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Mom Arrested for Washing Kid's Mouth With Soap

How do you correlate the diminished use of corporal punishment with the increase in school disciplinary problems over the past 30 years. I know I'll get an emotional answer, like I support beating children.

Come on, American. You know me better than that.

I think the issue is discipline--and it's a matter of how one does it. I just don't think a child needs to be touched in order to suffer consequences and learn from their mistakes.

My siblings and I are all decent human beings, and our father spanked us to the point that it was child abuse. Do I think it worked? No. I was scared of him as a child as a result. I dont' think being scared of a parent is a good thing. JMO
 
Do you have eyes to see with? No one carried a gun when I went to school.

So you don't have any actual evidence that this is even true, other than your personal anecdotal experience.
 
So I take it your kids never recieved presents from "Santa Claus", money from "The Tooth Fairy", or found eggs hid by the "easter bunny" right? Or is it okay to teach your kids its perfectly fine to lie?

He's 2. I haven't decided whether we will celebrate Christmas to the extent that Santa Claus exists or whether we will celebrate the Easter Bunny (not Easter), as he's being raised Jewish. (I'm not kidding.)

And your examples are terrible! Santa, Tooth Fairy, and Easter Bunny are happy things. I don't know anyone who would say, "Those are examples of parents lying to their children."

So I take it you've never sent your kid to bed without dinner, or force them to eat food they don't want? Or is it okay to teach kids its fine to starve people, or force them to do things they don't want to do?

I think I have sent him to bed without dinner one time, but I was very matter of fact about it. "I made you this for dinner. If you don't like it, you don't have to eat it. But I'm not going to make you another meal because you don't like what I made for you." He will never be forced to eat anything he doesn't like. I had that done to me, and I won't do it to him....ever.

Never sent them to time out or put them in the corner or sent them to their room, because you don't want to teach them its okay to exert power over people if they're weaker then you?

A time out has never been perceived as child abuse. I have given out some time outs, but I'm not a jerk about it. Again, very matter of fact. "You hit Mommy. It's not okay to hit Mommy, so you need to sit here for 2 minutes and think about it." I haven't had to give him a time out in ages because I think he learned from the other ones what "not" to do.

I can respect your notion of not feeling those things are right, but your reasoning for giving it just doesn't jive if you do a lot of other things routinely done by parents.

Letting him know that my kitchen is not a restaurant and that it's NOT okay to hit others are totally appropriate consequences. When I have punished him, I try to be as respectful as I can. I haven't always succeeded, and in those circumstances, I have apologized to my son--something my parents NEVER did, which shows respect to him, IMO.
 
Our ancestors were obviously bad parents and child abusers to say the least. The country became a world power at the hands of child abusers. ;)

Yeah.

A Palm Bay woman and her boyfriend

And the severe punishment of fornicators in times of historical antiquity at that. :shrug:

How do you correlate the diminished use of corporal punishment with the increase in school disciplinary problems over the past 30 years. I know I'll get an emotional answer, like I support beating children.

Is that all you can refer to? That's merely selective incorporation of raw data rather than a statistically reliable empirical analysis. For something like that, you have to refer to the likes of Berlin et al.'s Correlates and Consequences of Spanking and Verbal Punishment for Low-Income White, African American, and Mexican American Toddlers:

This study examined the prevalence, predictors, and outcomes of spanking and verbal punishment in 2,573 low-income White, African American, and Mexican American toddlers at ages 1, 2, and 3. Both spanking and verbal punishment varied by maternal race/ethnicity. Child fussiness at age 1 predicted spanking and verbal punishment at all 3 ages. Cross-lagged path analyses indicated that spanking (but not verbal punishment) at age 1 predicted child aggressive behavior problems at age 2 and lower Bayley mental development scores at age 3. Neither child aggressive behavior problems nor Bayley scores predicted later spanking or verbal punishment. In some instances, maternal race/ethnicity and/or emotional responsiveness moderated the effects of spanking and verbal punishment on child outcomes.

Which aspect of the empirical literature are you referring to?
 
How do you correlate the diminished use of corporal punishment with the increase in school disciplinary problems over the past 30 years. I know I'll get an emotional answer, like I support beating children.

