The World We Live In...

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T2Bruno,

If you were caught stealing a person’s mobile phone, would you feel shame? I hope so; it is one of the things that keeps people honest. Protecting children from a certain amount of shame is to insulate them from reality, and then when they are no longer children they will not be prepared to handle it.

I am truly sorry that your father abused you. However, IME there is no need to swing that hard to produce a discomfort that together with the psychological impact of the spanking were sufficient to change behavior. I would also agree that at a certain age the discomfort and shame from a spanking does lose its effectiveness, and the only way to make it effective is to increase the level of force of the spanking to the point at which it becomes abuse, though I disagree that you can set a specific age on it, as it varies from child to child, and it is the parent's responsibility to determine when it is no longer effective. It is irresponsible and abusive of a parent to simply spank harder if they are no longer seeing results from a reasonable spanking. Again, this falls back to my toolbox analogy.

I was spanked until I was about 12, as that was when I got up and laughed at my mom after a spanking. My parents used my father’s belt on me, and I never once had any bodily fluids release (plasma or blood) from the result of a spanking. I remember having whelps once, but they were gone in a matter of minutes. I do not support the striking of any child on bare skin, for the reasons you describe.

I respect your choice to not use this method though, and as I stated to joacqin, I believe it is possible to raise respectable children to adulthood without it, but I do not believe that if properly used it is harmful, and that it is a good tool for preparing children who cannot be expected to understand the subtle forms of social consequences that adults face to be prepared for the consequences of their actions.

 

When I was pretty young (five or so), I remember my father punching my older half-brother (he was a teenager then). I only remember seeing it once, but it was a doozy: right-handed straight shot and my brother was on his back. Making the whole situation even worse, this happened outside, plain as day to any happenstance neighbor whom would have been attracted by the yelling and accompanying nonsense. My half-brother and I are not close (he was raping me during this period), so I do not know if this happened other times or just the once. The punch was not for the raping by the way...that sorryness did not get exorcised until much, much later... (hmm...I'm sorry if that seemed glib)

My dad never punched me; when I did something wrong I recieved other forms of punishment such as the "stop-that-we-are-in-public!" trapezius squeeze or the "be-quiet-back-there!" driving hairpull. When I did something especially wrong I recieved the belt. This was not done in a calm and collected manner. This was me being held aloft by my hair while I got whipped on the back, ass and thighs. Looking back, it was more scary than painful, but still quite traumatic none the less.

You know, I am still somewhat scared of my father to this day. I'm not physically intimidated by him; I just have a healthy respect for my father's complete willingness to abandon reason in favor of rage-born rightness. To my father, he who is angrier wins. This makes avoiding him the most reasonable way to be his son, and honestly, I think he prefers it that way.

I would not want to show any future child of mine that being angry makes me right.

On second thought, that seems impossible.

Oh, forget this!

.........

I have the scalpel and scissors, but does anyone know how to tie a knot one-handed?

[ July 28, 2005, 23:30: Message edited by: Late-Night Thinker ]

 

AGREED!

 

Sorry to hear about the phone mate - I can understand the frustration/anger and bewilderment. I'm a big bloke but I still wouldn't face down two teenages with a knife. Check the news recently - there seems to be an example of why you shouldn't every day.
Interesting to see how this thread got turned into one on discipline. I never really crossed the line as a teenager/kid because I had a healthy fear. A couple of times I got hit/smacked - it did'nt do me any harm - and I'm not a violent person to this day. As a young chap I could have easily gone the wrong way, many of my mates did - if I hadn't feared the outcome from my father - primarily (and most importantly) his disappointment and secondly any physical punishment that may be forthcoming.