Did all parents hit their kids in the 1970s?

[Polythene]

I often hear that this was the norm. But was it, really?

I was Never smacked by either parent, but I wasn't an angel either 😅

Punishments were usually being kept in and made to stay in my room until my parents realised this didn't bother me because I'd read and listen to records.

So the worst punishment became having to sit in the living room watching TV with mum.and dad, no books, nothing! It was torture 😅

In the early 70's, 1972 I think, I was in the very early stages of a long teaching career, working for ILEA (the Inner London Education Authority) and it was considered a go-ahead move when they corporal punishment. Certainly it was accepted as run-of the mill in the rest of the UK.
The "law" (or ILEA regulation) came into effect not at the start of the academic year in September, but the calendar year in January, so I'd had my current class for a term already.
I vividly remember the DM of a sweet, well-behaved child coming up to see me and, in all seriousness saying, "Never you mind the change in the law, Miss TwoSheds; if you think my DC needs a smack, you give her a smack!" This was no child-beating harridan, but a regular school mum.
I assured her that I rarely had to raise my voice to her child, let alone my hand! Most of the children seemed to expect being smacked for naughtiness, and some, sadly, would flinch if approached unexpectedly.
ILEA was ahead of national legislation, where corporal punishment was finally abolished in 1986 (I think) when Sarah Ferguson famously did her good deed for the children of Britain by snarling up the traffic around Westminster Abbey, hence the Houses of Parliament, on her wedding day, holding back from voting by traffic jam the Tory backswoodmen in the House of Lords, coming up to London on a rare visit, intent on stopping the legislation going through on the grounds that flogging never did them any harm.
It remained legal in the independent sector until the passing of the Human Rights Act (I think 1999).
I remember chatting to a colleague about this when I had taken a job in the independent sector; he remarked that although it had remained legal for far longer, it had in fact been discontinued long at this school long since, mostly in the grounds that it was not only brutal but ineffective.
When I was at Junior School, I remember thinking that it was unfair that only boys got the cane, even though I was on the right side of that deal! It never occurred to me that smacking could be considered wrong; I didn't suffer it often, but was philosophical when it happened.
My own role model was my girls' grammar school; there was no corporal punishment, and it was perfectly possible to maintain discipline without it. (I think it was still an option at the parallel boys' school).

I was a teen in the 70s.
I used my mum’s words back at her in a brilliant burn (if I do say so myself) and POW right in the kisser.
lol I saw those stars and birds flying around my head exactly like they did in old cartoons.

I don’t know why I didn’t respond in kind or yell or cry, but I didn’t.
I got the leash and got my dog and took us on a walk - a long one - and ended up at a park, where we stayed for at least 2 hours.
If it was between Mum and me - the dog would always protect me. I loved that dog and she loved me and she was fierce.

After we got home I gave my mother a wide berth - she was in the wrong and she knew it.
But Mum didn’t apologise. Mum never apologised for a single thing ever. Not once.

My spankings all occurred in the 60s.
I remember the punishments, but not the crimes.
I imagine Mum recalled it that way, too.

I remember the wooden spoons, the yardsticks too. And, of course, whatever was at hand.
But that fist takes center stage for me. That fist gave me a black eye.

I was born in 1976 and was never hit by my parents. I wasn’t hit at school either. I don’t remember the teachers ever hitting the kids, actually. I knew a couple of boys who were regularly beaten at home, but that wasn’t discipline, it was abuse by vile, sadistic, bullying fathers.

I don’t think hitting kids was quite so common as people believe. A lot depended on the adults involved. My grandmother, for example, adored her father. He had fought in WW1 and been wounded twice. He’d also been involved in hand to hand fighting (a tough man, in other words). Yet he never hit any of his five children.

In my primary school (mid 70s) they thought nothing of slapping the back of a 5 year olds hand if they spoke out of line. For more serious "crimes" children (always seemed to be boys) got slippered on their bare bottoms in full view of the class. I still vividly remember a 10 year old boy bent over the female teacher's lap, wriggling and crying and trying to cover his bottom.

60s child, I was never smacked or hit. My brothers were as they were tearaway. I was a very good child though and was scared of my mum even shouting at me,which she never actually did.
I remember at secondary a teacher pinning a year 7 up by his neck against a wall, that was shocking even at that time. Mostly in my area we were still quite subservient to adults so a threat of some kind of punishment was enough.
I have never smacked or hit my kids and there is no way my DD would do anything above mildly raising her voice to DGD.
Happy time have changed.

Mine did but actually more in the 60’s. I hated every minute (who would?) and swore I wouldn’t hit my kids and we didn’t.

born in the 50's, never smacked and neither were my siblings.

I wasn’t but my mum was beaten badly by her mother in the 50s and 60s and she never wanted to do that to us,

Didn’t do me any harm.

And in the 80’s and 90’s as well. I was smacked and sometimes hit with a big wooden hairbrush.

