alice Miller has written extensively about "poisonous pedagogy" when it comes to crushing the spirit of children -- even of a particular generation in a particular authoritarian culture. She addresses the German nation that allowed Naziism into being. Over-controlling of human beings. "Thou Shalt Not Be Aware" addresses how important it is for adult children to not idealize parents too much and bury the toxic stuff they did otherwise then will the adult children repeat what their parents did using their authority and sense of righteousness to be inappropriate as well.
Eric Berne has written about the "pig parent" ego state that poses as a parent voice but is really the primitive child exploiting the posturing of a parent-adult voice and manipulatively childish at bottom. Some of our political leaders stay locked in a "pig parent" role popping off like an authority but being childish and irrationally immature. I consider John McCain slipping into this role for one.
We really need a paradigm shift from the patriarchal (which doesn't just mean men acting patriarchically) to a humanist one in terms of parenting and teaching.
best, libby
Joe -- thanks for your comment. It is good this is in the news, but when I hear people defending spanking it makes me cringe. Spanking is violent and humiliating and cruel and TRAUMATIZING. And can you imagine the shock when it is done to a trusting little ones, toddlers getting ambushed by an angry adult Mr. or Mrs. Hyde? And granted primal urges from toddlers test patience for sure and they need to learn boundaries but TRAUMATIZING them is not the way to go. "Spare the rod and spoil the child" should be totally retired. What was the old "rule of thumb" adage, where a man couldn't beat a wife or child with a switch larger than a thumb? Something like that.
From 85% to 65% is disappointing to hear, but it is going in the right direction. Alice Miller has written extensively about "poisonous pedagogy" when it comes to crushing the spirit of children -- even of a particular generation in a particular authoritarian culture. She addresses the German nation that allowed Naziism into being. Over-controlling of human beings. "Thou Shalt Not Be Aware" addresses how important it is for adult children to not idealize parents too much and bury the toxic stuff they did otherwise then will the adult children repeat what their parents did using their authority and sense of righteousness to be inappropriate as well.
Eric Berne has written about the "pig parent" ego state that poses as a parent voice but is really the primitive child exploiting the posturing of a parent-adult voice and manipulatively childish at bottom. Some of our political leaders stay locked in a "pig parent" role popping off like an authority but being childish and irrationally immature. I consider John McCain slipping into this role for one.
We really need a paradigm shift from the patriarchal (which doesn't just mean men acting patriarchically) to a humanist one in terms of parenting and teaching.
best, libby
jmac, thanks for commenting. I wasn't brave enough to include my own story in the above blog like Tom C. was willing to do which I seriously respect.
I was seeking out a website that was much more heavy handed in negative statistics about what spanking does to kids but when I came across this one I felt it was more positive and comprehensive and decided to focus my blog on it instead.
The reasons Hunt puts out I consider are precious warnings and important commentaries. Yes generalizations but not applicable to all. Sometimes abuse desensitizes people, with others it sensitizes them! Children become psychically wounded from repeated ambushes of dysfunctional parenting. When my father drank that made him all the more physically threatening in that state. I remember being girded in fear and avoiding him at all costs when he was drunk. Even if he didn't strike out physically (he sure did verbally), the sustained fear of the physical violence was traumatic in itself added to the verbal violence and malice.
My mother would not hit, but after thinking back I remember a period where my mother used to threaten us kids with my father hitting us with "the belt" later. It was pretty abusive of her, using him and the image of "the belt" to control us as well as behind his back negatively impacting our relationship with him and feeling threatened by him when she was the real threatener. I suspect the "belt" was in her history and probably around in the 50's. Wait until your father gets home threats!!! The father factor granted would have extra clout.
I think it is important for all of us who suffered through parents who had been victims themselves of not burying the reality of dysfunctional conditioning but facing it and understanding it and championing ourselves for surviving it. They say if you don't pass it back, you pass it on.
I think the egos of parents sometimes need too much control of their children, too much of a performance from their children to make their own egos receive respect from others and that can invade and sabotage a child's physical, emotional and spiritual boundaries and autonomy.
Temperament and personality and character has a lot to do with who we are. The nature vs. nurture considerations. But toxic nurture can be merciless on a human spirit. I also think that wounding in childhood can produce extra empathetic and extraordinarily human and courageous human beings. What is that expression, about being strongest in the broken places? Recovery is important. Our destinies being what they are. Some of us have to climb up from way below sea level but the view can be spectacular considering from where we have come compared to others who did not have the same steep and far climb!
best, libby
I was seeking out a website that was much more heavy handed in negative statistics about what spanking does to kids but when I came across this one I felt it was more positive and comprehensive and decided to focus my blog on it instead.