Parents, by and large, have not replaced the disciplinary methods that have been taken off the table.
 
How do you correlate the diminished use of corporal punishment with the increase in school disciplinary problems over the past 30 years. I know I'll get an emotional answer, like I support beating children.

Wow, I can't even go with the tride and true causation and correlation line on this one because this idiotic comment doesn't even reach that.

First off, you've provided no study or actual evidence other than your anecdotal. So even that is iffy. Why? Because you're relying on the assumption that school disciplinary problems have actually gotten worse. This is based off nothing but your perception. So, what are other reasons you may have this perception.

1. When you're younger you're not as aware of these things on a local or national scale
2. People have a tendancy at times to think back more fondly and favorably upon the past then reality
3. The increase of news proliferation has caused an increase of coverage of these issues, making an illusion that more instances of problems are happening then actually true
4. The school you went to was in a different local than most of those having issues currently, and as such comparing say an inner city school now to a suburban school 30 years ago gives you a false impression as its not comparing the same general school condition in both time periods

All of which are potential options for the perception that schools have more disciplinary problems over the past 30 years other than simply it actually being an increased problem.

But now lets actually assume your assumption is correct, that its gotten worse over the past 30 years. There's absolutely no way to come to a single conclussion as to why. Some other options other than the decline of corporal punishment...

1. Increase in populations leading to larger schools leading to less ability by administrators to keep control of everything
2. More lax, uninterested, single parents all around leading to kids less disciplined in a general sense (mind you, this could include parents who routinely hit their kids, but that's the only form of parenting that's done at all)
3. A general shift in entertainment geared towards kids over the years highlighting the rebel/trouble maker types as the "Cooler" type of kid
4. Further restrictions on schools in regards to how they themselves can discipline and control kids, thus allowing things to get further out of control

And I could go on I'm sure if I felt like thinking about it longer.

Sorry, your one liner little comment is nothing but a baseless opinion founded in assumption with no reason anyone should take it seriously.
 
Parents, by and large, have not replaced the disciplinary methods that have been taken off the table.
Yes they have, but the methods are ineffective. That's where the problem is, we're preached to by society to use certain punishments that are proving ineffective. So parents start throwing up their hands in disgust. Previous generations of parents weren't told what to do.

'Pushover parents to blame for generation of children who lack discipline and moral boundaries' | Mail Online
 
Come on, American. You know me better than that.

I think the issue is discipline--and it's a matter of how one does it. I just don't think a child needs to be touched in order to suffer consequences and learn from their mistakes.

My siblings and I are all decent human beings, and our father spanked us to the point that it was child abuse. Do I think it worked? No. I was scared of him as a child as a result. I dont' think being scared of a parent is a good thing. JMO

I think it depends on the child. My parents definitely physically abused my brother and I as kids. We were constantly being hit, and often for very minor reasons. That is NOT how I parent my kids.

However, I'm a single mom with an adolescent boy who has become more and more physically aggressive as he gets older and into his pre-teen years. This year, I'll admit...I washed his mouth out with soap for profanity. It lasted less than a minute and was extremely unpleasant for both of us. However, it did in fact work and it also ended his physical posturing towards me.

In general, I am NOT a fan of corporal punishment. However, I think that there are some scenarios in which it is warranted, within limits.
 
Do you have eyes to see with? No one carried a gun when I went to school.

This is probably an even worse realm for your advocacy, as whatever authoritarianism you advocate for dealing with "discipline problems" would likely be akin to their original cause. There exists specific evidence that the expansion of school violence is connected to the parallel establishment of compulsory schooling, which should provide us with insights as to the effects of authoritarianism in schools. As put by Elizabeth Midlarsky and Helen Marie Klain (“A History of Violence in the Schools.” In Violence in Schools: Cross-National and Cross-Cultural Perspectives, edited by Florence Denmark. New York: Springer, 2005):

School violence appeared to be particularly widespread during periods wherein education became compulsory for previously unschooled students. Neither the students nor their teachers had any positive attachment to one another nor to the schools. Disciplinary problems were rampant and were addressed through corporal punishment. In contrast to the opinion that leniency leads to chaos, the harsh discipline found in earlier times led, quite literally, to chaos.

