By Ernie McCray
(Flickr: HA! Designs – Art by Heather)
It seems the NFL, of all institutions, is drawing our attention to social situations in our society that we’ve generally overlooked for far too long: domestic violence and corporal punishment when it comes to disciplining our children.
Regarding the latter of these matters, I’ve been in several conversations lately where someone expressed how “grateful” they were for their parents taking the belt to their behind. It did them no harm, they say, and it made them the person they are today – and I’m thinking the human being they have become is someone who sees nothing wrong with hitting a five year old because of who knows what, talking back, lying, stealing from the piggy bank, hitting their little sister, getting in trouble at school…?
Well, I was hit about three times when I was a kid and what I remember most about it is how utterly fearful I was and how pissed I was at my mother. If I could have, I would have strangled her and I’m not the least bit “grateful” for entertaining such violent thoughts or the ass whuppings.
If I was slow to respond to something she felt I needed to do, instead of getting a switch she’d say something like “Well, I guess they’re going to have to play that flag football game without you, huh?” and I’m suddenly washing dishes or mopping the floor with pizzazz.
What I am grateful for is that my mother didn’t make physical punishment her default option for dealing with me as I made the earliest of my mistakes in life. We had our moments but I was allowed and encouraged to weigh in with my words when I felt a need to and I could flat-out get on a roll defending a position or getting at what I thought was an injustice in some rule she’d create out of thin air – but I never once sassed her (not out loud) and she would have, indeed, pounded me if I did. But that wasn’t what it was all about. I just didn’t give her lip because I respected her and appreciated all the wonderful things she brought to my life: the bus and train trips around the country, the books and ideas and movies and concerts and forums she introduced to me, the music that filled our dumpy little houses, the smile my “A’s” etched in her face, her chicken fricassee, her cheering at my games…
If I was slow to respond to something she felt I needed to do, instead of getting a switch she’d say something like “Well, I guess they’re going to have to play that flag football game without you, huh?” and I’m suddenly washing dishes or mopping the floor with pizzazz. Replace flag football, in this little scenario, with basketball or baseball or choir practice or wrestling matches or a YMCA backpacking trip or a Hopalong Cassidy Shootem Up at the State Theater or going to a dance at Estevan Center and you’ll get a clear picture of what it took to discipline me.
Put simply a kid does not have to be hit in order to learn to behave. I think we, as a society, have to ask ourselves, how do we even go about lessening violence in our country or speak of trying to achieve peace in the world if we use physical force against our children? If there’s violence in our children’s homes, no matter how “grateful” we are for having had our butts popped years ago, how will they be able to, with no positive model of civility being shown them, carry on the ideals of living in love and harmony that struggle for air in our troubled world?
We need to look at forms of discipline in our society that are more restorative than severe in nature. With that in mind a concept called Restorative Justice is a growing social movement dedicated to using peaceful approaches to solving problems as a way of life when it comes to meting out justice. All the stakeholders who have been affected by an injustice (both the victims and those who have inflicted harm) decide what should be done to repair what’s been done. It’s about learning how to sit all who are involved down to heal the pain that comes when someone has been wronged.
I’ve just joined a number of community activists recently who are working to get a Natural Helpers Program in our schools. This way of dealing with problems involves the principles of restorative justice by finding students, who demonstrate a natural ability to help others, and training them to handle a variety of troubling situations that can arise on a school campus.
With such approaches to problem solving being promoted in our schools, it would be heartening if parents, regarding disciplining their sons and daughters, also sought ways to be more compassionate and less punitive minded. We need to move on this on different fronts.
Maybe, some day, there will be a generation of grownups who are “grateful” that their parents thought enough of them, to not only not hit them, but supported programs in their schools, like Natural Helpers, that taught them how to think in terms of handling matters with reason and in a spirit of building healthy relationships in a community – learning to devalue violence, in the process.
Children learning how to help others increases whatever chances there might be for the creation of a hopeful world. There’s definitely much more for society to gain than lose when human beings learn to genuinely care for each other. Think about it.
Ernie McCray
Latest posts by Ernie McCray (see all)
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- Saying Goodbye to a Friend Who Gave Me a Helping Hand - November 28, 2018
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No joke, Ernie. Violence begets violence. Physical punishment of children usually stems from parental frustration and anger: it is irrational and desperate. It refocuses the child from learning something positive to being enraged at the parent’s use of force — as in wanting to strangle one’s mother. Premeditated violence is something else, and I think it out to be outlawed.
As for restorative justice at schools, it’s fine if it doesn’t take up a teacher’s class time. It certainly means we will need a lot more skilled counselors if it’s going to work. Natural Helpers sounds like that old program of specially-prepared student advisors/counselors who would meet with kids who got tossed out of class for poor behavior. Their job was to help with cooling off, talk through the problem and find a responsible solution to the issue.
I once was amazed to see a male middle school teacher weep from his inability to “control” a defiant boy of about 13 whom he had just expelled from his classroom. The school’s counselor stepped in and handed the kid off to a pretty 8th grade girl peacemaker who was available. Within the hour, the teacher had regrouped to teach his class and both students were smiling and mellow after having reasonably conferred to resolve a crisis. It was great.
Hear Hear
See, http://www.nospank.net.
I took a break from study to read your article and it made me think of the major disadvantage I had when teaching in the inner city. I taught middle school at Memphis City Schools. The children went through a metal detector at 6, 7, and 8th grade. Furthermore, most came from single parent homes of color where corporal punishment was a way of life. Now compared to my behavioral prompts and positive reinforcement, corporal punishment set the tone. So if education wasn’t valued at home where momma could smack you upside the head, then my prompting fell on deaf ears and my positive reinforcement became an exercise in reciprocity. I had to go with it and educate the parents what I was up against when they wondered how come I couldn’t make Malik behave. “Well, how do you discipline Malik?” I’d ask and they would tell me of all the ways they hit, knock, belt or beat their kid down and I would let them know. This is what has been established as the motivation for good behavior. The avoidance of pain. I can’t – won’t do that. So we need to establish a reason for him to behave that doesn’t involve physical pain, because I’m not able to be your ally in that. It took extra work and not every parent was open to the feedback. I didn’t teach middle school after that. There is such a larger picture to be addressed and you have started it with this conversation. Thank you for the article, as always you’re right on.
Willie Lang (above) hit the nail on the head… Paddle at home – Paddle at School.
I grew up in Tucson in Ernie’s time frame and that paddle sitting on the black board eraser tray did a whole lot to keep this boy in line… It was never used on me but it sure was used on kids who ‘acted out.’
Disrupting a class got immediate response. “Smack Smack Smack” and the lessons resumed with renewed attention…
No ‘molycodeling’ of miscreants and everybody found out early in life that misconduct was not tolerated in no uncertain terms… recidivist were in the minority.
Like the old saying goes…”Much good behavior is due to cold feet” (and I wore two pair of sox…: )
Dave B.
Spring Valley
America refuses to adopt U.N. guidelines that it helped draft more than 20 years ago.
The United States is one of only two U.N. member countries not to have ratified the original Convention (the other country is Somalia — which doesn’t have a functioning government.)
Are we still in the dark ages?
By Lawrence J. Cohen and Anthony T. DeBenedet, M.D. Jan. 24,
Follow @TIMEIdeas
Recently the U.N. special representative on violence against children called on member countries to ratify two optional protocols to the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child which would help prevent the sale of children, child prostitution, child pornography and the involvement of children in armed conflict around the world. The Convention was adopted in 1989 to promote basic human rights for children everywhere, but the latest effort to extend those protections underscores a disturbing truth: the United States is one of only two U.N. member countries not to have ratified the original Convention (the other country is Somalia — which doesn’t have a functioning government.) The Convention was drafted during the Reagan and Clinton administrations — with a great deal of influence from the United States — but has never been presented to the Senate for consent, which is the final step to ratification. Why?
Corporal punishment should be limited to the youngest agss and be purely instant and reactive such as a child getting a slap on the hand for climbing on a hot stove with a boiling pot on it.
In no case should if follow the historical status quo of planned beatings with escalating levels of weaponry.
My adoptive parents were definitely from the spare the rod era. At a certain age, when moms hand could do no more damage than become reddened and make me laugh, it became wait till your father gets home.
So I would sit and wait till the sound of his motorcycle roared up then wait until he had his 2-3 beers than a manhatten or two warm up and hed fling the door open and take out his frustrations of the work day.
Over the years it went from the hand to cutting my own willow tree switch to the belt to finally around age 12 wrapping the belt around his hand and using the large brass cowboy buckle as a flail.
It never, ever really hurt though. I just became able to stand the pain.
At school they had swats with a large paddle with a principal big enough to make it really snart when you pulled your pants down.
Anyways around age 17 my adoptive father finally raised his fist and was about to deck me with a punch in the face. He was around 63, and with one hand I grabbed his neck and pinned him against the wall and said youre never going to hit me again.
Because of this I was soon out of the house and joining the Navy. He feared me.
The problem with speaking with violence is for too many it is the only language they become fluent in. I wasnt going to abuse him because I am not genetically predispised to be an abuser. He was and its all he coul imagine of me.