Are you a bad parent if you decide to spank your child as a form of discipline?

Question

All other options have been exhausted, time outs didn't work, taking away priviliges didn't work, talking to them didn't work so what else is there to do? Spanking is not child abuse, it is a form of discipline, take the military for example. If a soldier is out of line, many times they punish him by making him do physical things, such as push ups. A spank is nothing more than push ups to a soldier, it is a form of discipline that is not abuse or mistreatment. This new generation of kids is growing to be disrespectful and destructive because parents don't take responsibility and the ones that do are acused of child abuse for a simple spank and have to live through an ordeal of having their children taken away. So what is the solution?

Answer 1

Why do we listen to "educators" "psychologist" and the like? Parents are who they are, have been for several 10-thousands of years. Children understand full well why a normally loving mommy is hopping mad. They see the crash coming. It is part of their normal growing up, a necessary test of wills.

Most will agree: abuse is REALLY bad. So this is not the subject. Some of my successful (and fondly remembered) kindergarten teachers and "educators" had no degrees, no formal education, and some had a short fuse. Other idiots on the other hand, who found it necessary to lecture/ interfere with the upbringing of our children and grandchildren, in the name of a Psychology Degree, were just that "idiots".

I believe that 90% of parents know exactly how to effectively 'discipline' a pest. And 95% really do love their children. So, leave normal parents alone, let them do what they do, what their parents, grand parents, and ancestors have done for centuries.

Who is so conceited to believe the world has found a fundamentally NEW, in fact the ONLY way to bring up a small child? This, somewhere around 1968, at Harvard and UC Berkeley.

Answer 2

Not necessarily, as long as it is NEVER EVER meted out when angry. My 10 year old son has only been spanked about 5 times in his life, and those were after there was a series of events, consequences, leading up to the spanking.

Don't threaten to spank, or any other form of punishment, and then not follow through.

When my son broke a serious safety or respect rule, he was given the opportunity to explain himself, had to write a note to illustrate that he understood what he did. Then he was given a warning, if it happened again then this privelege would be taken away for this amount of time. If it happened after that next punishment, he would be spanked.

Spankings are then handled as a HUGE event, with him having to come into the living room, getting a swat on the bare bottom. The build up to the actual spanking is worse than the hit itself; he knows we will not spank except in very few circumstances and he avoids them nearly always (it has been 2 years since the last occurence). At 10, I think we are beyond spanking so we will take away team sports events instead. But the spanking is an effective tool if used very sparingly and only when fairly forewarned.

And ALWAYS follow a spank with a hug and a brief talk about how you love him/her and don't want to spank again, repeat the rule broken and have him/her promise to not break that rule again.

Answer 3

Spanking isn't discipline; it's what parents resort to instead of discipline.

You don't give any details, so it's impossible to make suggestions.

What do you mean time-outs didn't work. Are you saying you tried them for one day? Often it takes months.

What are you giving them for?

How old are the kids?

What, exactly, happened?

I'm not saying a parent who spanks is a necessarily a bad parent -- though I am convinced that spanking is not a solution.

"The way to deal with someone who won't do what you want is to hit them." is just not a good message.

Kids who get spanked don't suddenly change their personalities and characters.

As I say, it's hard to know what to suggest in the complete absence of relevant details.

Perhaps you could talk to an expert in child-rearing who could advise you. There may be things going on you don't understand that you'd deal with differently.

If you went into the other methods expecting them to not work, waiting for justification to spank, well, that's why they didn't work.

Maybe your expectations are too high. Or maybe you're expecting them to learn each thing after a few punishments -- a lot of things take repeating the lesson over and over before it sticks.

Maybe you're setting an example of disrespectfullness that your children are dutifully learning from you.

(Are you disrespectful to your children? I don't mean do you bow and scrape, but rudeness toward them teaches them rudeness. Are you modeling civility? Do you insult them?)

Do you lose your temper? That's less effective than calming yourself before dealing with misbehavior.

Maybe one of your children has a problem of some kind.

Impossible to say.

It might simply be they are at ages when they keep testing borders and just need more of the same you've been giving them until they get the idea you're not budging.

Maybe there's something going on in their lives that makes them act out.

