Did all parents hit their kids in the 1970s?

[Polythene]

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

bullshit.

One particular boy I remember growing up with his mum used to get the hoover wire and whip him with it
She can’t understand for the life of her why he died of a heroin overdose in his late 20s, I guess it was all that love and positive role modelling that she gave him

I’ve never done any of that. I’ve never removed devices. I’ve never stopped pocket money. I’ve never smacked and yet there they are university graduates holding down full-time jobs and functioning in society. It must be a miracle.

Boys aged between 6 and 19 may be given up to three strokes with a light rattan cane on the buttocks over clothing or the palm of the hand as a punishment for serious misconduct, often as a last resort.

I disagree with it but it doesn't sound hugely extreme. I suspect their results are due to other factors.

That’s so awful 😢

Actually, I’m the same. I can’t even remember punishing my sons. They were children, still learning and the years they were small were the best years for me. I laughed every day at their antics.

I think people forget that we’re meant to guide them and they’ll get it wrong sometimes.

One incident I remember was my oldest son “helping” me to wash the windows. We were in our front bedroom and it’s a big bay window. I was kneeling on one of the window sills, up high, trying to wash the outside of one of the wee high windows and he had a basin full of water behind me. I could hear splashing and stupidly said to a 3 year old, sarcastically, “you’d be as well just emptying the basin”. So he promptly did 🤣.

Some of the parents on here would have punished him for not understanding sarcasm!

I’m the same as you. Both in professional jobs, both with qualifications coming out of their ears, both with good friends and both still making me and their dad howl with laughter at their double act.

There were some evil people allowed around children in the 70s. I'd care to bet there are a huge number of Gen Xers living with unresolved childhood trauma.

My best friend when I was 9 had a stepdad who later adopted her and she had a younger sister. Years later she confessed to me she was smacked more than her younger sister, probably because he wasn’t her biological dad. That’s sad.