Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site kontron.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!decwrl!amdcad!amd!pesnta!pyramid!nsc!voder!kontron!cramer From: cramer@kontron.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) Newsgroups: net.kids Subject: Spanking Message-ID: <559@kontron.UUCP> Date: Sun, 2-Mar-86 19:05:52 EST Article-I.D.: kontron.559 Posted: Sun Mar 2 19:05:52 1986 Date-Received: Tue, 4-Mar-86 04:27:29 EST Distribution: net Organization: Kontron Electronics, Irvine, CA Lines: 89 Aw, what the heck! Everyone else is giving advice on good parenting. I'll do my best to give you reason to question my sanity! As I was growing up, I was spanked. Infrequently. I can't think of more than five or six times that I can remember being spanked by my parents. It was almost always done by my father (probably a good thing, since he was the calmest person I've ever met), and was just about always done because of some willful action that was utterly without good reason and was stupid. As an example, I had an argument with my mother about something when I was around 8. (The last time I was ever spanked.) The original argument I don't remember, and I think it must have been pretty inconsequential. I went into the bathroom and proceeded to unroll an entire roll of toilet paper onto the floor -- greatly reducing its usefulness. (We were not a wealthy family, by any means, and I'm sure they were upset at the waste of the paper more than the defiance.) My father spanked me with his hand, against my bare bottom, about five or six times. It hurt. A lot. And I learned that this sort of utter waste to express my anger was NOT acceptable under any circumstances. My wife was brought up in a somewhat more traditional home. She was spanked A LOT. Her father lost his temper, and engaged in punishments that seem to me to be extreme -- but not child abuse. Unfortunately, my wife was being punished for the actions of her older brother who had terrorized her into taking blame for his mindless destruction of the house they lived in. When my wife was pregnant, the two of us talked a lot about punishment and how it should be done. I argued this way: Until a child is capable of some emotional maturity and reasoning, a spanking may be the only way to make them not do something which endangers them or others. Therefore, spanking can be appropriate for some situtations. If a child gets to be 10 years old, and you still have to spank them, you've made a serious mistake somewhere earlier on. A child should not be required to agree with every decision. A child should be allowed to argue the validity of a decision, and if they can demonstrate that they are right, the parent should back down. (As my parents did, frequently.) My wife had what seemed to me to be a rather Neanderthal approach to the subject. It was close to a, "spank 'em hard and spank 'em long" attitude. Now that our daughter is two, and trying to assert her independence, we actually have to involve ourselves in the process of teaching her how to behave. We spank her for the following things: 1. Behavior which she has repeatedly been told is inappropriate. (Example: writing in books that are "Mommy's" or "Daddy's".) 2. Life or limb threatening actions. (She frequently insists that she is quite capable of crossing streets and parking lots without us holding her hand, and thirty feet away from us. She gets spanked. I know, many of you think that shows a lack of love.) We want her to make it to an age where we can rationally communicate with her. It is true that when we are in a parking lot we can carry her, without spanking her. But sometime we may be inattentive for whatever reason -- we can't watch her all the time, she has to learn, by whatever means are necessary, that she can't do some dangerous things. (This also includes the time she started playing with a paperclip and an electric outlet, and the time she crawled into our refrigerator while moving and closed the door behind her.) 3. Direct defiance of an order. The reason for this is that, while at some point I expect her to be able to reason things out for herself, and debate an issue, if I DO give an order, it is likely to be something in the life-and-limb category. My wife hates to hear Hilary cry. As a result, she has a hard time spanking her. I don't have a problem spanking my daughter because, why it really rips me up to hear her cry, I know that our administration of spanking is fair, reasonable, and designed to assist her in becoming a self-disciplined and ALIVE adult. I have a sister who never spanked the kids. She and her husband lived in Berkeley. The kids wrote on the walls because my sister and brother-in-law didn't want to stifle their creativity. The oldest became a serious drug (cocaine) problem briefly at 11 (hey, this is Berkeley), and all of them were the most unpleasant, impolite, rude, and selfish little brats you can imagine. I am happy to report that my sister has overcome her attitudes about spanking, and they are fast approaching civilized behavior for kids their age.