Aibu to think most people don't smack their children

[sqirrelfriends]

So I just read a daily mail article (I know it's trash, please don't judge me) that's saying that experts are calling for smacking to be banned in England.

The comments section really surprised me, I don't know anyone who smacks their kids but it's overflowing with people saying that its the only way to control children and that half the prison population are there because they weren't smacked. Anyone saying that its wrong to physically punish a child is downvoted into oblivion.

Am I wrong to think this should have been illegal a long time ago? It's just seems wrong to be and my understanding was that kids who have been hit are more likely to be violent themselves.

My mother used to hit me on a regular basis and I haven't forgiven her. I suspect the only reason she wouldn't attempt to hit me now is because I am taller and stronger than her (which is why she stopped hitting me as I got older)
She is still an incredibly angry and aggressive person to speak to.
She pretends to others that she is a wonderful, loving, family oriented person.
The older my DC gets the more angry I feel towards her, as I could never hurt my child.

Yes I have- twice. Once when my child was five, and she found it a good game to run from our doorstep whilst I was locking the door, run 100 meters or so towards a very busy road and was literally about to run in front of a traveling car doing 40mph until I grabbed her. I had thrown my bag and left my door wide open to jump down the steps to sprint after her.

The other was when she was throwing an almighty tantrum aged 4 and nearly threw us both down a flight of steps as a result. I managed to turn around on the small step we were both stood on rather than fall down them all together (I was carrying her). God knows how.

Not saying these instances are ok at all- would I publicly admit to them- no. But both had her putting herself significantly in harms way for me to snap. Before I’d even blinked I’d smacked her. She’s 10 now and absolutely lovely and we’ve spoken about both a few times (still has zero road sense due to various reasons). All I can say is she didn’t repeat either of these behaviours again.

All I can say is she didn’t repeat either of these behaviours again.

I hope you didn't either. But you say she still has zero road sense for various reasons, so I'm unclear as to how much you were able to teach her about it by hitting her.

You could have kept her bodily between you and the door as you were locking it, or used reins. 100m is a long way for a child to run, that's a fair amount of time to have your back turned (and your door was still wide open when you turned and ran?) It's the responsibility of a parent to keep control over a child who is too young to have that level of awareness.

I suppose this is the point where we hear about why it was absolutely impossible to keep control of your young child or lock the door quicker in the circumstances, but if that's the case, there are still better solutions than hitting, especially when you admit it was completely unthinking. Rather like what she did...

I'm not having a go at you for making a mistake. But once again, you're doing that thing of justifying it ("she didn't do it again", yet still has no road sense) rather than looking at how you, the parent, could have handled the whole situation better.

Yeah probably right.

Road sense- there are underlying issues we have found out later that make this a huge obstacle for her- without going into detail it’s something that requires a diagnosis. She presents extremely well though and I was told for years by numerous professionals it was something or nothing/ that they would grow out of it.

But yeah I could have done all that. Reins- absolutely no way would they have put those on. She refused to go in a pushchair at 18 months. But that’s also hindsight unfortunately and she also runs like Usain Bolt (and still does- just not into main roads!)

And no she wasn’t unsupervised for 100 meters- she got a 5 metre start on me and is that bloody swift I struggled to catch her!

Well there you go...you are one of the parents who has done it, but looks back to see exactly how it came about - the sequence of events that led to the situation - and how you could handle it differently in the future (though it sounds as though she's more or less grown up now). Huge difference to those who would still insist that the situation was completely unavoidable to start with and a smack was right...that they have nothing to learn from it themselves about how to prevent it in future.

Yeah I do regret it on the whole I think. It’s just not as black and white as others see it.

I have two younger ones and wouldn’t ever do it- but then they aren’t as challenging either (that’s not a kind thing to say but I’m being factual). Even at aged 3 they wouldn’t do what she did and would happily wear reins etc. It’s hard and not as black and white as it seems in my opinion- probably why the rules are so wishy washy.

I was smacked as a child.

I would never and have never smacked my kids. Husband feels exactly the same - it's just not within us to do it and I genuinely never ever could.

But, I was fairly surprised recently to hear that three friends do - it just came up in conversation with them individually.

So tbh I do think more people that we all realise do smack.

When you hold a strong opinion about something it's easy to imagine lots of people feel the same - but it's not always the case.