And now for a bit of controversy...
Mar. 11th, 2009 01:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
the_vultureRecently, I followed a link, presented by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
fayanora, to a discussion titled How kids in England are smeared in the press, and what to do about it. The following is a reitteration of the thoughts I presented in response to her blog entry:
Upon reading the discsussion couldn't help but reflect on my experiences teaching in England and what I observed of the children (and their parents) there.
Two general themes seemed to run through the comments, the first being a discussion of the idea that thuggery amongst British youth is worse than most other nations because of a lack of any serious consequence for poor behaviour or even proper parenting, whilst the second revolved around the ethical ramifications of corporal punishment (spanking).
Unfortunately, these discussions tended to be really simplified and only touched superficially on some of the major issues that affect British youth.
I'll start with 'spanking'. This is based on a really simple behavioural concept: if an organism is repeatedly exposed to adverse stimulus (punishment) when it performs a particular behaviour, it will 'learn' not to perform that behaviour. In fact, even the alternative parenting programs that view spanking as barbaric and abusive still use this very principle; afterall, what is making the child sit on the time out bench, other than adverse stimulus?
In practise, pain (spanking) is a pretty damn effective adverse stimulus. Whenever discussions about spanking come up, I very often hear the statement "I was spanked as a child and I turned out okay." To be frank, I often find myself tempted to echo that very sentiment. In fact, corporal punishment has been an institution in Western society for centuries and, somehow, we have yet to see the collapse of civilization into a cesspool of amoral barbarism.
Opponents of spanking, however, will site many examples where this practice has gone beyond judicious use and into the realm of abuse, either through ignorance, sheer frustration and anger, or even true malevolence. They argue that EVERYONE should be banned from employing spanking as this reduces the risk of potential physical abuse.
Their arguments have merit; afterall, there are alternative negative stimuli to spanking, ranging from time outs, to groundings, to withdrawal of priviledges. The only problem is that these require far more of the parent than spanking does, ranging from a much better grounding in parenting theory, patience, time, and emotional strength. Unfortunately, not every set of parents is capable of employing these techniques effectively (I'll leave the argument for whether everyone should be allowed to be a parent for another time). So, just as allowing corporal punishment opens up a section of the population to possible physical abuse, banning it opens up the possiblity of sociological abuse, where a child with such a complete lack of any sense of consequence that they cannot integrate into modern society as adults and, instead, become a menace (often a serious physical variety) to those around them. In otherwords, they are raised to be criminals. Proponents of alternative parenting strategies have yet to come up with any practically applicable solutions to this issue. Essentially, banning spanking has removed one problem, only to replace it with another just as serious (if not possibly more so).
Of course, there are other contributing factors to the issues with British youth, but I'll leave those for another time.
What are your thoughts on the controversy surrounding the issues presented here?
fayanora, to a discussion titled How kids in England are smeared in the press, and what to do about it. The following is a reitteration of the thoughts I presented in response to her blog entry: Upon reading the discsussion couldn't help but reflect on my experiences teaching in England and what I observed of the children (and their parents) there.
Two general themes seemed to run through the comments, the first being a discussion of the idea that thuggery amongst British youth is worse than most other nations because of a lack of any serious consequence for poor behaviour or even proper parenting, whilst the second revolved around the ethical ramifications of corporal punishment (spanking).
Unfortunately, these discussions tended to be really simplified and only touched superficially on some of the major issues that affect British youth.
I'll start with 'spanking'. This is based on a really simple behavioural concept: if an organism is repeatedly exposed to adverse stimulus (punishment) when it performs a particular behaviour, it will 'learn' not to perform that behaviour. In fact, even the alternative parenting programs that view spanking as barbaric and abusive still use this very principle; afterall, what is making the child sit on the time out bench, other than adverse stimulus?
In practise, pain (spanking) is a pretty damn effective adverse stimulus. Whenever discussions about spanking come up, I very often hear the statement "I was spanked as a child and I turned out okay." To be frank, I often find myself tempted to echo that very sentiment. In fact, corporal punishment has been an institution in Western society for centuries and, somehow, we have yet to see the collapse of civilization into a cesspool of amoral barbarism.
Opponents of spanking, however, will site many examples where this practice has gone beyond judicious use and into the realm of abuse, either through ignorance, sheer frustration and anger, or even true malevolence. They argue that EVERYONE should be banned from employing spanking as this reduces the risk of potential physical abuse.
Their arguments have merit; afterall, there are alternative negative stimuli to spanking, ranging from time outs, to groundings, to withdrawal of priviledges. The only problem is that these require far more of the parent than spanking does, ranging from a much better grounding in parenting theory, patience, time, and emotional strength. Unfortunately, not every set of parents is capable of employing these techniques effectively (I'll leave the argument for whether everyone should be allowed to be a parent for another time). So, just as allowing corporal punishment opens up a section of the population to possible physical abuse, banning it opens up the possiblity of sociological abuse, where a child with such a complete lack of any sense of consequence that they cannot integrate into modern society as adults and, instead, become a menace (often a serious physical variety) to those around them. In otherwords, they are raised to be criminals. Proponents of alternative parenting strategies have yet to come up with any practically applicable solutions to this issue. Essentially, banning spanking has removed one problem, only to replace it with another just as serious (if not possibly more so).
Of course, there are other contributing factors to the issues with British youth, but I'll leave those for another time.
What are your thoughts on the controversy surrounding the issues presented here?
