To threaten to wash 4.5 ds mouth out with soap for swearing?

[ThumbelinaTrumple]

I haven't actually done it yet and i dunno if i would. would anyone/has anyone that would be brave enough to admit it? I must say he hasn't picked up these words from me but his best friend at school. He has also picked up the lovely habit of spitting too!
AIBU?

I always found that asking the child what the word means, made them embarrassed.

Follow it up by saying 'if you don't know what a word means, don't use it'

If you react you give them what they want, shock value.

It always worked for me. I had my mum rubbing soap round my mouth telling me all the words she didn't want to hear me saying.

The soap wasn't that bad but it evelated to a toothbrush with washing up liquid on when i .. through a mouthful of soap suds, told her she was 'a horrible fucking mommy and i fucking hate you.'

It was worth every day thereafter where i had the taste of w-up liq in my gob.

YABU

My children don't swear and I've never threatened that - just told them that some people find it very upsetting to hear swear words, people like Grandma (who they adore), and that if they heard them swearing, they would be very upset and may cry. I swear like a trooper, so I always apologise when I do and say that I shouldn't have said that, but it's not as if they're not exposed to swear words! they've tried it once or twice but it's never become a problem.

I'm with flamingobingo. I swear like a fishwife too but my kids are like Saffie from abfab - they pick me up on it because I've taught them that swearing in anger is bad, swearing around grandparents or at school is bad, in fact all swearing is pretty awful to hear and quite moronic. I have never forbidden them to do it though. They make their own choice and choose to take the moral highground.

I remember my mum saying this to me so much when i was a kid, that i actually went upstairs and tried it to see how bad it would be

Just to reiterate what some other posters have already mentioned; I work for a professional agency that regularly makes child protection referrals to social services and this sort of chastisement (whether soap or chilli) and even the threat of it would certainly be classed as a child protection issue for us. I have personally known of a case where a parent was interviewed by social workers after her eight year old child disclosed that her mum had forced her to swallow dish soap.

Maybe it was a regular method used by parents of previous generations, but then quite often the same generations also thrashed kids with belts, locked them in cupboards and used other extreme practices that the vast majority of people these days would identify as completely inappropriate.

The idea of actually doing that to a child is apalling - abusive, aggressive and degrading.

On the other hand I also feel very concerned about young kids who are encouraged to swear by parents (how 'hilarious' ) and rightly or wrongly would consider that a form of abuse too.

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My dad was forced to eat mustard as a punishment. It affected him a lot, I think, and to this day he remembers it sadly. It's a vile and cruel thing to do.