Originally posted by karoly aczel
I pause to consider parenting everyday. In fact, my kid is having a "bad hair day" as we speak. I've been talking him through the various scenarios of chucking a tantrum all morning.
No need for hitting though.
It does not surprise me that a 'one size fits all' spiritualist like yourself endorses a 'one size fits all' method for parenting.

Maybe i y, I'm out of this one. I'd rather do more parenting than go over this back and forth.

Maybe it's people that have a problem with their own violent tendencies that are outraged to hear of other parents using a so-called violent technique succesfully.

Seriously? Yeah, that must be it.

Originally posted by wolfgang59
There's a lot of talk of "spanking", "swatting" and "tapping".

Lets get it clear here: we are talking about [b]hitting a child.

A defenceless child.
A child, regardless of what they have done, who has rights.

Its mind-boggling that we have put corporal punishment for adults behind us but still debate its use for children.

Sickening.[/b]

Sickening indeed.

Originally posted by bbarr
Your first cited article defines corporal punishment as "the use of physical force with the intention of causing a child to experience pain but not injury...". So, already the study is irrelevant to the case I explicitly raised above. Swats on the butt aren't painful; they're surprising, attention-grabbing and indicative of parental seriousness. I do not adv ...[text shortened]... oral punishment.

Edit 2: The third cited article uses the same definition as the first.

I assume from all you have said you do not advocate the use of pain on children for any reason. I do not question your good intentions as a parent. But I question our ability to judge the psychological effects of "swats on the backside." Maybe I was just lucky that my decision not to use CP with my daughter was not the wrong decision. But I would recommend that parents educate themselves on alternatives.

Originally posted by JS357
I assume from all you have said you do not advocate the use of pain on children for any reason. I do not question your good intentions as a parent. But I question our ability to judge the psychological effects of "swats on the backside." Maybe I was just lucky that my decision not to use CP with my daughter was not the wrong decision. But I would recommend that parents educate themselves on alternatives.

I would bet that there are some that claim to be against corporal and capital punishment that are all for abortion.

Originally posted by RJHinds
I would bet that there are some that claim to be against corporal and capital punishment that are all for abortion.

I am sure there are some rape victims who agree with you in the situation they are in. So You would win that bet.

Originally posted by JS357
I am sure there are some rape victims who agree with you in the situation they are in. So You would win that bet.

Thanks for conceding that one. 😏

Originally posted by bbarr
Yeah, that's a really bad argument. You first equate swatting with hitting, because you want to exploit the emotional connotation of 'hitting', then conclude this is a violation of the rights of children. But my claim concerns swatting, which I'm claiming is only justifiable when it inflicts no pain. So your exploitative equation with hitting is misguided he ...[text shortened]... h is in question, you don't get to just stipulate that it's a violation of rights. Sorry!

So what is "swatting"? (We are debating corporal punishment.)

Is it OK for you to swat an adult?

How does a swat work?

Originally posted by wolfgang59
So what is "swatting"? (We are debating corporal punishment.)

Is it OK for you to swat an adult?

How does a swat work?

Swatting is intended to kill a fly, but only to get the child's attention. 😏

Originally posted by ThinkOfOne
Seriously? I'm not at all interested in getting bogged down in semantics.

I think you probably know what I was getting at, but if you object to the word 'violence', I'll use the term 'physical force'.

So, I'll reprhase:
[quote]From what I understand, more than a few parents have managed to successfully raise their children without having had to ev ...[text shortened]... to striking children.

But I think you probably know what I was getting at there too.

I am sure some parents have managed to get by fine with swatting, and others have gotten by fine without it. So what? That only supports your position if you presume that swatting is itself a worse practice than non-swatting when it comes to the very particular cases and circumstances I mentioned.. But that's exactly what you need to establish, not just assert.

I was not cavalier in claiming anything about causing pain to a child. On the contrary, my claim is that it is a necessary condition of swatting being justifiable that it cause no pain. My view is stringent, not cavalier. Unfortunately, I can't say the same about your egregiously bad analogy. Apparently you are cavalier about the basic standards of argumentation.

Originally posted by ThinkOfOne
You first equate swatting with hitting, because you want to exploit the emotional connotation of 'hitting'
C'mon. Why do you insist on trying to make a big deal out of word choice?

If someone wanted to do the same with you it'd be easy enough to do, since you keep using the word 'swat':
[quote] from google:
swat/swät/
Verb:
Hit or crush[ ven "swat" has inflicted "no pain"? Realistically how reliable is this determination?

I make a big deal out of word choice because you persist in presenting "arguments" that are are question-begging and based on the connotations of the words with which you're hysterically attempting to redescribe my view.

Oh, no! Epistemological worries! Give me a break.... I recommend swatting yourself repeatedly until you figure out how much force is sufficient for a painless yet pretty immediate call to attention. My grandmother seemed to have a pretty robust understanding of painless swatting.

