Anti-Smackers Wanted

[Xenia]

As a long term lobbyist against smacking children, spanking, slapping, etc etc whether a "little tap" or anything, I know there are lots of anti-smackers on Mumsnet too.

If you do share that view then respond to this consultation
www.homeoffice.gov.uk/publications/about-us/consultations/definition-domestic-violence/dv-definition-consultation?view=Binary

on that issue - where it talks about violence against those under 18 there is no reason at all why the bill (which in some aspects I do not accept which is why I happened to be looking at it) should not be a great vehicle to get all smacking banned, not just smacking which leaves a mark which is the current ridiculous English law and is a typical British fudge.

You can respond direct to the consultation and/or ask your MP to take a particular stance on it.

On the other proposals in the consultation I would be against legal changes as there is too much scope for abuse of the proposed new law.

I'm anti smacking.

But how do you define smacking? Does a tap on the hand count as smacking?

Also if you ban smacking presumably there has to be some punishment for offenders, but what? How do you punish parents without punishing the child? I mean do we send people to prison?

We have social services for child abuses do you not think and the police have enough on their plate with out having to investigate loving parents

We already have children in schools doing as they please while all the wile using the threat of you can't touch me I get the police on you

If you think a tap on a hand should see a loving parent investigated by ss we know how sensible they can be or even arrested or worse their children put on a cp register you are off your head

We have a Tory government they believe in small government
It will never happen as it happens I think the law is about right

Their are times I have had to restrain my own child from hurting him self or others I would not want to loose my job or go to jail for being a good parent

In the uk we can barley get teachers or carers not for the threat of children knowing of their touched even if the child is in dangering someone life, they can have the adult up on changes is a really bad direction now the op wants to imasulate parents.

Even today in the news the young boy who had evaded his fair then went on to abuse the ticket inspector in now pressing charges for being thrown off the train

Were o were did he get that attauide from not big on physical punishment myself but I do believe their will be times that a child may knee to be restrained or physically removed from a situation

And to say we shall have police then coming in to investigate is mad it will be the child's word against the parents if their is anything that will cause a toxic home it would be child pitted Hsiang parent

Older children do often have a tend to over dramatise events to make them selves the victims

In our very own educating Essex a teacher was accused by a pupil of hitting her luckily he had the backing of the head and CCTV parents won't have that protection.

I am opposed to smacking but I think there needs to be more parenting classes first. Many people were smacked as children and old attitudes die hard.

I do not want a child taken into care because of a tap. I want parents educated and supported. I also do want parent's lives being wrecked because of teh false allegation of a six year old. I think the present law is right, but there needs to be education.

Very few parents actually want to smack their kids.

In the UK you can hit your child within the law and you cannot do that to your spouse, workers, servants or a stranger. We have a special right to apply physical force to a child. That is wrong. The law should be the same as between husband and wife.

I have never smacked my children, and since they are now both bigger than me it's a bit late to start. But I must say I would have wanted to reserve the right to. For example if they did something to endanger themselves such running out into traffic after being told not to.

My mother (but never my father) used occasionally to smack me (not very hard), and I am one of the many men who would claim to have had the best mother in the world.

I think that to impose a blanket ban (with the inevitable question of how you enforce and punish transgressions) would be an outrageous intrusion of the state into family life.

no, between husband and wife is not an equivelant, nobody has authority over another adult, however a parent has authority over a child. I'm not prosmacking but a loving parent has to make judgement calls every now and then.
a hard smack (which leaves a mark) and worse is already illegal. That's where the focus should be, not on criminalising handtappers.

Hitting and smacking are two very different things by my definitions.

If a smack is what it takes to make a child realise the situation they put themselves in was dangerous then so beit. As long as its not done out of temper.

What next parents cant shout at children as it may emotionally scar them?

I think in this time when people are complaining about the behaviour of young people a lot has to come back to the "fear" of disciplining children that seems to be developing.

As long as it doesn't mark or cause long term harm then parents should be allowed to use their own judgement in such situation.

(I don't smack and hardly ever even raise my voice but that's because that works for me and I am not saying their will never be a situation where either may be effective)

I agree Xenia, I'll look at the link.

I lived in Sweden during the time when an anti-smacking ban was first discussed and then introduced and, while it did not lead to a stream of law cases or imprisonments, I am convinced that it had a great effect in shaping people's ideas of what is socially acceptable. It made people think first and make that extra little effort to have good discipline in the first place, instead of letting things escalate. Certainly it did not have the effect of making parents feel they could not physically restrain their children during a meltdown or remove them from a situation: I have seen many Swedes doing that.

Having said that, the reason for the ban in the first place was that a sizeable proportion of the population had already come round to the idea that smacking was a bad idea: in other words, the country was ready for it, which always helps with legislation.

I agree with Xenia: we managed to ban the physical chastising of spouses and employees (perfectly acceptable, indeed encouraged in earlier periods) without a breakdown in family life; we could manage this one too.

Somehow, once it became illegal, most people managed to educate themselves on the subject of wife-beating, and as for the ones who didn't- well, who would see that as a reason for making it legal again?

I haven't smacked mine either. It's wrong and it's bullying.

I don't want to debate whether the current law (which allows a smcak which leaves no mark and is thus a nonsense) is right or not and whether because you are older/bigger than someone you should have a legal right to smack or spank them whereas if you're over 18 you are protected by the law.

It was imply to say that here is a new proposed law in its initial stages and if there were enough head of steam it could be a good route for anti-smackers to get the law improved even further to outlaw physical violence against children. Your children are the only people in the UK you are allowed legally to spank or slap without their consent. That is morally wrong.

It tends to be the brighter parents who are better at child psychology who seem able to raise perfectly decent children without resorting to violence. The smackers need to sit our feet and learn that there is a better way.

Actually I doubt the Coalition would see this as vote winning enough but it's still worth lobbying to see if something can be put into here.

Also if they are going to outlaw being nasty to someone through the words you use why just apply that to your spouse. Why not say it applies to others with whom you live who are children? It's discriminatory against children if it is introduced only to protect adults. We need the children's commissioner lobbying on this too.

I was smacked as a child. I will not smack my children and I have told dp that I will not tolerate any smacking of our children by him.

Smacking or any other form of physical force against a child, whether its a tap on the head, a smack on the hand, or anything worse, is wrong. It simply teaches children that its ok to hit someone when they make you angry or do something you don't like them doing. And vice versa that its ok for others to hit them.

In my own experience this was (in a past relationship) a direct cause of my partner thinking it was ok to use physical force against me if I annoyed him, and me thinking I had to accept that, as I had annoyed him/made him angry.

I will not let my boys grow up thinking that this is acceptable. They ARE disciplined, in effective but non-physical ways.

So your happily slagging on smackers, you post in aibu yet your not trying to start a debate? Ok then!

What's wrong with debating the issue anyway? Or is it the case that you are unable to do that without insulting people simply because they don't agree with your view on the issue?

I don't agree with smacking, but I think that some parents can then resort to alternatives that are worse.
I think that more parenting classes are needed to educate parents.
When you can read on a parenting website that it is perfectly reasonable to wash out a DCs mouth with soap -to quote -'as long as it is part of a loving relationship' or that social services will take them away-you wonder about some parents!

I refuse to debate with people who turn the word 'smack' into 'hit'.

i think a lot of the problems we have at the moment are down to poor and ineffectual parenting

a smack can be very effective at the right time

Having said that, the reason for the ban in the first place was that a sizeable proportion of the population had already come round to the idea that smacking was a bad idea: in other words, the country was ready for it, which always helps with legislation.

That's not true. The shift in attitudes came after the change in the law. Of the countries which have explicity banned smacking only Finland had majority public support prior to abolition.

screeching and swearing at a child is way more damaging than a whack on the backside imo

So why is it that there seems to have been no increase in other kinds of child abuse in countries which have introduced their anti-smacking ban? Is it only British parents who can't be trusted not to come up with anything worse?

I don't understand why anyone would smack a child, but then I come from a home where there was no such thing as a gentle smack, I was belted or had stuff thrown at me, or my hair pulled.

And for those who are kidding themselves ... in the UK smacking IS common assault. The reason parents who smack their children don't get prosecuted is that the law allows the defence of 'reasonable chastisment' for parents who commit common assault against their children.

I feel very strongly that there are alternatives to smacking, and we don't smack. However, it does take a lot of effort to raise children so that a) they don't need to be disciplined because they pretty much do what you want and b) to use alternative effective methods of discipline. I don't want to see somebody prosecuted for losing their cool and smacking a child's hand tbh. I don't see myself as 'better' just because I don't smack.