Corporal punishment of children
Spanking: All points of view
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Note:
The Dr. Phil Show for Friday, May 16th will be on the topic: "Spanking
Scandals." Check local listings for time and channel.
The show will make the case for legislative change about corporal
punishment in schools. Currently 21 states allow educators to corporally
punish students, e.g., hit them on the buttocks with a wooden paddle.
Project Nospank believes that "No child should attend school where
physical abuse is acceptable. No child should be exposed to such a
wrong-headed example of 'problem solving' -- not from teachers, not from
parents. Unfortunately, this is still largely the American way. Please alert
friends, family and colleagues to the Dr. Phil Show, Friday, May 16th. Also,
leave your words of wisdom on Dr. Phil's message board at
www.drphil.com/.
Since 1995 when this website was founded, spanking has become a
high-profile controversy in North America.
Conservatives Protestants have become the main supporters of corporal
punishment of children, probably because of their belief in the
inerrancy of the Bible, and the frequent
advocacy in the book of Proverbs of spanking as the preferred method to discipline children. Many feel that abandoning spanking will leave their children undisciplined and lead to increased lawlessness and violence in society as those children reach adulthood.
Most child psychologists, religious liberals, secularists, and others now oppose spanking.
Children are probably not too keen on it either. From their reactions, it is
obvious that they regard spanking as a terrorist act.
The trend in North American culture seems to be to abandon spanking in favor of other methods of child discipline,
except among the conservative Protestant community.
Studied conducted over many decades have shown that even a minor amount off
spanking increases the likelihood of children growing up into adults with
problems of alcoholism, drug abuse, anxiety and depression.
The use of the word "spanking" to refer to the discipline of children appears to be largely a North American term.
In Britain, it is generally called "smacking; the word "spanking"
often has sexual overtones.
Status of corporal punishment:
Corporal punishment in schools was/is:
Banned in Taiwan in 2006-DEC. This became became the 109th country to ban
all school corporal punishment.
Banned in all 175 Catholic Diocesan School
Systems in the U.S., according to a survey by the National
Coalition to Abolish Corporal Punishment in Schools.
Banned in 28 states of the U.S.
Is legal in Utah with the permission of a parent or guardian. However.
it is not widely practiced in the state. Most school
districts there have a formal ban in place.
Still permitted in some public and private schools in the U.S.
Becoming more popular in Kentucky.
Spanking generally is:
About to be banned in South Africa. The government passed the Children's
Amendment Bill in 2007-JUN over the opposition of some conservative
religious groups. If signed into law, it would remove parents right to use the
defence of "reasonable chastisement" in court.
Promoted
by many conservative Protestant leaders and organizations.
Opposed by the American Academy of Pediatrics and many other professional
associations.
Prone to being escalated to a lethal level. The Department of Health and Human Services and the New England Journal of Medicine estimate that 1,000 to 2,000
children die every year in the U.S. from corporal punishment that has gotten out
of control. They estimate that 142,000 are
seriously injured annually. 1
Our group's opinions and biases:
We feel that the debate corporal punishment of children is one of the most
important, current, religiously-based, conflicts in
North America.
In the past, studies into spanking have been inconclusive. Those
researchers who initially opposed spanking generally found that it was dangerous and
ineffective. Those who initially supported spanking typically found that it was safe and
effective. This is fairly common in such studies: the researchers'
original opinions tend to be confirmed by the data that they collect.
However, recent, longitudinal and objective studies in
Ontario, Canada and New
Zealand definitely show that
even moderate spanking can have devastating results for a minority of children --
particularly males -- that only become obfious after they reach adulthood.
We suspect that when the results of some of these large, long-term behavioral
studies become generally known, that many parents will stop
spanking their children.
The stakes are extremely high:
If corporal punishment advocates are correct, then the abandonment
of spanking will significantly increase violence and criminal activity
by the next generation of adults.
If corporal punishment opponents are correct, then the abandonment
of spanking will greatly decrease adult violence, mental illness, addiction,
and criminal activity.
When writing essays on this web site, I try to just "tell it like it
is" without allowing my personal beliefs or recommendations to intrude.
I am making an exception here by adding this personal note, because I feel that the adverse
consequences of spanking children are very serious.
A particularly large study in Ontario Canada
has shown that, on average, children who are sometimes or often spanked
experience a higher level of anxiety, severe depression, alcoholism, and/or
drug addiction in adulthood. About one in seven children experiences more than one of these
problems.
Dr. James Dobson, child psychologist and head of the fundamentalist
Christian organization Focus on the Family, has written a a very popular book "The new
strong willed child." There are many other similar and successful books
by other conservative Christian authors that advocate spanking. The Ontario study shows that, on average, for every
ten children who is being brought up in a family where the parents follow
the corporal punishment recommendations in one of these books and employ
spanking as a main discipline method, one
more child will be destined to suffer from more than one of the above
disorders during adulthood.
I have a hunch that if all parents replaced spanking
with other methods of discipline there would be a major reduction in adult
mental health problems and addiction within a generation.
In this section, you will read that:
The book of Proverbs in the Bible -- traditionally believed to have been
written by King Solomon -- strongly recommended corporal
punishment of children.
Many Evangelical Christian leaders favor spanking.
There is an alternate interpretation of the Bible's message about spanking -- that strong
physical discipline can lead to vicious, bullying, and hateful behavior when
a child becomes an adult.
Some countries have outlawed spanking, both in the home and at school.
Some child protection services In North America regard any corporal
punishment
that leaves marks on the skin to be abuse.
A massive, long-term study in Ontario shows that spanking
of children often causes problems in adulthood, including anxiety,
major depression, drug addiction and alcohol addiction.
One in three boys in New Zealand has a mood-altering gene which will cause 85% of
them to engage in criminal and antisocial behavior later in life, if they are
seriously abused
during childhood. The study has not yet investigated whether moderate
levels of spanking will also trigger this behavior. There is little reason to
believe that this same gene does not exist in males in North America.
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Angry with our website?
Since we explain all viewpoints on spanking, you are certain to see
material in this section that is offensive to you. Please do not write us a
complaint letter, unless you feel that we have misrepresented your position.
Please direct your Emails to the pro- or anti-spanking groups with which you
disagree.
Books about spanking:
Dr. Murray Straus of the University of New Hampshire is one of the world's
leading experts in family violence, including the spanking of children. His year
2001 book compares commonly held beliefs about spanking with the results of
carefully made studies about the negative effects of spanking. This is a book aimed at
the general public. Customer rating at both Barnes & Noble and Amazon.co, is
five stars out of five.
Amazon.com is an online bookstore. A search of their books on spanking
and corporal punishment produced the following list. If a generic
Amazon image appears, click on your browser's refresh key: