About Hitting Children When They Do Wrong...
I wonder how my parents and people in their generation became decent adults.
Everything I know about psychology tells me that children don't grow healthy when their parents beat them, and yet I see more examples of kids turning bad because they were never hit than kids getting scarred by their parents hitting them.
We have an idiom here "العصا لمن عصى" which means "A wooden stick is for who disobeys." It was a common practice when I was young to hit children who disobeyed their parents with wooden sticks or rubber pipes. (Both hurt like hell, especially in Winter.) It was common even in school to hit those who forgot their homework, arrive late to school, or act rebellious.
As a child, I hated that! ...I was a very obedient kid, but I had my share of times I messed up pretty badly and was punished for it.
Looking back on it now, I don't think it was bad to be hit for doing wrong. Especially since I was never punished for something I disagreed with being wrong to do.
The fear of punishment is a strong motivator to avoid bad behavior. It's the only motivator that works for some children. It balances out the temptation one might feel for doing bad behaviour.
My mother and father, when they tell me about the punishments they had when they made mistakes make me flinch. Sometimes, they were punished without even knowing what they did wrong. Yet, both of them are decent people with no emotional scars that I could notice.
People in older generations were strong, or maybe there was a secret ingredient that made them healthy despite the beatings they endured. If there was such an ingredient, I'd like to know what it was.
Children in new generations are rebellious. They're never punished enough, and their bad behavior seems to be reinforced by adults, if indirectly.
They don't study in school and cheat. They use bad words to refer to their parents/teachers and know they'll get away with all of that. It's terrible.
I wonder what sort of adults we're creating right now... I'd be happy to be proven wrong and they all become decent adults, but I'm not too confident about that.
I don't think it's wrong to hit children, but I think it should be the last resort solution when all other solutions fail. Also, hitting them should never feel like an act of revenge.
The worst things you can do are to punish children without explaining what they did wrong or beat them without giving them a chance to explain their reasoning. Sometimes all they want is attention or maybe they don't know better...
Children are 'innocent' for better or worse.
...These are my thoughts after listening to a teacher talking about how rebellious children in her school are, and that she's 'supposedly' not allowed to hit them, (even though other teachers hit them,) and she doesn't know what to do with them.
I was thinking... If hitting is psychologically damaging, how did I and people from older generations become decent adults at all? Or if leaving children without hitting them is better, how they not become rebellious?
What do you think?
I'm not sure how this post will be received since "beating children" is a very sensitive topic in most of the world. I don't like the term "beating," and I'm not sure what is considered "beating." My thoughts about it may be too jumbled... Would love to hear your opinions about this.
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What an interesting topic, and incidentally it is quite closely related to what I posted about yesterday.
I one remember talking to a bunch of friends from a wide cultural range about corporal punishments in parenting (a.k.a. beating). One guy explained how he was beaten regularly when his parents were angry with him, usually with a shoe, a belt, or whatever they found at the moment. A girl related that her parents never beat her when they were angry, but the next day, when they were all calm, they expected her to ask for a beating. She would even had to pick out the belt or stick, bring it to her parents, explain what she did wrong, why she needed to be punished, and how many hits her crime required.
I was shocked about the first story, but severely upset about the second one. I told them that my parents never beat me with any object, only their hand. This, however, always came without warning, like the lightning out of a blue sky, usually in my face and only once. Then they would explain to me why it was necessary. Everyone was shocked. No, not in your face, how horrible! Interestingly, for me that was not a problem. I considered the type of beating I got to be the best practice, but then again, everyone else thought the same about the way they were beaten.
There was one girl who was never beaten, not even once, not even a little. She told us that her mom would always take the time to explain to her patiently what she did wrong. Of course she was punished, but never physically. Not being allowed to watch TV, or visit her friends, were typical ways. The worst punishment, however, the one that she says taught her most effectively to be a good girl, is when her mom would refuse to hug her, or even smile at her. Just like the rest of us, she also thought this was the best way to discipline children.
So in conclusion what can I say? I believe that kids need to be taught their limits. Most importantly, they must learn that limits are firmly set in stone. It doesn't take a lot of effort to do this, only consistency. A parent should never go back on their word, not once. The other thing is attention and patience. In order to get kids to respect you, you need to earn their respect. I know a bunch of parents who constantly scream at their kids, and the kids continue misbehaving. Then they beat them, but the kid continues to be rebellious. In my view, this is the parent's failure to teach them respect at an early age. Other kids never need to be beaten, or even yelled at. They just need to be told in a firm voice to please stop. Sometimes it is enough to say their name, or give them a stern look. Ultimately, I believe a respectful child always wants to be good, and will obey their parents. But to get their, the parents need to start early on, and be always 100% consistent.
Thanks for this comment. That was very educational... I agree, consistency is better. I like the story of the girl that was never hit, I think her parents were smart in that sort of punishment.
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I do agree that discipline has helped a lot in most cases. It is one of the best tools to make a child listen. Just like you stated, children want attention.
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