"Fair" punishment

pdog said:

I've been clear that I'm interested in the behavioral and punitive aspects of this example, but I don't want to be deceitful and let you believe that this is ONLY about disciplining children. Will I ask you at some point about the application of adults? Maybe. But as stated previously I will entertain the debate of the failed analogy between children and adults if that is your position.

The question is what component is fair about a time out (also use them a ton) that isn't present with toys. Why is taking away half of their toys a waste of time. To me it's the relationship of that thing of value to the kid. Both kids have the same amount of time in a day. But if you use a unit that is unequal between those two kids, is a kid that had enough insulation from the punishment really being punished the same?

And I should clarify something - this is not about progressive fines, nor did I seek to absolutely defend progressive fines in the other thread. The bigger question to me is can something with a disparity be an effective and fair punishment. I could easily agree with you - it is pointless to try to make a fair punishment out of an arbitrary quantity of toys.

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Everything has disparity, all of your punishments are equal and not equal depending on the standard applied

Hypotheticals are poor debate fodder to begin with and vague hypotheticals are even worse. Why am I punishing the boys, not what action but why am I the arbiter? Are they both my boys, then why did I buy one so many more toys than the other? Is only one my boy, why am I punishing someone elses kid? Am I a teacher of the boys, what right do I have to take away their toys?

ttwtt78640 said:

Lets say that Timmy has an X-box and a remote controlled helicopter and that Tommy has two matchbox cars and two stuffed bears. Does that change your idea of equality of deprivation any?

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Not if they both have to give up 100% and sit in the same chair .

pdog said:

I never considered this a complex question until recently. I wanted to put it into generic terms and see what kind of responses I got but do it in terms that was a little less loaded. This is largely a social science question regarding concepts like surplus, deprivation, etc.

This is simply an opinion poll. The boys are the same in each scenario, and you can assume that they misbehaved in the same manner. The number of toys never change. The only thing that changes is the cost of punishment. Choose the one you feel treats both boys with the same degree of punishment and maybe explain why.

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Deprive both of all toys. This is the only effective negative reinforcement available. In terms of "punishment", the goal is to deprive pleasure in order to shape behavior. In terms of fairness, they receive the same punishment with total deprivation. Keep in mind "loss" and "punishment" are not equivalent terms. A greater loss isn't necessarily a greater punishment and a lesser loss isn't always less punishment. I would also comment that "fairness" is a secondary consideration in the effectiveness of punishment and should not be secondary in other contexts.

pdog said:

That is not, nor has it ever been the question at hand. This is two people punching somebody, period. I have no interest in talking about the arbitrary fine decided by an authority.


The numbers you broke down below were my elaboration



But this is the very definition of "appeal to authority." There is no logic that goes into establishing a fine anymore than there is to establishing the number of toys. IT IS ARBITRARY.


Exactly. The aspect is from the effect on the punishee.



You're comparing, not establishing basis for either of those two examples. You're justifying 'more' which I agree with. But one toy more or 100 toys more is completely arbitrary.

7) While everyone does not have toys everyone has time.
Totally, 100% agree. So why do we have penalties in "toys" at all?


No - I see "all toys" being equal. Neither kid gets to play and must think about their actions. The reality is that this 100% toys option is the same has not making the punishment based on toys at all. It is TIME without toys.

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Why is the one week not equally arbitrary - why not 3 days or a month? Would you advocate eliminating fines as an option, leaving only freedom deprivation (jail or house arrest) as a possible sentence? Fines act as a restitution to society, acting simply as a crime tax, while freedom deprivation has a cost to society as well as to the perp.

Lutherf said:

Since Tommy has 4 toys and Timmy only has 2 then the only fair thing would be to have Tommy give Timmy one of his toys so that both have 3. In that way Tommy will feel the sting of the righteous hand of justice and Timmy will be less inclined to misbehave because he is now on the same socioeconomic level as Tommy.

While it would appear at first glance that taking all toys away from both boys would achieve the same result this would be false. To exercise that option would be to ignore the social benefits of "restorative justice".

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Dear God, I pray this is sarcasm.

pdog said:

Not if they both have to give up 100% and sit in the same chair .

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But that requires action on the part of another for the entire week just to make sure that they stay in that chair (unless you handcuff them). Taking the toy(s) is instant and requires no more than securing them out of reach of the child, e.g. locking the toy(s) in the car trunk.

Henrin said:

Yes, everyone can see the poll question, but no one knows why their toys are relevant to the question or what the boys actually did.