Originally posted by bbarr
I make a big deal out of word choice because you persist in presenting "arguments" that are are question-begging and based on the connotations of the words with which you're hysterically attempting to redescribe my view.

Oh, no! Epistemological worries! Give me a break.... I recommend swatting yourself repeatedly until you figure out how much force is ...[text shortened]... attention. My grandmother seemed to have a pretty robust understanding of painless swatting.

All I had to do with my youngest child was raise my voice to get his attention. I don't recall ever having to spank him because he always obeyed me. That was not true of my other four children, especially the three other boys. I now believe the reason I did not have discipline troubles with my youngest son was because He was a genius.

Originally posted by JS357
I assume from all you have said you do not advocate the use of pain on children for any reason. I do not question your good intentions as a parent. But I question our ability to judge the psychological effects of "swats on the backside." Maybe I was just lucky that my decision not to use CP with my daughter was not the wrong decision. But I would recommend that parents educate themselves on alternatives.

Do you also question our ability to judge the psychological effects of other forms of discipline? What about expressions of anger or disappointment when a child misbehaves? Or what of the psychological effects of periodic enforced isolation due to room-sending? Or of the public shaming that comes with time-outs? You don't get to pick and choose, based on nothing other than untutored intuition, which forms of discipline are prima facie worrisome and which aren't. If you want scientific rigor, I'm all for it. But make sure you establish a baseline and study the relevant alternatives. From what I've read of the research on discipline in parenting, the definitions are sloppy, confounding variables are rarely controlled for, and conclusions have this strange tendency to concur with the pre-experimental views of the 'researchers'.

Originally posted by wolfgang59
So what is "swatting"? (We are debating corporal punishment.)

Is it OK for you to swat an adult?

How does a swat work?

Yes, we're debating corporal punishment. But just what qualifies as corporal punishment is tendentious. If you think it's a necessary condition for an act to qualify as corporal punishment that it causes pain without intent to harm, then I'm against it. If you think that painless but forceful impingements on children qualify as corporal punishment, then I think it can be justifiable.

Seriously? You don't know what it is to swat a child on the butt? You're playing dumb, right? I've said this a few times already in this thread. Amazingly, it is possible to swat a child on the butt in a manner that both causes no pain yet immediately garners the attention of that child and indicates to that child your seriousness about whatever issue instigated the swatting! In my much younger days, I was periodically directly acquainted with such swatting. I was never hurt, just startled enough to pay attention and quit with whatever stupid tantrum I was having (often due to having to be in a shopping center).

Obviously it is not OK to swat an adult. Similarly, it is not OK to force an adult into a timeout. Nor is it OK to force an adult to eat this or that meal, or go to school, or go to bed, or take a bath, or... There are different standards of treatment for autonomous adults than there are for dependent children. There are norms of respect and non-interference that constrain our behavior towards adults but not to our own children. Duh.

Originally posted by bbarr
Yes, we're debating corporal punishment. But just what qualifies as corporal punishment is tendentious. If you think it's a necessary condition for an act to qualify as corporal punishment that it causes pain without intent to harm, then I'm against it. If you think that painless but forceful impingements on children qualify as corporal punishment, then I th ...[text shortened]... interference that constrain our behavior towards adults but not to our own children. Duh.

"Swatting"is not a term I am familiar with in this context, I do not think it in common usage in UK or NZ.

I was asking for clarification and you start to get rude.

Maybe we are on the same side?

I know slapping a child is illegal in UK and now (2009?) in NZ.

Safe restraint is as far as I would go with a child ... or indeed an adult.

I would not ever force a child to eat a meal, go to bed or whatever, I believe children have the same rights as adults - perhaps greater rights - and we should all be mindful of that.

Originally posted by wolfgang59
There's a lot of talk of "spanking", "swatting" and "tapping".

Lets get it clear here: we are talking about [b]hitting a child.

A defenceless child.
A child, regardless of what they have done, who has rights.

Its mind-boggling that we have put corporal punishment for adults behind us but still debate its use for children.

Sickening.[/b]

I think you are being too extreme here.

If you think that a parent swatting a child's backside in a way that does not leave a mark in response to an immediate danger to their life is sickening, then you are being overly sensitive.

It may be illjudged or undesirable, but sickening?

ThinkofOnes attempts to try and equate all forms of violence as equally serious undermine his arguments and, when called out on this, he disingenuously pleads that it is only semantics.

Corporal punishment can cover everything from a mild slap on the wrist to thrashing with a birch. In the UK there was a case that resulted in the child's cracked ribs.

The latter is truly sickening, and it is not semantical to suggest that the arguments for or against one form of punishment may not be true for another or that the effects, short term or otherwise, may also not be the same.