Physical Punishment to Children

In India we see more spanking and physical punishments to children compared to US (not sure about other countries). Do you think that spanking your kid really helps? My husband went to my daughter's school parent education night and one of the Indian parent was arguing that his parents used to spank him and hit him hard when he was young and he just turned out to be fine so there is nothing wrong in doing that (It was really scary to see that Indian argue with American teacher saying spanking is ok ) Do you believe in using physical force on children to get them disciplined? Or you think it is not important to used physical force and can be disciplined by timeouts or once in a while shouting?

SOwmyaa di... u are on vacation and not allowed to visit DM

Anyways... spanking or abusing has never ever helped..the child eventually becomes habitual to such an attitude... ..but sometimes like when it is way "OUT OF CONTROL" then i LITTLE tiny spanky would do .... i think it is better to use authoritative voice but not shouting...there is a clear differentce b/w the 2..so ..a nice authoritative tone with clear explanations to your child about wht u dislike precisely and wht u want him to do.... maintain the precision and focus ..

i believe that a calm attitude with no shouting but an authoritative voice with clearity of do's and don'ts will straight up the things - hopefully *thinking smiley*

Parents and teachers should not do any physical harm against childeren. Children can be punished by shouting or getting sent to their room. No matter how bad they can get, you should never use physical force on them.

It is against the law in the U.S. for any adult to use physical force on children. When I go to india with my kids, I would not let my in-laws use physical force on my kids.

I wasn't spanked as a child and I think I'm ok. I dont think spanking could have made me a better person.

As Mnm said, an authoritative voice and looking the child in the eye is often more effective. The child has to understand that he/she did something wrong.

If a parent is loving yet firm from the beginning, then there wont be any need to spank the child. That balance must be maintained.

i dont believe that spanking ever does anything, but build resentment. you know what they say...a kid who is beaten goes to beat his kids. not true in all cases, but mostly it is true about if ur spanked u tend ot think that its okay. i think it should be like TO and stuff like that.

Oh dear.......I have stepped into a mine field

OK, my take, err, even at the risk of being politically incorrect is different.

Whether you really need to spank a child depends entirely upon the child. Beleive me, that is something I learnt on a personal basis.

I do think we had done this topic somewhere before too...

Anyway, I have two kids, both boys. Both are as different as chalk and cheese. My older is almost 7 and younger 3 1/2. My older son was so terribly naughty, that I was practically boycotted by the moms who had kids of the same age. He was aggressive, hyper, and dominating. Yet he was never ever mean, just that he was too forceful. And the only thing he even remotedly understood as a language of discipline was spanking. No amount of eye to eye, setting rules, time outs or grounding could help. He is one child who can be very happy in his own company, and hence, being let alone hardly ever bothered him..... When I was pregnant the second time around, I was actually advised by my friends not to go for it, as they felt it would be impossible for me to handle two like them......

My younger one was as quite and gentle as an angel. It is not that he never gets into mischief, or never does anything wrong. But I have never had to lay a finger on him. With him eye to eye, and 'bad boy' or time outs work fine. However, recently I had to spank him, and for the first time. I had been trying to potty train him for 6 months now, and no amount of 'good boy' and 'bad boy' was working. And then he started going around in completely soiled pants and not tell me because I would make him wash and call him a bad boy or give him time out and stuff, so he would go and hide. So one day, I calmly took him, cleaned him, and then spanked him - hard. It's been about 10 days now.He has not soiled his pants, and he has even learned to pee the way his elder brother does...... standing !!!! And suddenly, my 'good boy' means the world to him..... .just one day of careful calm spanking......

As a child, I had my share of spanking, as I was indeed extremely naughty, and now that I think back, at times even a nightmare whereas my sister is the calmest person one could come across. I doubt she even ever got screamed at.....a fact I resented greatly, only to find it getting repeated with my own boys....