We thus again see the pattern of coercive and authoritarian restrictions and disciplinary methods having the effect not of ending problems, but instead of producing a greater amount and more intense form of the very behavior that its application was intended to stymie. This is due to the fact that legitimately harmonious relations cannot be bred by coercion or force, and must instead be produced by voluntary association. Utilization of coercion or force will have the effect of producing contentious and hostile relations rather than peaceable ones, a reality acknowledged by the authors’ quotation of an astute observer's comment that “[t]here is as little disposition on the part of American children to obey the uncontrovertible will of their masters as on the part of their fathers to submit to the mandates of kings.”
 
Yes they have, but the methods are ineffective.

I disagree. There are a number of extremely effective strategies for parenting children. I'm a huge fan of the Love & Logic approach, which I do believe works. However, I also believe that parents should be allowed to use corporal punishment, within limits. A firmly delivered spanking on the buttocks in the early childhood years for specific behaviors is, in my opinion, fine. However, corporal punishment shouldn't be the sole "go to" approach that parents use. My parents used physical violence with me until I was 23.

It worked, depending on what the term "worked" means, but it essentially destroyed our relationship. Parents need a number of different tools in our tool belts, hitting our kids shouldn't be our only tool to manage their behavior.

It's a tool, I have no problems with it, but if the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a nail. Spanking is a hammer, and should only be used in specific circumstances. There are any other number of other strategies that can be more effective, depending on the age and disposition of the child.

Spanking is fine for a toddler, but beating the crap out of your 14 year old isn't an effective approach. Parents constantly have to work at doing our job, and we have to evolve, just like our kids do.

Parenting is a difficult, complicated job and it appears to me that a lot of Americans simply aren't willing to do it. IT isn't that they're attempting to use ineffective methods, but that their application of those methods suffers from their inconsistency, laziness, and unwillingness to be inconvenienced by the need to discipline their children.
 
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The mother's boyfriend did this, and the mother stood by.

See folks this is why you're not supposed to get involved in romantic relationships while you're raising children. The risks of child abuse are greater when you do, and the stresses of the step-parent dynamic is the leading cause of second-marriage divorces.

I wonder where the child's father is.

If I was the kid's father, the b/f would be making piece with his god, because I would be on my way over to kill him.
 
He's 2. I haven't decided whether we will celebrate Christmas to the extent that Santa Claus exists or whether we will celebrate the Easter Bunny (not Easter), as he's being raised Jewish. (I'm not kidding.)

Whoopsie. :3oops: My bad

And your examples are terrible! Santa, Tooth Fairy, and Easter Bunny are happy things. I don't know anyone who would say, "Those are examples of parents lying to their children."

I have actually had people argue that was a form of "lying" to your children. And more to the point, while yes, I know those things are a parent "lying" to them to make them happy and give them that magic of childhood, I intentionally distorted its intent to simply "teaching them lying is okay".

Just like you distorted spanking your child to teach them that if you break a big rule that you can get punished for it into "teaching them its okay to hit someone if you're bigger than them".

A time out has never been perceived as child abuse. I have given out some time outs, but I'm not a jerk about it. Again, very matter of fact. "You hit Mommy. It's not okay to hit Mommy, so you need to sit here for 2 minutes and think about it." I haven't had to give him a time out in ages because I think he learned from the other ones what "not" to do.

And spanking didn't use to be perceived as child abuse.

You hit mommy, and mommy is bigger than you, so mommy is going to force you to go sit in a corner and be confined for two minutes. Sure seems like teaching him if you're bigger and don't like someone doing something you can impose your will on them....at least, if you're going to use the same mindset that punishing a child with a swat on the behind is equivilent to teaching them its okay to hit someone if you're bigger then them.

I get what you're saying about time outs aps. I actually agree. But you're justifying what YOU do or what you have done, while over exaggerating and simpliying the things you dislike.

Ultimately though, children are different and part of being a good parent is knowing what's going to work for your kid. My sister and I are perfect examples.