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The OP thinks that people with more should pay more for the same misbehavior simply because they have more.
it is nothing more than an appeal to emotion argument.

so in other words.

timmy has 2 toys and tommy has 4 and so tommy should have to pay more toys if he misbehaves than timmy since timmy has more.

it is a failed argument all the way around.

ttwtt78640 said:

The poll question deals with sentencing for an infraction, I picked option #2 because it is the least severe. If a fine, penalty or sentence is to be equal or "fair" then it may not vary based on anything except the nature of the offense, and possibly one's prior record of offenses. The concept of taking a percentage of one's assets is not fair because that implies that jaywalking is not equally serious based on one's wealth. The example should have included a child with 100 toys and a child with no toys - which makes it impossible to punish the child with no toys and far less likely to see option #1 as fair.

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How did you get all that from the question? The Idea that punishing children and civil penalties are in any way related is way off base IMO.

johndylan1 said:

How did you get all that from the question? The Idea that punishing children and civil penalties are in any way related is way off base IMO.

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If a child has no (or few) toys then what was the punishment? The idea that taking everything for any minor infraction (not doing a homework assignment) as the "fair" thing to do escapes me.

ttwtt78640 said:

If a child has no (or few) toys then what was the punishment? The idea that taking everything for any minor infraction (not doing a homework assignment) as the "fair" thing to do escapes me.

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Loss does not equal punishment, deprivation does. The operative word is punish. In this example there were no boys without toys, had there been that available as a circumstance I would have to find another form of punishment for the toyless boy and consider applying the alternative to both.

ttwtt78640 said:

If a child has no (or few) toys then what was the punishment? The idea that taking everything for any minor infraction (not doing a homework assignment) as the "fair" thing to do escapes me.

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Not taking away every toy is hardly a punishment. Kids only need one to be perfectly entertained. THAT is what you are trying to take away, their entertainment. Well, kids don't even really NEED toys for entertainment. So yeah, IMO, unless you can take away ALL of their toys, you're wasting your time just taking away SOME of them, for, say, not doing some of their homework.

The poll is rigged, there is no option for locking them in the basement for a month.

johndylan1 said:

Dear God, I pray this is sarcasm.

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It would be if it wasn't so damned close to some of the lunatic ideas I've seen proposed around here.

pdog said:

I don't care about any of this right now. I'm interested in one particular facet, particularly the severity relative to the punishee. Nothing more, nothing less.

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For Gods sake man think of the children.

Well, I HAVE two boys. I am certain that one of them must have more toys than the other. If they get in sufficient enough trouble they would both loose ALL their toys.

pdog said:

I never considered this a complex question until recently. I wanted to put it into generic terms and see what kind of responses I got but do it in terms that was a little less loaded. This is largely a social science question regarding concepts like surplus, deprivation, etc.

This is simply an opinion poll. The boys are the same in each scenario, and you can assume that they misbehaved in the same manner. The number of toys never change. The only thing that changes is the cost of punishment. Choose the one you feel treats both boys with the same degree of punishment and maybe explain why.

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The answer is obviously the first poll choice.Because with the other choices Tommy is not punished the same as Timmy due to the fact with every option Tommy has more toys to play with than Timmy. Those with the dicks of the rich in their mouth will claim that trying to make financial punishments hurt the same is just a e-vile socialist commie plot of stealing from the rich and redistributing to others.

johndylan1 said:

In terms of The word "punishment" the only effective negative reinforcement that is available is to remove all toys. In terms of fairness, equality isn't the preeminent goal but effectiveness is. Punishment shapes behavior, fairness shapes feelings.

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Why is the only "effective" option to remove all toys? I'm interested in the thought process that let people arrive there.

Even if equality isn't the goal, didn't we effectively achieve equality? By making both boys loose all toys we effectively changed the units to something that does relate equally to both boys - TIME away from toys.

Quag said:

The poll is rigged, there is no option for locking them in the basement for a month.

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considering you are joking ( you may guess what I think now ) that would be fantastic :mrgreen:

KevinKohler said:

Well, I'm no parental expert...I have a 5 year old daughter, and a 3 year old son, and frankly, I just kinda make **** up as I go. I think my parents did a pretty bang up job with me, but I can't remember **** from when I was 5. I think that taking things away makes for a better punishment than physical pain or fear, up to a point. Physical pain is over with rather quickly, unless you're a hardcore spanker, at which point...well, we won't get into that. For me, as a kid, the worst was when I KNEW I was getting a spanking when my dad got home, and had to sit around and WAIT for it. My kids are still a bit young for that, IMO, so I take away something equally precious, their time. Time out for me is sitting in a chair facing the wall at the end of the hallway, QUIETLY. The timer doesn't start till you stop crying or yelling or screaming. Works wonders. I don't think I would be physically capable of taking away ALL of their toys. I'd have to lock them in the computer room, and even then, they might have one or two stashed.

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Agree on all accounts. We have similar parenting styles (I have two kids of similar age and the same distance apart). I try not to yell - it's a signal to the kid that I'm loosing control and kids are fricking geniuses at exploiting inconsistency. Instead repeating the same answer over in over in a calm voice is my game - you can literally see and hear the kid grow more and more frustrated that he is not having any luck changing the outcome.