The reasons Hunt puts out I consider are precious warnings and important commentaries. Yes generalizations but not applicable to all. Sometimes abuse desensitizes people, with others it sensitizes them! Children become psychically wounded from repeated ambushes of dysfunctional parenting. When my father drank that made him all the more physically threatening in that state. I remember being girded in fear and avoiding him at all costs when he was drunk. Even if he didn't strike out physically (he sure did verbally), the sustained fear of the physical violence was traumatic in itself added to the verbal violence and malice.
My mother would not hit, but after thinking back I remember a period where my mother used to threaten us kids with my father hitting us with "the belt" later. It was pretty abusive of her, using him and the image of "the belt" to control us as well as behind his back negatively impacting our relationship with him and feeling threatened by him when she was the real threatener. I suspect the "belt" was in her history and probably around in the 50's. Wait until your father gets home threats!!! The father factor granted would have extra clout.
I think it is important for all of us who suffered through parents who had been victims themselves of not burying the reality of dysfunctional conditioning but facing it and understanding it and championing ourselves for surviving it. They say if you don't pass it back, you pass it on.
I think the egos of parents sometimes need too much control of their children, too much of a performance from their children to make their own egos receive respect from others and that can invade and sabotage a child's physical, emotional and spiritual boundaries and autonomy.
Temperament and personality and character has a lot to do with who we are. The nature vs. nurture considerations. But toxic nurture can be merciless on a human spirit. I also think that wounding in childhood can produce extra empathetic and extraordinarily human and courageous human beings. What is that expression, about being strongest in the broken places? Recovery is important. Our destinies being what they are. Some of us have to climb up from way below sea level but the view can be spectacular considering from where we have come compared to others who did not have the same steep and far climb!
best, libby
abra, thanks for your always thoughtful comment. i am glad for you that spanking did not feel like it produced any lasting trauma. I see there is progress in a lessening of corporal punishment from my parents' generation to my generation to the younger generation. Fathers are more involved in day to day parenting more often i think now than in the 50s. That is a good thing. I am glad the subject came up, though I hate to hear the reinforcers of spanking coming out publicly and proudly. To me it shows someone in denial who is over-idealizing parent's toxic behavior and excusing his or her own.
best, libby
best, libby
Stuart, your comment resonates some of sky's messaging above. I agree. Punishment not effective for change. At least not positive change.
I considered rewarding good behavior as part of Hunt's advice to issue love and respect to children. As Aretha sang R-E-S-P-E-C-T. I also like the words love and respect more than "approval" because I think when an adult has a respectful curiosity about a child and their unique thoughts and feelings and does not over focus on wanting them to be cookie cutter good children that displays unconditional love rather than conditional love.
I remember reading a great story from Bruno Bettelheim, maybe in the book The Good Enough Mother how a mother tracked down the famous man to ask his advice about her young boy. The boy was suddenly having toilet training issues. When the mother finally showed up for her appointment with Bettelheim and explained the problem and begged him to tell her why it was happening, Bettelheim asked, "What does the child say?" The mother was stunned. What did he mean? She apparently hadn't bothered asking the child, though the child could talk. Bettelheim asked the child why he was fighting being toilet trained and the child gave a long story about how he had been helping the cat with its toilet training and dropped it into the toilet bowl to the trauma of both child and cat. The child's disclosure made it possible to reason with him and repair the problem. But the mother had not bothered asking or expecting sense from the child. Bettelheim saw a problem with the mother. NOT the child with this!
best, libby
I considered rewarding good behavior as part of Hunt's advice to issue love and respect to children. As Aretha sang R-E-S-P-E-C-T. I also like the words love and respect more than "approval" because I think when an adult has a respectful curiosity about a child and their unique thoughts and feelings and does not over focus on wanting them to be cookie cutter good children that displays unconditional love rather than conditional love.