My sister was a pistol of a kid. Bratty, rebelious, and always quick to talk back. Spanking didn't work with her. My parents have still joked about it sometimes how there'd be times she'd get swat on the behind and she'd look back and go "That didn't hurt" all sarcastically and just antagonize it farther. They learned relatively quickly it wasn't a very good discipline tool with her. However, sending her to her room or not allowing her on the phone or other isolating stuff where she was stuck by herself hit home much better.

I on the other hand was a far meeker kid, far more emotionally sensitive and was relatively logical for my age despite being generally a very imaginative kid (apparently I purposefully failed my kindergarden entrance test because I thought it meant I would have to go to school all the time and so I sabatoged myself). Isolation punishments didn't do much for me. You'd send me off to the corner for 5 minutes and I'd spend the time day dreaming or creating some random game in my head. Send me to my room and I'd find a pad to doodle on or pull out some legos I had stached away. However if punishment got far enough to where I was going to get spanked it generaly stuck, with the joke later being that I'd start reacting to it before any kind of swat even landed.

I think unfortunantly we've became a one size fit all society, and its just not how things are. EVERYONE responds to different stimulous and methods differently. I think some of the more severe type punishments should not be the first things out the gate, just like in adult life most of your most severe punishments don't come on a first offense or for a minor crime, but I don't think its unquestionable to use them at times. I just think there IS a line you can go over from punishment to all out abuse.
 
Whoopsie. :3oops: My bad



I have actually had people argue that was a form of "lying" to your children. And more to the point, while yes, I know those things are a parent "lying" to them to make them happy and give them that magic of childhood, I intentionally distorted its intent to simply "teaching them lying is okay".

Just like you distorted spanking your child to teach them that if you break a big rule that you can get punished for it into "teaching them its okay to hit someone if you're bigger than them".



And spanking didn't use to be perceived as child abuse.

You hit mommy, and mommy is bigger than you, so mommy is going to force you to go sit in a corner and be confined for two minutes. Sure seems like teaching him if you're bigger and don't like someone doing something you can impose your will on them....at least, if you're going to use the same mindset that punishing a child with a swat on the behind is equivilent to teaching them its okay to hit someone if you're bigger then them.

I get what you're saying about time outs aps. I actually agree. But you're justifying what YOU do or what you have done, while over exaggerating and simpliying the things you dislike.

Ultimately though, children are different and part of being a good parent is knowing what's going to work for your kid. My sister and I are perfect examples.

My sister was a pistol of a kid. Bratty, rebelious, and always quick to talk back. Spanking didn't work with her. My parents have still joked about it sometimes how there'd be times she'd get swat on the behind and she'd look back and go "That didn't hurt" all sarcastically and just antagonize it farther. They learned relatively quickly it wasn't a very good discipline tool with her. However, sending her to her room or not allowing her on the phone or other isolating stuff where she was stuck by herself hit home much better.

I on the other hand was a far meeker kid, far more emotionally sensitive and was relatively logical for my age despite being generally a very imaginative kid (apparently I purposefully failed my kindergarden entrance test because I thought it meant I would have to go to school all the time and so I sabatoged myself). Isolation punishments didn't do much for me. You'd send me off to the corner for 5 minutes and I'd spend the time day dreaming or creating some random game in my head. Send me to my room and I'd find a pad to doodle on or pull out some legos I had stached away. However if punishment got far enough to where I was going to get spanked it generaly stuck, with the joke later being that I'd start reacting to it before any kind of swat even landed.

I think unfortunantly we've became a one size fit all society, and its just not how things are. EVERYONE responds to different stimulous and methods differently. I think some of the more severe type punishments should not be the first things out the gate, just like in adult life most of your most severe punishments don't come on a first offense or for a minor crime, but I don't think its unquestionable to use them at times. I just think there IS a line you can go over from punishment to all out abuse.

I wholeheartedly agree with what you have written, and I appreciate the thoughtfulness you put into your posts in here. I didn't mean to sound like my statement would apply to all circumstances.

One of the things that I love about being a parent is choosing what things I will follow in my parents footsteps (imposing and enforcing a strict bedtime) and what I will never do (make him sit at the table until he finished his plate, spanking). I am willing to make changes when the situation calls for it, but I think I can say with no doubt is that I won't spank him. I can't. It's not who I am UNLESS he hit me as an older child. Then I would likely hit him back. But, boy, I hope I never encounter that.
 
