I grew up in Oklahoma, and the cops showed up once when I was around 7 because I was being abused. They said my stepdad was allowed to hit me and made it understood that I was the one disturbing the neighbors and I needed to behave.
The Oklahoma board of education is just now this year making legislative headway into a law banning teachers from hitting disabled students. Not all students, just disabled students. They’ve been arguing about it for years because there’s enough parents saying that being allowed to hit a kid with crutches is part of their religion.
You are very lucky to have grown up somewhere other than the US. I can’t wrap my head around this level of abuse not being normal. It sounds wonderful.
My father was abusive. He often told me I had it good because unlike his father, he didn’t use the belt to punish me. I was under surveillance at school because that little sentence slipped from my mouth once and he was warned that if I ever gave signs of being abused, they would immediatly call the authoritiesm
Meanwhile, my grandfather from my mother’s side, raised my mother with care, concern and respect and nothing beyond a stern word ever came her way. That same man told my father he’d beat him to death with a shovel if ever hit after I showed up bruised for visiting my grandparents.
And at school, we had a teacher that found it adequate to twist kids ears and bang their forehead on the blackboard. When that came to be known by my father, it was the only time he stepped up to prevent abuse on me and threatned to beat the woman if she was ever to lay a finger on me.
Corporal punishment is wrong. But let me add one caveat: under extreme circumstances, extreme measures are required.
I do not hit my children. I’m stern but I don’t take myself too serious and my pants don’t fall to the ground if I have to apologize for a wrong decision or word from me. But I do not subscribe to the quasi-cult of ever showing or even imposing hard limits to kids. And kids, more often than not, like to push boundaries and test limits. And there are extreme cases where one single swift swat replaces quickly and effectively hours of negotiation. It saddens me to watch grotesque scenes play out in public venues with kids throwing tantrums, screaming their heads off and demanding this that and the other because parents, and now I quote a couple I personally know, “do not believe in negative reinfforcement, be it by words or actions”. Theirs and other kids alike are horrible humans.
I’m sad for what you personally lived. It’s inhunane and monstruous. And belief is never an excuse for any behaviour.
Just out of morbid curiosity: where do those religious folks find the backing in their books to uphold those rotten ideas?
But let me add one caveat: under extreme circumstances, extreme measures are required.
And it should be up to the parent to show that it was indeed an extreme circumstance that needed an extreme reaction, it shouldn’t be assumed. There was an undercurrent of catrastophization in a lot of the abuses I witnessed, where a parent or teacher assumed that if a child’s disrespect went unpenalized, they’d lip off to a biker and get killed, and that was used to justify corporal punishment. It could have been dangerous, therefore corporal punishment was required. It wasn’t seen that the child viewed them as a safe adult to vent about how stupid their homework was, their judgement was not to be trusted and they needed to be penalized as if they had insulted a stranger’s mother. And that’s not taking the religion aspect into consideration, where you can substitute ‘killed by a biker for insulting him’ with ‘go to hell for eternity for thought-crimes’ and corporal punishment starts sounding more appealing.
As far as the religion aspect goes, I actually have an archived article that explains it with far more eloquence than me. I sent it to my therapist a while back to help explain my standing. https://archive.ph/Dre0R
And it should be up to the parent to show that it was indeed an extreme circumstance that needed an extreme reaction, it shouldn’t be assumed.
Completely agree.
And after your reply, I also noticed I needed to clarify another thing.
I understand “corporal punishment”, in the context we are talking, is severe and recurrent physical aggression; that is not what I intended to parse when I mentioned “extreme measures”.
An “extreme measure”, in what I intend to convey is a swat - on the back of the head, on the butt; at the very worst a slap - just to cause a break in a locked state of mind and set a hard boundary, from where something positive can be done.
I suffered “corporal punishment”. That is aggression and abuse, calculated and reiterated. I’m not advocating for that.
if a child’s disrespect went unpenalized, they’d lip off to a biker and get killed
This snippet caught my attention. At an intuitive level, something tells me this is not about discipline and education but control, physical and mental. And that shows the “respectful and upstanding” citizens (parents and teachers) are the true bad actors.
I understand “corporal punishment”, in the context we are talking, is severe and recurrent physical aggression; that is not what I intended to parse when I mentioned “extreme measures”.
I was using the legal definition of corporal punishment as currently allowed in schools, “the deliberate infliction of physical pain by hitting, paddling, spanking, slapping, or any other physical force used as a means of discipline.” What you consider ‘extreme measures’ is still considered corporal punishment, but it’s on the lighter end. My elementary school principal proudly displayed the wooden spanking paddle on his desk, he had a little stand for it and everything.
At an intuitive level, something tells me this is not about discipline and education but control, physical and mental.
Of course it’s about control, discipline and control are synonyms? It’s even said that kids are being ‘out of control’ if they misbehave in public and parents are encouraged to spank their kids in the middle of the grocery store to reestablish dominance. The general perception is that kids ‘test’ their parents control through misbehavior, and parents are shamed if they let challenges to their authority stand. It’s supposedly to train kids for the strictly hierarchical world they’re allegedly entering as adults,
Again, that’s without the religious aspect that says everybody is tainted with the evil of Originial Sin at birth, and that an evil demigod is really good at telling kids to misbehave so he can build his army in hell. There’s parenting manuals I grew up with that straight up said an infant crying is following satan and trying to manipulate their parents. It was encouraged to put crawling babies on a blanket and switch them with a plastic ruler if they tried to crawl off the blanket without permission. The holy book specifies that ‘the wages of sin is death’, so using implements to hit your kids with is a generosity in comparison.
I’ll read your link a bit later. Thank you.
It is long and a hard read, but it’s truly an eye opening experience for people who didn’t grow up with American Evangelicalism.
