what are the reasons for NO smacking?

[hermykne]

I AM CURIOUS to know, folling the other thread, as my dd is so bold at the moment nothing gets thru to her, even putting her in a time out room for 2/3mins, shes 3. she will keep on screaming and then hit something or push something over.
can last 40mins and no matter how you go over the matter with her when shes calm, she doesnt seem to learn anything,
and i suppose smacking will not make her understand either...
but what does smacking create or instill in behavourial patterns in yours opinions?

hmm yes well labour seem to think its fine to criminalise parents whose kids play truant

would have thought banning smacking would have been higher on the agenda tbh

Before I go to choir practice - I'm intrguied as to why people think that sitting a child on their own on a naughty step/time out place isn't humiliating. Or having something taken away from themmmmm

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But smacking which leaves a mark is against the law that is a raised mark, bruise, swelling scratch etc

As it happens I don't do those either. But think the arguments below re how we do deal with transgressions in our society are most compelling.
I prefer actions with consequences.
And humour. Like ds wailing, 'I don't want to walk' and sitting down on the way from the butchers to the car. Very annoying. But when I said, 'I KNOW! Let's fly then!' he was amused, so we devised increasingly bizarre ways to get to the car - swimming, horseriding, swinging from tree to tree - until we were at the car.

off topic but isn't that criminalising parents whose kids play truant the daftest thing ever??!

um what would a stroppy 15-yo who really wants to piss off their parents do in respone? umm...?

[doh]

And no, I'm not perfect, and yes, I do shout and don't like myself for it, but I don't hit and won't hit. My stepdaughter is 14, my son is 4 and my daughter is 9months. I won't say I've never felt the itch to slap my son, but none of them have ever been hit nor will ever be hit. All are - in my opinion - lovely kids.

oh and while we're on stupid laws, that leaving a mark thing. racist for a start, depends to an extent on skin colour. and there are plenty of ways of causing serious pain without leaving a mark. i hate that law - sick and nasty.

well the dds both had a tantrum about what to watch on the telly so I said right no telly until you can come nicely to me in the kitchen and tell me what you have decided. It took about 10 seconds for them to decide. I then made a big fuss about how clever they were to sort it all out.

Or today dd1 refused to get ready to go to ballet so I sat down and said, right, no ballet then until you start getting ready. And I'd have done it too (not gone). She knows that so she got ready

tbh we haven't really ever used the naughty step either

I have put dd1 in her room when having a massive strop

agree aloha, that is an inspiration. i'm picking up a lot of parenting tips on this thread apart from anything else

I'm sure that law would make some people rethink whether smacking is a good idea and so I to that extent i support it, I believe not enough people have been made aware that it is the law though.

brilliant idea aloha but my goodness you have to be in a good mood to have that degree of imagination (or I do anyway)

Socci - I agree that there has been a shift in attitude, I just don't think that it has reached the level where the majority of people view smacking as wrong. Again I would be careful of criminalising purely on a relatively sudden shift in morals, (given that this has happened within a generation).

My point on smacking working was made because a lot of people have stated further down the thread that smacking doesn't work. If it didn't, then we wouldn't still be debating.

At least the anti-smackers can rest assured that they are totally free not to smack their children.

it's a sunny day and i feel christmassy!

actually smacking often doesn't work. as discussed below, kids can become innured (sp?) to it so that has to get more severe to work; or they can ignore it. and people may smack for other reasons than efficacy - frustration, cruelty, letting off steam...

And there was I thinking that you were a Lambeth girl - definitely not sunny here!

ah! sunny southwark. madonna comes here for her hols, i believe.

Laligo, hard to support the stats I guess, but there are people on here who finds that it is effective for them. They may be the lucky few, but given that Parliament looked at this not that long ago, I don't think so. Even the Government recognises that there is such a thing as a trivial smack!

Again, I'm not trying to convert an anti-smacker, just grateful that I don't live in a society which criminalises it!

Can't beat the shopping in Borough Market then.

In answer to HRHQoQ, for me the naughty step is not about humiliating but about showing that until they can behave reasonably and appropriately, the dss will have to be separated from the rest of the family.

The wider perspective is that in life generally, it is a reality that people who do not behave appropriately and respect others are not really welcome anywhere.

Oh jeez... what a thread, with more than a whiff of hysteria... not surprising.

I plan NOT to smack dd, however I am not going to condemn people who do smack occasionally though.

I would also like to say that my mum did smack me when I was a young, I do not remember it and am not a violent person in any way. In fact nor are my siblings.

I can say with total honesty that my mum did have a severe temper and I did not fear a smack, what I feared was her screams and shouts! It was horrendous and terrifying. Discipline is not an enjoyable experience is it? It is not supposed to be.

I still love my mum a lot and I certainly don't love her any less. But it was her temper that scared me (and my siblings) NOT her smacking.

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OMG i am amazed at this thread, i'llnever get a chance to read it - please stop for 24hrs