I remember reading a great story from Bruno Bettelheim, maybe in the book The Good Enough Mother how a mother tracked down the famous man to ask his advice about her young boy. The boy was suddenly having toilet training issues. When the mother finally showed up for her appointment with Bettelheim and explained the problem and begged him to tell her why it was happening, Bettelheim asked, "What does the child say?" The mother was stunned. What did he mean? She apparently hadn't bothered asking the child, though the child could talk. Bettelheim asked the child why he was fighting being toilet trained and the child gave a long story about how he had been helping the cat with its toilet training and dropped it into the toilet bowl to the trauma of both child and cat. The child's disclosure made it possible to reason with him and repair the problem. But the mother had not bothered asking or expecting sense from the child. Bettelheim saw a problem with the mother. NOT the child with this!
best, libby
jan, always wise words. and pragmatic ones. yes, turning around long term traumatizing and negative conditioning requires time and effort and attention and empathy and funding. the nightmare conditions of America's justice system, the prison system needs so much restructuring and investment of creative and empathetic thought and funding, like the American school system. Instead we have the privatizers and profiteers sabotaging these systems all the more.
best, libby
best, libby
You cover so much ground, Libby, and i agree with almsot all of it. In pracitce, the difficulty often comes when there isn't a storng foundation of love and respect, a healthy relationship between parent and child and the parent can't or won't realize it and doesn't want to hear that the quality ofheir relationship needs to change. Often they are only open to being given some simple "tricks" and "techniques" for discipline. Convincing them otherwise is sometimes a long and difficult. {R&R}
I don't believe most parents have the proper emotional toolkit to deal with every form of acting out a child can dream up. We are all just human. But raising the level of self-awareness and closing the emotional feedback loop for everyone should be a social goal. And the best method of doing so is experiencing emotional consequence. Both negative and positive. Becoming mindful doesn't mean humanity has to use a form of retribution or punishment for every single miscue as seemingly happens today. Every single act is punished either emotionally or physically through incarceration or the violent threat of it. Community can never be achieved without forgiveness. It is a central tenet to our ability to connect to each other. Punishment and retribution is self-defeating unless we are talking about people unable to practice mindfulness such as sociopaths. We should seek to learn through emotional growth and the help of others who may be further upon that path. Nhat Hanh has proven through even the most violent people, including prison inmates, that mindfulness and nonviolence can be taught to literally anyone.
In some way, shape or form, children need to learn consequence for their emotions and resultant behaviors too. And do so through constructive feedback. But only when they are actually at a developmental age to understand what exactly that means. In other words, can actually start to practice mindfulness. That is well later than the age that dysfunctional parents start hitting or emotionally-abusing their kids. Can you imagine having a conversation about mindfulness with a four year old? They aren't developmentally-able to even grasp that concept.
Hitting kids simply does not work. Hitting adults does not work. Violence does not work, period. I know many people will disagree with that statement but it doesn't. Now, I appreciate the practicality of simply defending oneself from violence. But, even that defense against violence creates instability in our own existence. Even defending oneself against violence destroys our psyche. But we can talk all we want about violence. People need to develop emotional tools and coping skills they may have never learned as a kid. And, do so before they have their own kids. It is society's responsibility to each other and to community to accomplish this on behalf of everyone.
That will never, ever happen in this socioeconomic system. Because the survival of this system is predicated exclusively on violence. In a system of competition for resources, money, jobs, food, etc, everyone in the system is either an exploiter or the exploited. Humanity is devolving emotionally under the modern state's corporate and political control structures. And that itself is playing a major role in all forms of violence.
In some way, shape or form, children need to learn consequence for their emotions and resultant behaviors too. And do so through constructive feedback. But only when they are actually at a developmental age to understand what exactly that means. In other words, can actually start to practice mindfulness. That is well later than the age that dysfunctional parents start hitting or emotionally-abusing their kids. Can you imagine having a conversation about mindfulness with a four year old? They aren't developmentally-able to even grasp that concept.
Hitting kids simply does not work. Hitting adults does not work. Violence does not work, period. I know many people will disagree with that statement but it doesn't. Now, I appreciate the practicality of simply defending oneself from violence. But, even that defense against violence creates instability in our own existence. Even defending oneself against violence destroys our psyche. But we can talk all we want about violence. People need to develop emotional tools and coping skills they may have never learned as a kid. And, do so before they have their own kids. It is society's responsibility to each other and to community to accomplish this on behalf of everyone.
That will never, ever happen in this socioeconomic system. Because the survival of this system is predicated exclusively on violence. In a system of competition for resources, money, jobs, food, etc, everyone in the system is either an exploiter or the exploited. Humanity is devolving emotionally under the modern state's corporate and political control structures. And that itself is playing a major role in all forms of violence.
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