I was at a friends birthday party aged about 8. My friend was cheeky to her mum. We were all sat at the table having our party food. Her mum leathered the hell out of her and sent her upstairs. The kids that lived close by went home after myself included. Obviously nobody was in a party mood. Just a couple of kids that lived too far to walk alone waited to be collected and her extended family that stayed. My friend passed away a few years later and that’s the only clear memory I have of her.

I got smacked on the bum a small handful of times- probably fewer than 5. Always by my mum, never my dad. I survived unscathed but didn’t smack my own children.

Yes and my parents didnt need too much od an excuse to dish out a belting

My mother smacked or slapped me relatively regularly, my father never laid a finger on me. To be honest, I preferred her slapping me to the shouting. I was born in 1958, for reference.

I think my most memorable smacking was when I was 6, when my class teacher slapped my legs for not going to the toilet at playtime (I didn't want to go and a tooth had come out, so I was rinsing my mouth in the classroom).

I wasn’t smacked in the 80’s/90’s

My parents weren’t smacked in the 60’s/70’s

And apparently my grandparents on both sides weren’t smacked either except at school.

My grandparents and great grandparents had very tough lives though and I suspect didn’t want to introduce violence into their lives when they’d been through so much already

I know, so risky. There seemed to be little consideration of the danger. Mind you, I watched one of those fights on a TV drama last night where two thugs were hitting each over the head with weapons and just getting up and doing it again. I know from my years in healthcare they would IRL be temporarily stunned and permanently disabled after just one such blow.

I was smacked three or four times, as were my siblings.
We were warned about a behaviour and then if we continued and earnt a smack (slap on fully clothed bum or leg with open hand) we received one.
We each remember and discuss our smacks and laugh about our naughty feats. For example, warned and punished about some climbing and sliding pranks that destroyed two garden trees; and being warned not to call my mother 'awful' again by my father, then immediately calling her that defiantly - was rewarded by being asked to step outside the back door for a smack. I knew I deserved it so walked out and took it.
Cried in my bedroom then apologised to Mum.
One of my brothers received a smack for calling the neighbour smelly more than once.
One received a smack for continually pulling my sister's glasses off.

The desired affect was achieved.

Parents never smacked other people's children.
Parents didn't embarrass their kids with a public smack unless it was to stop them being run over in traffic.
Families were larger, in smaller houses, with less time for long explanations about the obvious.

Teachers could smack in the 1970s and 80s - generally used the same rules of issuing a warning and dealing out a measured smack soon after. I witnessed three smacks on the hand with a ruler by teachers in the classroom and about six occasions where children were sent to the Principal's office for the strap for very disruptive, criminal and rude behaviour - never for not completing homework type things - like for stealing someone's money repeatedly, stabbing a classmates shoes with a javelin, throwing pencils and chairs, putting holes in a wall, and pulling girls' hair.

The Principal would make the child (usually a boy) wait in line outside for a good half hour then have them come in and explain their crime. They would then issue one hit by a leather strap to an outstretched hand. They were told that it would be harder if they withdrew their hand. One boy told us it actually was harder. We liked talking to the boys about what happened when they got the strap. They had to apologise in a letter to their teacher too.

By far the most usual way of discipling children at school was to have them stay in at recess to write one hundred lines on a page of paper. The sentence, displayed on the blackboard, was something like - I will not trip up my friends when in line for assembly.

Our family were extremely well mannered and obeyed rules.
We were also very happy, laughy and expressive children - encouraged to converse at dinner and to share our opinions.
We knew some naughtier children and they rightly received more smacks. In my mind, if was fair.

They were times where parents expected kids to join society, be polite and helpful and to do chores. I remember being trusted to stay home alone, walk to shops, use sewing machines, knives, stoves and light the fire by about eight.

The wooden spoon whacked on the back of the legs was normal in my world. That made me determined never to raise a hand to my kids, parents were easily frustrated and didn’t seem to understand kids the way we do now. In my grandmothers time babies were put in the pram at the end of the garden. Their crying was thought to be ‘exercising their lungs’!

From my experience most parents did. Some teachers were pretty handy with the slaps as well at my primary school.

Thinking back its amazing this was just part of accepted life isn't it?

Edited to add, I never hit my own children.

Born in the 1960’s. Slapped with a hand, normally on the back of legs by Mum. Not frequently and never hard enough to leave a mark.
It was over quickly. If I’d ever been given the choice between a smack and being sent to bed early I would have chosen the smack.

We need big subtitles to come across the screen on those sorts of scenes, along the lines of those "Do not try this at home" warnings.

Not all of them.

Not every parent but I do think smacking was common. My mum smacked us a handful of times that I remember, my dad never did. Schools had the slipper or the cane - I only remember one or two really naughty boys that got caned though. I think by the time I was at Comprehensive School in the 80s it was dying out thankfully

Smacked on the hand, yes

It was so wrong and harmed my relationships with my parents

My parents didn’t, thankfully.

but the headteacher did.

I was born in the early 1960s and would say that “low level” physical punishment was fairly common.

I was one of four children. My father never laid a finger on us, but my mother used to “shake” us very occasionally.

At primary school the headmistress once smacked me on the back of my calf with a ruler because I spilt a bottle of ink (accidentally obviously). I still remember how unfair that felt.