But I used to hear parents say they spanked and spanked and spanked and it never worked.

A lot of kids just get used to it and continue misbehaving, even escalating their misbehaviors out of revenge.

It's not a magic bullet.

Suppose it doesn't work. What will you resort to then?

Answer 4

I am from a very traditional African family so spanking was the way I was disciplined. I never got hurt by my parents neither did I feel mistreated in any way. It was as simple as I do something stupid and I get punished for it. Later, my mother tried all sorts of other punishments e.g. time-outs and withholding allowances and no tv for my younger brothers but nothing ever worked as well as a good old-fashioned spanking and in the end she always went back to it. I feel I am a better person for it, especially because I am the hard-headed kind. I don't hate or resent my mother for spanking me, in fact, it makes me love her even more that she moulded my character from an early age and that she did what she had to do to make me the responsible person I am today. So don't feel bad for doing it, but at the same time, know when enough spanking is enough, you don't want to go overboard into the cruel and unusual punishment territory and some things don't warrant a complete spanking, just a good pinch of the ears or cheeks. And never hit the child's head. But I think you are a great parent if you discipline your child and not let them run wild like the mollycoddled kids of these days.

BTW, I turned out ok, I am in an Ivy League school and I speak 9 languages and I never ever lie. And I love my mommy :-)

Answer 5

My kid gets spanked as a last resort. If putting him in time out doesn't work and telling him no, he gets a spank and he surely stops what ever it is that he is doing. You are talking about spanking, not beating and I think that society is taking it a little far. I completely agree with the new generation growing up disrespectful. But this generation is also having a more breakdown of the typical family which I also believe is really important. I do get scared after I spank my kid in public that someone is going to report me and take him away.

Answer 6

You sound like you've already made up your mind on the issue, but I do not think spanking (done properly) is child abuse. I have heard the argument that spanking doesn't work because you have to spank more and more. In my case it was EXACTLY the opposite. I spanked a couple of times when my daughter was little and was CONSISTENT about it (not just spanking her when I got mad - but using it as a last resort punishment in a series of steps). She hasn't had to be spanked in years and years and is a very well-behaved young lady. Good luck (and BE CONSISTENT!) :)

Answer 7

Honestly I don't know either. I agree with you 100 percent. I do believe in spanking a child, not beating but spanking. AND YES...THERE IS A DIFFERENCE. I know there are going to be many comments from those out there ridiculing this method of punishment, but it does work. When I was a child I didn't back talk, I wasn't disrespectful, and I did well in school. Now, all people have are excuses with NO consequences for their child's actions. Children learn this, after all if they know they can get away with something they will continue to do it. And what happens as they grow up...with no consequence their behavior becomes more and more severe. All these people THINK that they do know is that spanking is bad, but they have no alternative that actually works. Years ago when it was acceptable we didn't have near as many problems out of children that we have today.

Answer 8

I dont think spanking is wrong as long as you only do it with your hand and dont do it hard enough to leave a bruise or a mark. And I only use spanking as a last resort. I've only spanked my child a couple times because it was the only thing that would get through to her in those few occasions. Sometimes spanking is necessary for your child to get the message that what they're doing is wrong or dangerous.

Answer 9

NO YOU ARE A BAD PARENT IF YOU DECIDE NOT TO (in my opinion) spanking is a very thin line legally. the police say it is legal but DCS says it is child abuse you need to be very careful treading that line. I believe spanking is a necessary evil to properly raise a child into a responsible productive member of society. if you choose to spank always remember on the bottom only and no more than 3 swats with your hand oh and don't hit while you are angry ( these are all dcs rules where i live)

Answer 10

In my opinion spanking is okay in moderation. Don't increase the amount of spankings the more it doesn't work. Also never spank with anything that can't feel pain. If you use your hand to spank then you can tell when there has been too much, if you use a paddle or belt you never know because you can't feel it. My mother used to beat the hell out of me because she refused to "hurt her hand." Use spanking just as it is... a punishment. Don't use it to HURT your child. That is where I see a difference between punishment and abuse.

Depending on how old your child is, you could also try the military aproach. My stepdad used to make me do push ups and leg lifts instead of spanking me. It worked for me!