THESE LETTERS ARE FANTASY FICTION, WRITTEN AS IF BY AN ADVOCATE OF SPANKING. THEY MUST NOT BE TAKEN AS WARRANT TO BREAK LAWS OR ABUSE CHILDREN
Dear Parent,
Thank you for your letter, concerning the corporal punishment of your adolescent boy.
You raise some very large issues, to which I will respond.
In many countries in recent years, issues have arisen about children's rights and about the wisdom or otherwise of physical punishments by parents or parent-surrogates. Some nations and states have legislated against corporal punishment, either in the home or in places of education.
Strange as it may seem to you, coming from an advocate of retaining spanking as an option, I do believe that all human beings have rights. Children are human beings.
But I have also seen, in recent years, more and more children in "western" societies behaving in an unruly way - and more and more tragic cases, however rare they still are, of children, especially boys, committing the most terrible and heinous crimes.
I am quite prepared to believe that some of these problems arose out of genetics, childhood abuse or neglect, though it would only be belief because in these matters we can show correlation but not cause.
But I also believe, that in our efforts to be more respectful, liberal and tolerant toward children, we have forgotten that they are children and that in some children the primitive, the cruel, the violent, are powerful forces which, just sometimes, have to be met with equal power.
When I look at the number of children incarcerated in our liberal "Western" societies, I cry. I cry, because I think we have created this.
And I think we have created this by offering insufficient control within the home. I believe that many citizens would have been satisfied, in relation to many crimes, if they could have been assured that parents would deal with the misdemeanour quickly and painfully, in a loving context. Instead, we involve courts, social workers, psychologists and incarcerators. Besides this being at immense public cost, it results in the institutional abuse of children by incarceration.
Listening to children, what they mostly tell me is that they far prefer to be spanked than to be kept at home for days or have the social worker, psychologist or medic called to play with their brains or, worse, mess them around with medications, all of which have some side effects and some of which create lasting physiological damage. Spanking does not cause lasting physiological damage, it causes a sore butt!
So I come from children's rights!
I come from the view that, certainly from early adolescence up, and probably from earlier, children should be given the option of specified forms of physical punishment. This is quite different from how it was in the "bad old days" (if they were bad). It says, present options. At school too, I would like children to be able to vote. If there is a majority for spanking, paddling, whatever, bring it back.
Do we really live in democracies?
Yours,
Spanking Adviser