An incident at the grocery store recently got me wondering about spanking. Even though I was spanked as a child I don’t remember any controversy over spanking. I do remember vowing that I’d never spank my own children, but I also vowed I’d let them eat whatever sugar cereal they wanted.
Fast-forward to now, a mother at the grocery store swatted her toddler yesterday in the cereal isle because the kid was screaming (oddly enough) about Cocoa-Puffs. The spanking was swift and didn’t seem too terribly painful, but the child only continued to scream louder. I decided to learn more about spanking.
One interesting thing when doing a cursory Google search on spanking is the amount of porn and sexual websites that are unveiled by any search with the word “spanking” in it. Interestingly enough, there is also a plethora of research that indicates that spanking children has extremely negative sexual connotations that can be very damaging to children. One such article titled “Spanking and the Corporal Punishment of Children: The Sexual Story”, published in the International Journal of Children’s Rights, portrays spanking as a much more damaging and complex social practice than it is commonly thought to be.
But for some parents, especially those who believe that in extreme situations spanking is the only way to get their child’s attention, removing spanking is like taking away all their power as parents. For some parents spanking is the last resort for use in situations when the child is in danger.
The American Academy of Pediatircs argues, however, that spanking is not as useful as some parents think it is. The AAP is strongly opposed to the use of spanking in children and does not recommend it under any circumstance. Instead, they encourage redirection of children under two, and ”time-outs” for use in children three and older. The ”time-out” should be administered in one minute increments per year of the child’s age. So, a three-year-old has to sit for three minutes and so on.
Currently many other countries consider spanking to be corporal punishment and have outlawed the practice. Most European countries, Israel and Japan have laws that prohibit the physical punishment of children, including through spanking. Here is an interesting take on spanking as corporal punishment.
Claire Cohen, mother of two-year old Amelia, says she hadn’t felt strongly about spanking until her daughter entered the nerve-racking toddler phase of life. “I never was anti-spanking or anything, I guess it didn’t occur to me until I was trying to teach my daughter that it’s not okay to hit, or bite, or pinch,” says Cohen. ”It just didn’t make sense to me that I could be always telling her it’s not okay to hit and then go and smack her.”
Many parents and childhood educators agree with Cohen and insist that spanking is abuse and sends the wrong message to children. Some argue that aside from the sexual boundaries and trust issues that are violated when a child is spanked, the foundation of respect that adults are supposed to foster in children is seriously undermined in the process.
“It’s hypocrisy, pure and simple,” says Cohen who explains that she doesn’t ever want her daughter to think it’s okay for someone bigger than her to hit her or touch her body, especially her bottom, in a violent way.