So now I make it a point never to scold any one child for anything they are into together. But with time, my elder child has quitened down and I don't even have to raise my voice at him anymore. he is of an age when he has started to understand, so it's not required. And I have a reason to beleive that my younger one is growing to grow much more naughty as days go by, more than my elder one, though in different way.....so I don't know what kind of approach I would need to handle that.

I beleive that as parents, the best appraoch is to see what works best. Hitting a child to vent out frustration, or simply to bully them to do unreasonable things is what I would term as abuse. However,all the parents that I talk to, whether American or ndian or Chinese, all of them have had to resort to spanking at one point or the other. our neighbour has two daughters and a son. her first born - a daughter - and her thrid born, a son, are as cool as a cucumber. but her second child, a daughter, is a nightmare. At 8, she is the biggest bully you could meet and acts way over her age. And her mom is completely at loss. Her other children are so well behaved and nice that it's hard to beleive, and surprisingly, she has never ever used force of any kind on any of them. But she looses it when it comes to dealing with her second one......and ultimately, it seems her husband looses it too and it's him who spanks her.

Irony ?? he is the police.........

So, I beleive it's gets easy to be judgemental when it comes to others, but as parents, they are the experts and perhaps they do need to use it get something across to the child. My friend was a big one on no abuse and never spanked her daughter. I at times felt a kind of disapproval and slight trace of smugness which said - hey I think you can't handle your son - until she had her second daughter. Suffice to say, she respects my plight more than she did before......

Today teens in US are far worse than they were 20 years back. They are ill behaved, and seldom respect authority. Sure there are tons of kids who are very very nice, but the number of disrespectful ones has grown sharply over the years. I beleive that to some extent fear and respect are kind of interviened. Here I am not talking of fear as in abuse, but fear as in respect of authority. And to lay down that authority, sometimes, spanking is necessary.

personally i feel tht slapping a child once in a while or a mild hit at them when it is necessary does notharm the child but it shud not be done in a regular basis or extreme state.once in a while if a child is hit when he or she does something does terribly wrong will give him or her a fright of tht deed and he will think twice before doin tht thing again.But if spanking is habitual,then the child wont feel any difference coz it also becomes habitual for the child.i feel hitting a child till the age of 8-9 is ok,in the above conditions.i too had my little share of spanking and feel its helpful to me now.

Edited by Debo_13 - 07 September 2006 at 12:19am

Minnie di... great post indeed...

I am not so favour of spanking but it is sometimes inevitable... that's why i used the "Out of control" phrase...

I have been watching the series of "Super Nanny" for some weeks as it comes the time we are dinning and my parents pitying the other parents ...all the children are rude indesciplined and then... the Super Nanny comes and saves the parents!! Whoa.. a new "Super Man" type avatar i love her "Naughty Stool" or "Naught corner" or "Naughty mat"

Anyways... i here advise all the troubled parents to read Super Nanny's book or watch the show (if that doesn't work.. don't blame me this is an advise from a teen Work on ur own risk ).. but seriously time outs, bargaining NEVER EVER helps..especially bargaining.. parents tend to fall in the trap of children ( my experience... ok.. let me tell u a secret... we children are the BIGGEST emotional blackmailers on the whole earth muhahahahah) ...

the point is to let ur children realize UR authority over THEM in an impressive an intelligent way.. U know ur children better than any one... u only need to know the techniques to handle them... but then...u HAVE to keep urself calm...even if u feel like cracking glass... shouting and calling names only works negatively..yup.. my eldest sis was like shouting all the time on her 2nd girl (she is one of the nightmare hyper children who even "Runs" in a fever of 102 degrees ) .. that's where my parents said "NO! Wrong! No shouting" and then gave my sis tips on parenting

I admit.. i have been spanked from my parents a couple of times but only for genuine reasons ... becoz i was their ultimate naughty child ...and ... it was natural.. the youngest and born-after-12-years type children are bound to be naughty but most of the time the "eye contact authoritative voice" worked on me ... perhaps their past experience from 2 children was ooozing out on me but ... i have to admit again... they only spanked on bottom when they felt "now it is necessary"..