I grew up in Oklahoma, and the cops showed up once when I was around 7 because I was being abused. They said my stepdad was allowed to hit me and made it understood that I was the one disturbing the neighbors and I needed to behave.
The Oklahoma board of education is just now this year making legislative headway into a law banning teachers from hitting disabled students. Not all students, just disabled students. They’ve been arguing about it for years because there’s enough parents saying that being allowed to hit a kid with crutches is part of their religion.
You are very lucky to have grown up somewhere other than the US. I can’t wrap my head around this level of abuse not being normal. It sounds wonderful.
Speaking from experience, this culture is just as common outside the US, and outside Christianity too.
People with even halfway decent parents don’t realise how lucky they are.
My father was abusive. He often told me I had it good because unlike his father, he didn’t use the belt to punish me. I was under surveillance at school because that little sentence slipped from my mouth once and he was warned that if I ever gave signs of being abused, they would immediatly call the authoritiesm
Meanwhile, my grandfather from my mother’s side, raised my mother with care, concern and respect and nothing beyond a stern word ever came her way. That same man told my father he’d beat him to death with a shovel if ever hit after I showed up bruised for visiting my grandparents.
And at school, we had a teacher that found it adequate to twist kids ears and bang their forehead on the blackboard. When that came to be known by my father, it was the only time he stepped up to prevent abuse on me and threatned to beat the woman if she was ever to lay a finger on me.
Corporal punishment is wrong. But let me add one caveat: under extreme circumstances, extreme measures are required.
I do not hit my children. I’m stern but I don’t take myself too serious and my pants don’t fall to the ground if I have to apologize for a wrong decision or word from me. But I do not subscribe to the quasi-cult of ever showing or even imposing hard limits to kids. And kids, more often than not, like to push boundaries and test limits. And there are extreme cases where one single swift swat replaces quickly and effectively hours of negotiation. It saddens me to watch grotesque scenes play out in public venues with kids throwing tantrums, screaming their heads off and demanding this that and the other because parents, and now I quote a couple I personally know, “do not believe in negative reinfforcement, be it by words or actions”. Theirs and other kids alike are horrible humans.
I’m sad for what you personally lived. It’s inhunane and monstruous. And belief is never an excuse for any behaviour.
Just out of morbid curiosity: where do those religious folks find the backing in their books to uphold those rotten ideas?
And it should be up to the parent to show that it was indeed an extreme circumstance that needed an extreme reaction, it shouldn’t be assumed. There was an undercurrent of catrastophization in a lot of the abuses I witnessed, where a parent or teacher assumed that if a child’s disrespect went unpenalized, they’d lip off to a biker and get killed, and that was used to justify corporal punishment. It could have been dangerous, therefore corporal punishment was required. It wasn’t seen that the child viewed them as a safe adult to vent about how stupid their homework was, their judgement was not to be trusted and they needed to be penalized as if they had insulted a stranger’s mother. And that’s not taking the religion aspect into consideration, where you can substitute ‘killed by a biker for insulting him’ with ‘go to hell for eternity for thought-crimes’ and corporal punishment starts sounding more appealing.
As far as the religion aspect goes, I actually have an archived article that explains it with far more eloquence than me. I sent it to my therapist a while back to help explain my standing. https://archive.ph/Dre0R
Completely agree.
And after your reply, I also noticed I needed to clarify another thing.
I understand “corporal punishment”, in the context we are talking, is severe and recurrent physical aggression; that is not what I intended to parse when I mentioned “extreme measures”.
An “extreme measure”, in what I intend to convey is a swat - on the back of the head, on the butt; at the very worst a slap - just to cause a break in a locked state of mind and set a hard boundary, from where something positive can be done.
I suffered “corporal punishment”. That is aggression and abuse, calculated and reiterated. I’m not advocating for that.
This snippet caught my attention. At an intuitive level, something tells me this is not about discipline and education but control, physical and mental. And that shows the “respectful and upstanding” citizens (parents and teachers) are the true bad actors.
I’ll read your link a bit later. Thank you.
I was using the legal definition of corporal punishment as currently allowed in schools, “the deliberate infliction of physical pain by hitting, paddling, spanking, slapping, or any other physical force used as a means of discipline.” What you consider ‘extreme measures’ is still considered corporal punishment, but it’s on the lighter end. My elementary school principal proudly displayed the wooden spanking paddle on his desk, he had a little stand for it and everything.
Of course it’s about control, discipline and control are synonyms? It’s even said that kids are being ‘out of control’ if they misbehave in public and parents are encouraged to spank their kids in the middle of the grocery store to reestablish dominance. The general perception is that kids ‘test’ their parents control through misbehavior, and parents are shamed if they let challenges to their authority stand. It’s supposedly to train kids for the strictly hierarchical world they’re allegedly entering as adults,
Again, that’s without the religious aspect that says everybody is tainted with the evil of Originial Sin at birth, and that an evil demigod is really good at telling kids to misbehave so he can build his army in hell. There’s parenting manuals I grew up with that straight up said an infant crying is following satan and trying to manipulate their parents. It was encouraged to put crawling babies on a blanket and switch them with a plastic ruler if they tried to crawl off the blanket without permission. The holy book specifies that ‘the wages of sin is death’, so using implements to hit your kids with is a generosity in comparison.
It is long and a hard read, but it’s truly an eye opening experience for people who didn’t grow up with American Evangelicalism.
I’ve read it. And it’s a hard read, indeed. But strangely enough it helped to put into place a few loose pieces in my mind, on a good deal of matters.
I have no words and I tend to talk too much. Between what you have told me and what I read, I’m simply horrified.
Thanks for reading it.
Thank you for sharing.