Gentle Parenting has failed, lets accept this.

[Zod666]

I read everyday about children's behaviour, even primary school age where they are out of control, don't fear or respect adults and this is all down to that loverly middle class BS known as 'Gentle Parenting'.

Let's just call this out for what it is, because it does not work. I have a friend who's 8 year old son does what he likes, is disrespectful, hits his mum and no amount of 'punishment' such as removal of electronic devices etc makes a blind bit of difference, he just does not care.

So how do we discipline children like this? is it really bad to give them a measured smack on the back of the legs/bum? Obviously there is a difference between a smack to correct a child and beating the hell out of them which is child abuse and should be prosecuted, and in England smacking is still legal.......

In years gone by their have always been kids that will go too far, and by this I mean the James Bulger killers who I think no amount of discipline would have changed their outcome in life, but for the majority of kids I feel we are failing them with this soft approach where there think they can do anything without repercussions.

AIBU?

What now? Maybe she should start caning her little brat with a slipper I’m sure that will solve all her problems.

delusional. Absolutely out of this world detached from reality.

How, can you give examples please?

Wow, I've seen it all now.

Of course yabu to think hitting children is ok.

There are so many different facets as to why your friend's son might be misbehaving and unless you live with them, you don't know what they are.

Emotional difficulties, excessive screentime, attachment issues, inconsistent boundaries, being too permissive, being too authoritarian, insufficient sleep, poor diet, exposure to inappropriate people or material. We cannot analyse your friend's parenting because the only information we've got is that he's out of control and she doesn't hit him.

I can say with certainty that hitting him isn't going to improve any of the root causes of his behaviour. It sounds like she's relying on a book to tell her how to parent him instead of looking at the child she has in front of her and actually doing the work of figuring out what he needs.

You've come on here to rant about an 8 year old you've met who you think should be hit. Of course no-one is on your side. What did you expect? "Oh yeh, based on absolutely no information about the child or the friend, definitely she should start doing something which has been proven ineffective and damaging by all scientific research."

And then telling the many of us who have not had to resort to violence to manage our children's behaviour that we either all have miraculously well-behaved children through none of our own doing, or they just haven't reached the age where we'll suddenly want to start hitting them.

You think you got hit and turned out fine, I think you're anything but fine.

There is never any excuse to hit a child but I am dismayed at some of the posts on parent/child relationships. I don't think it's right or healthy that parents should always mask or hide their own emotions from their children. For example, there was a post from a woman whose teenage son had kicked a football into a valuable ornament. She was unwell, her own mother (I believe) had just died and a number of other life events had occurred. As a consequence she shouted at her son when the ornament was broken and was advised on MN to go hug him and tell him she'd never shout again and that she loved him unconditionally. I think this is wrong. She is a human being with frailties, frustrations and a full set of emotions! Should her son go through life thinking that his mother is superhuman or even an automaton existing only to acknowledge his needs and sensibilities? Will he go into adulthood thinking that all adults (especially women) should accommodate him?

again please learn to read.

Who, exactly, told you that saying "no" or "that's not a good idea" to a child is a mean thing?

I am Gen X and got smacked and I would never smack my daughter. The day I lay a finger on her I have lost her respect. I would also be a rubbish parent.

please only comment if your IQ is over 40.

Please take your own advice OP...

Can you genuinely not think of a single form of discipline that doesn’t involve physical violence? Are you thick?

You’re right, it was always for talking and I still talk.

But you haven't really told us anything about your friends parenting, just that she's "read all the books" and her son is terrible. The only practical example is punishing by removing electronics, which is not gentle parenting.

Either her parenting is ineffectual (not "gentle") or her son is an particular terror - but in either case I can't see hitting him improving it?

Too many people think gentle parenting means no boundaries or consequences. True gentle parenting is just parenting without violence or shame. Quite a few “gentle” parents label themselves as such but actually misguidedly think that means no discipline at all.
I prefer the term “authoritative” parenting for this reason.

That said, I do think a lot of kids’ behaviour is worse these days. I don’t think it’s down to not smacking kids anymore. I think it’s a combination of screen time addiction in parents and in children and a societal problem where parents are often working 3 or more jobs between them to afford to live and they’re too darn tired to take the harder route of holding boundaries.

No no I meant I agree with the gentle parenting part, I specifically meant that parents don't even raise their voice to kids these days. That's why I said the teachers who have discipline are the ones who are 'loud' and will shout when necessary

The whole point of smacking is that it's for reasonable chastisement and that's it's moderate and within sensible limits.

I have read all of your posts. You have said that she sometimes confiscates his electronics (which is unlikely to meet the strict definition of gentle parenting unless the electronics are directly related to the behaviour) and that she follows "gentle parenting" exactly and has read some books.

You have shown no evidence that you actually know what gentle parenting is so I'll pass on believing that you are qualified to assess whether she's doing it or not. You haven't even specified which books. Anyone could write a book and stick "Gentle Parenting" on the front, including you, and we have all seen how much nonsense you talk.

It seems like I am reading just fine, you just don't like it that your extremely lazy solution, "Oh well, just hit him then!" has been shown up to be ludicrous. It sounds like your friend and her son need help, and definitely not from you.

It's clearly a fundamental flaw of gentle parenting though that SO many people misunderstand it and get it wrong.

Like it's a poorly defined concept if so many people think the poor parenting they are doing, aligns with 'Gentle Parenting'.
Most of us will agree the majority of these poor parents honestly think they are gentle parenting.

Furthermore, most of the people I know who then argue that that's not gentle parenting blah blah blah and claim they are doing the REAL gentle parenting? Also have poorly behaved, entitled children with poor boundaries.

This is a weird way to say you want to smack your friend’s kid.

I would say your friend probably isn’t doing it right.

YABU. I'm a teacher. The vast majority of badly-behaved kids I've taught have not been the children of middle-class gentle-parenting types.

Nothing about this is right. Of course people bully when they are the product of abusive behaviour. It is all they know.

Are you sure, because this is MN and we like to demonise the middle class as being the very worst kind of people 😆

These threads about justifying physical abuse as a way to parent are getting tiresome and dire.

Haven't RTFT but obviously it did affect you, as you're now a person that thinks it's ok to hit a child in the name of parenting.