And your examples are terrible! Santa, Tooth Fairy, and Easter Bunny are happy things. I don't know anyone who would say, "Those are examples of parents lying to their children."

Actually it is lying to your children. We know there is no Santa, or Easter Bunny or Tooth Fairy. Yet we tell them that they are real. That by it's very defination is lying to them.

I think I have sent him to bed without dinner one time, but I was very matter of fact about it. "I made you this for dinner. If you don't like it, you don't have to eat it. But I'm not going to make you another meal because you don't like what I made for you." He will never be forced to eat anything he doesn't like. I had that done to me, and I won't do it to him....ever.

With the millions of kids in the world that are starving you can be sure that I'm going to make my kids eat what they don't like if it is fixed for them. It will also teach them not to waste. If my kids don't eat what they are made for dinner then they get it cold for breakfast. My folks did that to me. And there's nothing that I won't eat that is put in front of me now. Even the stuff that I darn near throw up at even the smell of it.

A time out has never been perceived as child abuse. I have given out some time outs, but I'm not a jerk about it. Again, very matter of fact. "You hit Mommy. It's not okay to hit Mommy, so you need to sit here for 2 minutes and think about it." I haven't had to give him a time out in ages because I think he learned from the other ones what "not" to do.

A few years ago the area that I live in the CPS was trying to get something passed stating that putting your child in a corner was child abuse. So yes that type of time out was considered as child abuse. Stupid as it was.

As far as spankings teaching a child that hitting someone smaller than them is "OK" that's just a cop out. My parents spanked me plenty and I never considered that beating up on smaller folks as being OK. And obviously you didn't either.
 
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The first thing I thought was... poor girl. This isn't the old school days when soap was lye and ruffage. Soap contains a number of foaming agents now and various poisons which aren't even suitable on the skin... and they made her chew on a bar. Gross.

Of course they had to take her to the hospital. Soap is an external use only product.
 
And your examples are terrible! Santa, Tooth Fairy, and Easter Bunny are happy things. I don't know anyone who would say, "Those are examples of parents lying to their children."

In all seriousness, those are examples of parents lying to their children.

Every year I teach my boys (5 and 8) the history of Santa and why we celebrate him with "the Santa game", where everyone pretends that Santa is real and hands out gifts.

This drives my estranged wife nuts. As if that weren't enough reason to keep doing it, I don't want my children believing these fairy-tails as though they're actual literal fact when I know otherwise.

Lying per-se is not right or wrong, and I have and would again lie to my children if it served their interest, but allowing them to believe in Santa would sew mistrust.

Now then, queue the token atheist: "Well why do you teach you kids about God and other fairy-tails, then?"
 
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The first thing I thought was... poor girl. This isn't the old school days when soap was lye and ruffage. Soap contains a number of foaming agents now and various poisons which aren't even suitable on the skin... and they made her chew on a bar. Gross.

Of course they had to take her to the hospital. Soap is an external use only product.

The way my mom washed my mouth out with soap was to take a little dish liquid on her the tip of her finger and rub it on my lips, which I immediately licked and got the dish liquid (a very small amount) on my tongue. And that was enough.

I think my mother washed my mouth out with soap twice. Once for saying a dirty word and once for telling her a lie. A blatant "no, I didn't break that vase" when she was standing right there and saw me break the vase.

Twice. that's all it took. These people went way overboard.
 
Do you have a study that indicates school disciplinary problems have increased over the past 30 years?

I doubt very seriously that any such study has been done. But the very fact that at one point you could bring a gun/knife to school and no one blinked twice at it and compare it to now when much of the punishments used back then are considered child abuse now vs how guns/knives are treated in schools now shows to me that there is a correlation. Unless you can come up with another explanation that's more logical?

Reason that I think such a study has not been done is because then the CPS would have to be reigned in and Big Brother would have less power.
 
sticking an object in the mouth is a way to solve problems. :

Now, cummon, Aps -- you have to admit that there are certain problems that can be handled most efficiently by exactly such an action.
 
Now, cummon, Aps -- you have to admit that there are certain problems that can be handled most efficiently by exactly such an action.

You want aps to chew on your bar for 10 minutes?

Ouch!
 
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