Uncle of the year?

[Darth Cruel]

Who's conditioning people?

I just have a stricter definition of what constitutes a spanking than traditional childrearing.

In general...everyone does it to someone else at some point. Hell...talking about the things we like or don't like about figures has the same effect. And as it applies here...calling spanking abusive has the intent of casting an unfavorable image on it in an attempt to make other people feel more strongly against it much like my use of the word "conditioning". Now, both are only bad or good depending on your point of view. But I have never seen any proof that spanking is a bad thing. So I find it to be wrong to cast that light on it without reason.

You have to understand that I find all teaching to be conditioning. So you can substitute many different words for conditioning. Teaching, convincing, brainwashing...they are all the same to me in their basic intent. But there are good and bad applications for the basic concept. And in this particular example, using the word abusive as an adjective for spanking projects negativity to the concept that is not warranted. To say "I don't use spanking" is a neutral, inarguable statement. But to say "spanking is abusive" simply can not be supported by fact.

The only bad use of spanking that I have seen is when humans who commit atrocities on other humans are allowed to use the fact that they were spanked as mitigation (read: rationalization) for their actions.

 

[devilof76]

People have free will. If they choose to suspend their critical faculty and simply absorb whatever stimulus impinges upon their senses without understanding it for themselves, then I guess they're being 'conditioned'. Under those circumstances, however, it is not the 'teacher' doing the conditioning, but their own negligence in regard to the relationship of their own minds to reality.

On the other hand, children have highly underdeveloped mental faculties. Their control of their impressions and conclusions is transitory, if not completely non-existent. To take advantage of that and use violence as a place holder for realistic negative stimulus is as close to conditioning as you can get, but unlike an animal, who lacks rationality or the potential for it, a child's comprehension of the world and their place in it does not function by shock treatment. The result of prolonged exposure to such treatment will not achieve the desired result. In short, you can't condition a human, unless you drive them to neurosis or worse. But that's not training, per se. It's a short circuiting the conceptual faculty, and the potential for future learning becomes crippled, to the extent of the abuse.

I believe that physical harm is not the right way to teach children how to behave. I do not consider a spanking to be a form of physical abuse. It is not the use of pain as a negative reward; it's more along the lines of employing a humiliating shock to the senses as means to focus attention. However, I can't count the number of times I've heard the former rationalized as just a spanking.

 

[Darth Cruel]

People have free will. If they choose to suspend their critical faculty and simply absorb whatever stimulus impinges upon their senses without understanding it for themselves, then I guess they're being 'conditioned'. Under those circumstances, however, it is not the 'teacher' doing the conditioning, but their own negligence in regard to the relationship of their own minds to reality.

No...it is always the teacher doing the conditioning. The recipient of the information is always the one being conditioned. Whether the conditioning is successful depends on more than just free will. It also depends on the ability of the recipient to correctly process the information. And that makes me believe that the teachers have the moral resposibility to offer the truest possible information. Otherwise it all just becomes doublespeak like politicians use.

On the other hand, children have highly underdeveloped mental faculties. Their control of their impressions and conclusions is transitory, if not completely non-existent. To take advantage of that and use violence as a place holder for realistic negative stimulus is as close to conditioning as you can get, but unlike an animal, who lacks rationality or the potential for it, a child's comprehension of the world and their place in it does not function by shock treatment. The result of prolonged exposure to such treatment will not achieve the desired result. In short, you can't condition a human, unless you drive them to neurosis or worse. But that's not training, per se. It's a short circuiting the conceptual faculty, and the potential for future learning becomes crippled, to the extent of the abuse.

You are seriously underestimating the abilities of the mind of a child and seriously exaggerating the effects of a spanking. The effects that you are concluding are more possible if a weak-minded person is beaten mercilessly by a hate-filled person (parent or anyone else) repeatedly and frequently over a long period of time. The average child getting their butt spanked will only serve to curb undesired behavior...and then only if the spanking overcomes the child's desire to perform the behavior. But that goes in to when to use spankings and that is a different issue.

I believe that physical harm is not the right way to teach children how to behave. I do not consider a spanking to be a form of physical abuse. It is not the use of pain as a negative reward; it's more along the lines of employing a humiliating shock to the senses as means to focus attention. However, I can't count the number of times I've heard the former rationalized as just a spanking.

If you get all of this from the idea of hitting a child on the ass as a means to familiarize them with consequence to their actions, and thereby curb undesirable behavior, then it seems to me that you have applied extremes to spanking that, in reality, do not exist. I could be wrong, but what I am getting is an unreasonably extreme attitude about spanking. Calling a spanking physical harm is not realistic. Harm is the damaging of something. A spanking will not damage a child and I highly doubt that you will find an expert who will say it does. You are right that a spanking is not physical abuse, but niether is it a psychological one. Don't imagine a monster where there are none.

 

[devilof76]

Ok, you haven't heard a word I said. I'm not going to repeat myself, so if you want to go back and read it another time, you know where to find it.

 

[Darth Cruel]

Ok, you haven't heard a word I said. I'm not going to repeat myself, so if you want to go back and read it another time, you know where to find it.

C'mon, now. This is a weak way to debate your point. It is a cop-out and you know it. I have more respect and faith in you than that. Just admit you are wrong. I didn't miss anything, I just disregarded the irrelevant information.

 

[Anzik]

My wife wonders why the kids listen to me more than her. I told her to whoop their butts. She asked if thats what I do and I said not anymore, but they know I will if I have to, but it has been a long time since I had to do anything more than look at them with the 'dad' look. Its a child's (and a humans) nature to test the boundaries and authority has to be set. I have a sister in law that uses time out and all it did was teach her kids to be sneakier. I have another that has used spanking but then gives him candy so positive that could have come from the spanking has vanished and she has taught the child he has power of guilt.
It depends on the child and the will of the parent.
As for conditioning and training, we are arguing semantics. One of the rules I use in martial arts teaching is that English stinks as a language. It is very inaccurate and each person can perceive a word differently. Conditioning and training to one person can mean the same thing, and to another be very different.
First and foremost humans are animals. Very intelligent (in comparison to other species) but still animals and that intellect doesn't always kick in. For example, the bell curve on IQ tells us most people are within 92-102 on the IQ chart, significantly higher than a dog, yet the dog can exist and even thrive on its own, and yet some humans believe they can't unless someone holds their hand.
The problem is that too often parents do certain things because how it will make them feel rather than what it takes to teach the child. Judgment also plays a big key as well. A parent should have the judgment not spank a child for not washing off a plate, but should spank if you set the house on fire, or punch a sibling.

 

[Darth Cruel]

I disagree that all kids push the testing of the boundaries to the point where a spanking is necessary. Some don't, and those that do go to different distances that do not all require a spanking. But I do find a spanking to be a perfectly harmless, and very effective, tool to use when lesser efforts have failed. In fact, although even I use it as a last resort (I guess I feel a need to appease people I don't agree with on this matter, but I consider that to be a character weakness on my part and I have no idea why I do it), I am having trouble understanding the mindset that a simple spanking does harm to a child under normal circumstances. Spankings are no big deal but they are treated by some people like one of the primary reasons for the collapse of all things good (and I am referring to people who make TV shows about serial killers and insinuate that they did it because they got spanked, not to people simply trying to make a point here on these forums).

And I will go so far as to say that I think using spanking as a last resort instead of as the first line of discipline is a poor practice. A good spanking has a much faster effect resulting in more immediate and longer-lasting correction to bad behavior as well as negating all of the time wasted on kids sitting in a corner (or wherever) and having to leave a grocery store. So it is really more in line with common sense to use it first.

And I will reiterate that I believe some behavior in some children can be corrected with lesser discipline practices...but they are still a waste of time that could be spent doing more important things so why bother when spankings are so harmless and so effective.

 

[Jen]

My dad used to spank me with a belt - all it accomplished was it made me scared of my dad. Granted the only time I had much interaction with my dad was when he was mad.

I think sometimes a smack on the ass can work with unruly kids - but there needs to be love too or else you are just teaching your child fear.

 

[Darth Cruel]

My dad used to spank me with a belt - all it accomplished was it made me scared of my dad. Granted the only time I had much interaction with my dad was when he was mad.

I think sometimes a smack on the ass can work with unruly kids - but there needs to be love too or else you are just teaching your child fear.

This falls outside my definition of a spanking. Not the use of a belt, but the withholding of any other emotion than anger negates the effectiveness in some cases and can actually create the argument that it is abuse. ANY discipline is rendered useless if it is administeed by a person that is not somebody the disciplined person has a positive opinion of, including time-outs, grounding and all the others.

 

[devilof76]

C'mon, now. This is a weak way to debate your point. It is a cop-out and you know it. I have more respect and faith in you than that. Just admit you are wrong. I didn't miss anything, I just disregarded the irrelevant information.

And you say I'm copping out?

No...it is always the teacher doing the conditioning. The recipient of the information is always the one being conditioned.

Conceptual cognition does not function by conditioning. It is a volitional proess from start to finish. Anything less is rote memorization and not learning.

Whether the conditioning is successful depends on more than just free will. It also depends on the ability of the recipient to correctly process the information.

The heart of free will is the choice to focus or not. It is not the mere option of actions that popular usage defines it as. Free will is at the root of human consciousness, and in the truest sense of the word, it is the choice to be conscious, or not; to regulate one's mental activity, i.e., one's consclusions, sub-conscious organization, automatic reactions, decision making processes, etc.

And that makes me believe that the teachers have the moral resposibility to offer the truest possible information. Otherwise it all just becomes doublespeak like politicians use.

Even if everything a teacher says is true, if a student is not mentally active during the learning process, and attempts to simply 'absorb' what is being taught, the information they receive will be no better than the ideas in the head of a political drone.

You are seriously underestimating the abilities of the mind of a child and seriously exaggerating the effects of a spanking.

I'm doing neither. Children are intensely observant, and process information like fiends. At some point, they are going to question whether or not their transgressions deserve a punishment that consists of physical force. There is no rational argument that can justify a punishment of force other than a crime of force, and to consistently impose such a state upon so active a mind is to enforce a serious contradiction at the most sensitive stages of cognitive development.

The effects that you are concluding are more possible if a weak-minded person is beaten mercilessly by a hate-filled person (parent or anyone else) repeatedly and frequently over a long period of time.

The effects are exaggerated as the force is increased, and the eventual result will be either a weak mind that has given up trying to make sense of it, or a bullheaded will that refuses attempts to understand why other people do what they do.

The average child getting their butt spanked will only serve to curb undesired behavior...and then only if the spanking overcomes the child's desire to perform the behavior. But that goes in to when to use spankings and that is a different issue.

Any negative consequence will do, and consequences tailored to fit the transgression will always be superior. Particularly with above average children, and I don't see how that kind of treatment would not encourage above-average behavior. A child being able to understand why what they did is wrong is 1000% times more important than indoctrinating obedience.

If you get all of this from the idea of hitting a child on the ass as a means to familiarize them with consequence to their actions, and thereby curb undesirable behavior, then it seems to me that you have applied extremes to spanking that, in reality, do not exist.

Like I said before, it's not a dog. It's a human. We have minds. We are not stimulus-response machines, unless we're broken, but then, unlike other animals whose consciousness does not function above a sensory-perceptual level, we don't work at all.

I could be wrong, but what I am getting is an unreasonably extreme attitude about spanking.

You're wrong.

Calling a spanking physical harm is not realistic.

I didn't. I called it physical force.

Harm is the damaging of something.

Which is when force crosses the line into abuse.

A spanking will not damage a child and I highly doubt that you will find an expert who will say it does.

Not physically, but it sets a precedent in the mind of a child that right and wrong are a matter of whim; it is wrong because the authority said so. Morality is not intrinsic, nor is it subjective. Moral value is objective, i.e. there are reasons why things are good and why they are not. Shocks and cookies are incompatible with a rational process of thought.

You are right that a spanking is not physical abuse, but niether is it a psychological one.

Not psychological, cognitive. And with what children have to look forward to in the rest of their 'education', why start at home?

Don't imagine a monster where there are none.

If an inability to make abstract moral distinctions is not the monster devouring the world today, I don't know what is.

Happy now?

First and foremost humans are animals. Very intelligent (in comparison to other species) but still animals and that intellect doesn't always kick in. For example, the bell curve on IQ tells us most people are within 92-102 on the IQ chart, significantly higher than a dog, yet the dog can exist and even thrive on its own, and yet some humans believe they can't unless someone holds their hand.

Because humans were not designed to exist on a perceptual level. Dogs are, and designed well. A human genius could attempt to abandon conceptual thought entirely, and all they would ever achieve is their own transformation into a mental cripple.

The problem is that too often parents do certain things because how it will make them feel rather than what it takes to teach the child. Judgment also plays a big key as well.

There are parents who are so terrified of their children experiencing pain that they will remove all negative stimulus from their sphere of influence. On the other hand, there are parents so afraid of their children behaving badly that they will snap at them for the slightest error, which even if it never reaches the physical level, has the same effect: unexplained, unpredictable, disproportionate punishment, and both methods ____ up children's minds. Not like all-out beatings, but the principle is the same.

A parent should have the judgment not spank a child for not washing off a plate, but should spank if you set the house on fire, or punch a sibling.

Yup. And make it hurt.

My dad used to spank me with a belt - all it accomplished was it made me scared of my dad. Granted the only time I had much interaction with my dad was when he was mad.

Did you ever wonder what you could have possibly done to deserve that?

I think sometimes a smack on the ass can work with unruly kids - but there needs to be love too or else you are just teaching your child fear.

Kids I have known who are most out of control are those who have actually been encouraged to misbehave. They are the ones who were impossible to raise without regular spankings, because nothing else worked. It goes both ways, and I do not believe that spankings as such are wrong. They should just be a last resort in extreme cases, or in cases that the child has threatened or committed physical harm.

 

[The Ween]

People who really care about raising their kids, and there are a lot of them who don't care, have to find what works for each child. I was never spanked, but my eldest brother was.

 

[Jen]

Did you ever wonder what you could have possibly done to deserve that?

Nothing that deserved a spanking, imo - such as trying to clean the fireplace and getting old ashes on the carpet...or getting a C on my report card.

My dad was an angry man who didn't really have a desire or patience to be a parent. Now that he's older - he's mellowed out, and is trying now to make up for past mistakes.

But I agree that a physical, violent outburst/attack from a child needs a lot more than just a time out.

 

[devilof76]

I just mean that you didn't do anything that involved physically harming anyone. So why should someone be harming you?

 

[CLU]

Nothing that deserved a spanking, imo - such as trying to clean the fireplace and getting old ashes on the carpet...or getting a C on my report card.

My dad was an angry man who didn't really have a desire or patience to be a parent. Now that he's older - he's mellowed out, and is trying now to make up for past mistakes.

But I agree that a physical, violent outburst/attack from a child needs a lot more than just a time out.

*buys Jen a drink*

 

[Darth Cruel]

And you say I'm copping out?



Conceptual cognition does not function by conditioning. It is a volitional proess from start to finish. Anything less is rote memorization and not learning.



The heart of free will is the choice to focus or not. It is not the mere option of actions that popular usage defines it as. Free will is at the root of human consciousness, and in the truest sense of the word, it is the choice to be conscious, or not; to regulate one's mental activity, i.e., one's consclusions, sub-conscious organization, automatic reactions, decision making processes, etc.



Even if everything a teacher says is true, if a student is not mentally active during the learning process, and attempts to simply 'absorb' what is being taught, the information they receive will be no better than the ideas in the head of a political drone.



I'm doing neither. Children are intensely observant, and process information like fiends. At some point, they are going to question whether or not their transgressions deserve a punishment that consists of physical force. There is no rational argument that can justify a punishment of force other than a crime of force, and to consistently impose such a state upon so active a mind is to enforce a serious contradiction at the most sensitive stages of cognitive development.



The effects are exaggerated as the force is increased, and the eventual result will be either a weak mind that has given up trying to make sense of it, or a bullheaded will that refuses attempts to understand why other people do what they do.



Any negative consequence will do, and consequences tailored to fit the transgression will always be superior. Particularly with above average children, and I don't see how that kind of treatment would not encourage above-average behavior. A child being able to understand why what they did is wrong is 1000% times more important than indoctrinating obedience.



Like I said before, it's not a dog. It's a human. We have minds. We are not stimulus-response machines, unless we're broken, but then, unlike other animals whose consciousness does not function above a sensory-perceptual level, we don't work at all.



You're wrong.



I didn't. I called it physical force.



Which is when force crosses the line into abuse.



Not physically, but it sets a precedent in the mind of a child that right and wrong are a matter of whim; it is wrong because the authority said so. Morality is not intrinsic, nor is it subjective. Moral value is objective, i.e. there are reasons why things are good and why they are not. Shocks and cookies are incompatible with a rational process of thought.



Not psychological, cognitive. And with what children have to look forward to in the rest of their 'education', why start at home?



If an inability to make abstract moral distinctions is not the monster devouring the world today, I don't know what is.

Happy now?



Because humans were not designed to exist on a perceptual level. Dogs are, and designed well. A human genius could attempt to abandon conceptual thought entirely, and all they would ever achieve is their own transformation into a mental cripple.



There are parents who are so terrified of their children experiencing pain that they will remove all negative stimulus from their sphere of influence. On the other hand, there are parents so afraid of their children behaving badly that they will snap at them for the slightest error, which even if it never reaches the physical level, has the same effect: unexplained, unpredictable, disproportionate punishment, and both methods ____ up children's minds. Not like all-out beatings, but the principle is the same.



Yup. And make it hurt.



Did you ever wonder what you could have possibly done to deserve that?



Kids I have known who are most out of control are those who have actually been encouraged to misbehave. They are the ones who were impossible to raise without regular spankings, because nothing else worked. It goes both ways, and I do not believe that spankings as such are wrong. They should just be a last resort in extreme cases, or in cases that the child has threatened or committed physical harm.

I almost forgot about this thread. I'll get back to you on this one...lots to debate here.

 

[devilof76]

Last time I give you the long answer.