As for the other argument...punishments between the wealthy and not wealthy will NEVER be fair. They CAN'T be. Good quote from the last Batman movie...."The rich don't even go broke the same...". And that's the truth. You could take away ALL of Warren Buffets money for speeding, and the man would be perfectly fine. He has access to resources the rest of us don't, by virtue of his wealth and reputation. There's no changing that, and all progressive fines will serve to do is make our legal system even worse, more expensive, and more jammed up. Imagine a world where rich people hire lawyers to fight every single fine or citation, instead of just paying them outright?

Taking away half of their toys does not deprive them of toys. A kid only needs one. I mean, if you had older kids, with a xbox or whatever, would taking away HALF of his video games REALLY hurt him? Not really. Sure, he'll wine for a few minutes, but then he'll realize he's perfectly fine picking up some game he hasn't played in a while. Same with kids and toys. It doesn't....hurt them. It's just not gonna deter them from acting up, the same way taking away ALL of their toys would. And for my money, timeout is SO MUCH EASIER.

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I don't disagree at all. Not one single bit. But it was obvious to you that an arbitrary number of toys is not effective, presumably since in the case of your kids, they have more than enough other toys to insulate themselves from the punishment. An earlier poster broke the toys down into a point value system - each person has the same number of points and those points are divided by the number of toys, showing the difference in personal value that each toy has. The reoccurring theme is that when the cost has the same availability to each person, the punishment is deemed fair. In the case here everybody goes with TIME - no toys is the same as timeouts - they are both TIME away from toys and both boys have roughtly the same amount of time to sacrifice. Is it perfect, no. Never will be. But it seems that we can do the same thing with fines that we are doing with toys - just not use them.

Effective, yes, as evidenced by a lack of rich people speeding around all over the place...fair? No.

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First we'd have to have statistical data for this. But isn't it a red herring anyway? Why do we need to treat effectiveness and equality separately? If we just remove toys/fines, don't we end up with a system that is both more effective and more equal?

Medusa said:

considering you are joking ( you may guess what I think now ) that would be fantastic :mrgreen:

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Well I was considering sending them to the salt mines for punishment should have been an option, but not everyone lives near one

Crovax said:

Everything has disparity, all of your punishments are equal and not equal depending on the standard applied

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I disagree. One of those options effectively changed the unit of punishment (toys) to something more equally held amongst the boys.

Hypotheticals are poor debate fodder to begin with and vague hypotheticals are even worse. Why am I punishing the boys, not what action but why am I the arbiter? Are they both my boys, then why did I buy one so many more toys than the other? Is only one my boy, why am I punishing someone elses kid? Am I a teacher of the boys, what right do I have to take away their toys?

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I disagree. I understand people's need to have more realistic details, but that should be entirely unnecessary with abstract thinking. I'm an engineer and these are variables to me. The punishment is X. I don't need to know what X - because if X is the same on both sides of the equation, it simply cancels. For those that need a little more realism, I tell them both boys decided to play with their toys instead of doing homework. But that's all you get. You need to be able to imagine two completely equal boys in all ways accept for the number of toys. Is it realistic to imagine that you personally know two perfectly equal boys. Of course not, but that is not the focus - and the reality is that this abstract thinking parallels the aggregate very well. You might not be able to find two perfectly equal boys. But you could take two large groups of boys and do the exact same thing.

While "the basement" part is extreme - isn't that effectively "no toys"?

pdog said:

I never considered this a complex question until recently. I wanted to put it into generic terms and see what kind of responses I got but do it in terms that was a little less loaded. This is largely a social science question regarding concepts like surplus, deprivation, etc.

This is simply an opinion poll. The boys are the same in each scenario, and you can assume that they misbehaved in the same manner. The number of toys never change. The only thing that changes is the cost of punishment. Choose the one you feel treats both boys with the same degree of punishment and maybe explain why.

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Sorry, but I wouldn't take away any toys. I'd spank both boys until they couldn't sit.

(I'm just kidding. Don't worry, I don't think spanking is a suitable punishment)

I would tailor my punishment to the particular boy. For example, one of the boys loves to play his musical instrument. I'd take that away. The other boy loves to play video games. Sorry, kid...the computer stays off.

jamesrage said:

The answer is obviously the first poll choice.Because with the other choices Tommy is not punished the same as Timmy due to the fact with every option Tommy has more toys to play with than Timmy.

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But can you quantify the "obviousness" of that choice. That's the part I'm interested in - looking at the subconscious logic instead of just treating it as a gut feeling.

Quag said:

Well I was considering sending them to the salt mines for punishment should have been an option, but not everyone lives near one

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that would be less entertaining :lol: