So today, I learned that there are 22 states in the United States that allow corporal punishment to be used as a form of discipline within schools. (In case you don't know, corporal punishment is basically spanking someone on the buttox with a paddle.) Now where I live, it is illegal all across the board, and in some states, only private schools take this disciplinary action.
This leads me to wonder what could possibly provoke an educational administration to consider the idea even in the slightest bit that they should use corporal punishment. I see absolutely no long term benefits from spanking ANY child. Some states have things such as restrictions for the size of the paddle, which faculty members are allowed to use it, how many times that person is allowed to hit the student, and the list goes on and on.
Parents are allowed to say that their child can not be paddled. But, as in one case I heard about in an elementary school, a student who is not to be paddled is given a one day suspension from school! That goes on your record! What the hey?
Some teachers and administrators argue that corporal punishment teaches students to not misbehave. But wouldn't they rather that the child obeys by choice rather than by fear? Also, doesn't the action of paddling students only teach them that violence is a cure? And if that is the case, then aren't these teachers and other staff members only assisting the vicious cycle of abuse towards others to continue?
And on top of all of that, deaths have been caused by this. Blood clotting has occurred, and so has serious injuries. Students that have reported being hit in the leg with a paddle (rather than the bottom, which is where they are supposed to be hit) have been told by adminstrators that there is nothing that can be done- yet if a parent did this to their child, their child would be taken away! Oh, and it gets better, because those who bruise easily, are disabled, and those who are mentally ill (including learning disabilities), have been thrown into the mix of eligible paddling students.
So I ask you-What is wrong with people? This whole concept sickens me. I don't understand why a detention couldn't just be put in place, or any other non-physical disciplinary consequence. Adults don't go around working in offices and every time whend they fail to meet a deadline, have to have their boss call them into a room and make them bend over tables! It is absolutely of the upmost absurdity and is neglectful of every individual's human rights as American citizens to allow this to continue. I just can't even bear the thought of my child being in one of those student's shoes; if I were to ever become a parent. I would raise all sorts of hell.
Wherther or not you like it, it's true.
How do we learn in our early years? Experience. WE are unable to understand most of what's within our field of preception, let alone outside. I learn that stovetops are hot, and therefore burn, by touching and getting burned. I learn that I need to wait for my soup to cool by burning my tounge a couple times. I learn that candy tases good by eating candy. The list goes on and on.
I can tell you that such-and-such a thing is bad for you, but you wouldn't truly understand, you can't. Human beings (specifically when in their younger years) do not have the cognitive capacity for higher thinking. This is only accomplished with years and years of experience.
I could show you that something is bad for you. Rather than telling you that you'll be flattened by a car by wandering out into the street, I could show you. Not by flattening you or your friends under my car, but by demostrating that you go in the street, you get smacked (it doesn't even need to be hard, just hard enough to leave a mental impression) Although it doesn't show why it's bad to go into the street, the child won't get flattened by a car.
"We are predestined to determine our own destiny... Elit Druin."
I guess the schools figure that, since they take on the responsibilities of a parent during school hours, and since many parents spank their children when they do wrong, schools should be allowed to do the same thing.
Now don't jump down my throat when I say this, but when done properly by a kid's parents, spanking is actually pretty effective. Growing up me and my sisters were spanked, and it worked very well with us. One of my sisters had much more sensitive skin, more prone to bruising, so when she was to be spanked it was more of a tap (like a symbolic spanking), and often they came up with different punishments entirely for her (like standing in the corner for a while). They knew their kids and what would work and what was too much for us.
When a school tries to impliment it, though, I see how it goes awry. Teachers and administrators don't know much, if anything, about a student's physical capacity. In addition, in many cases when a student does something that would warrant corporal punishment, they would receive it from their parents when their parents found out about it, so it goes without saying that two spankings for one crime are unnecessary. Lastly, as you said, in the business world, a boss is not going to spank you for doing something wrong. You get reprimanded/cut pay/fired, depending on the offense. The purpose of school is to prepare its students to work, particularly in the business world.
I think the problem is that the schools are taking in re Gault and their guardian-like obligations a bit too seriously. Parents are supposed to instill moral or religious ideals in their children, but does that mean that the schools should teach their students to follow a religion? No way. They just haven't realized corporal punishment falls under the same kind of thing.
I host a website about school paddling as physical abuse, sexual abuse, and sexual harassment.
Although I have come to oppose all forms of "spanking" I think there are particular problems with institutional government and church staff "spanking" other people's children -- not the least of which the people doing the spanking do not care about the children as biological parents ordinarily do. This makes the children much more prone to abuse and exploitation, just as in the home a stepfather is six times as likely to abuse a child as a father, and a live-in boyfriend of the mother 50 times as likely.
Other systematic problems abound. "Children" are actually paddled right through age 19. Older students are blackmailed with artificially draconian punishments to "bend over." It has nothing to do with "kids not understanding words." In Grand Prairie High School near Dallas, for example, female students have about a 2% chance of being paddled in elementary, 11% in Junior high, and 17% in high school. Nearly all paddling is done by men at the high school level.
There is also risk these days of spy camera videotaping and use as child S/M pornography, either from the school's own pervasive systems or a private spy cam from the paddler or witness.
The fact is the Bible does not teach school paddling, and the New Testament does not even teach a parent to hit a child.
For those who are interested in true history, the "school paddle" actually came from slavery. That is the sole reason why today nearly all paddling takes place in the former slave states.
At one time violence was encouraged and tolerated against slaves, sailors, wives, prisoners, apprentices, and children to name a few classes. Today only children -- if anything the least culpable of all -- are the only class of "hittable people" left. There is no good reason for this.
It is time to end the slave plantation model of schooling in the US.
Jeff Charles
www.nopaddle.com
Jeff1844@aol.com
Ok so I went to a private school when I was younger but I never got the paddle. On the other hand I know some people that as kids were never punished for doing things wrong in school or even out of school and they ended up in prison. I just think that parents shouldnt be afraid to discipline thier kids, and schools should be allowed to as well but certain guidleines should be established.
I understand where you are coming from and I think that some of this information is a bit disturbing to me. But I also know that there is detention in place in most schools and I also know they have something they call on campus suspension too. The problem is that in most schools they are seeing the no matter how many time they go to detention or OCS, these kids just arent acting appropriately. Now I do realize that as children of a certain age they should not be subjected to the paddlings. In fact in my private school growing up if you were second grade and above then that was your punnishment but it all depended on gender too. If you were a girl then it was a designeted female administrator giving the paddling and if you were male it was a male faculty member. But I have to admit that just the fear that someone was going to spank you with some large wooden thing was incentive enough to not do anything wrong. But then again nowadays kids have this sense of well you cant legally touch me and I can go to the cops and report you, so parents dont discipline thier kids in fear they will go to prison. All because the government wants to dictate what we do to the last little bit.
wow, that's insane and did not know that.
i just posted a similar blog