Weak parenting & badly behaved school kids

I'm sure older people said the same about you when you were younger.

Also to those saying that hitting or the belt is needed... You may as well be a paedophile as that is 10000% abuse and just as damaging.

They looked like Year 7s or 8s. A lady told them off and said "What would your mothers say if I told them how you're behaving on this bus?" and a couple of them answered "She wouldn't care".

Oh they probably did say that - but they were right! The difference is that I actually got punished. Hitting / using a belt isn't right but a smacked bottom doesn't cause any permanent damage and certainly worked for me.

Yes, obviously that's the problem.

Do you have a solution?

Allowing a smack on the bottom is dangerous... I've seen parents whip their children with a belt and when the child speaks to authority the parent simply replies ow the child is over reacting I only gave them a smack on the bottom....

In fact who is going to monitor the smacks on the bottom? These smacks could be extreme...

Violence is never the answer.

I'm not advocating whipping or using a belt. But on the occasions I've been smacked, I've really thought about why I ended up getting that and I wouldn't do the same thing again for a while. It definitely did hurt and I would cry my eyes out but I wasn't damaged by any stretch of the imagination. I was just being taught a lesson!

Proper discipline when they're younger!

When getting the bus the other day, there were a group of about 10 schoolgirls messing around, jumping on the seats, shouting, swearing etc. They looked like Year 7s or 8s. A lady told them off and said "What would your mothers say if I told them how you're behaving on this bus?" and a couple of them answered "She wouldn't care".

I reckon that's the problem... their teachers threatening to phone home doesn't mean anything to them. They know they won't be punished anyway. I've always tried to be good at school because if my teacher had to phone home and speak to my parents, I'd be in line for a smacked bum when I got home. These kids seem to just get away with it. What do you think?

lol when I was a kid this was my life:



That's what the kids of today need

Why do you think this?

Ive taught in schools in both england and china... the difference: (generally speaking)

Teacher in china: "Your child has been bad, they are failing/misbehaving etc"
Parent in china: *blames the child, and themself*


Teacher in england: "Your child has been bad, they are failing/misbehaving etc"
Parent in england: *blames the teacher... blames their friends... blames any medical condition they can find... blames technology... blames the goverment........ blames anyone, EXCEPT their child or themself, who ofcourse are perfect"

See spoiler if your interested in my thoughts of why the differences are more pronounced in different parts of society.

The bible is right about some things - "Spare the rod, spoil the child".

If you dont discipline your kids, they will act like monkeys in the zoo. Nothing puts a kid in their place and teaches them manners quicker than a swift smack round the face.

I feel like that makes it sound considerably more violent than it is. There's a massive difference between a beating and getting spanked. For me it's always been very controlled and on the bottom, which is nicely padded and designed for it. When I have kids, they'll get the same. It's done no harm to me!

The bible is right about some things - "Spare the rod, spoil the child".

If you dont discipline your kids, they will act like monkeys in the zoo. Nothing puts a kid in their place and teaches them manners quicker than a swift smack round the face.

Hitting a child is lazy and teaches them nothing... Or in worst case scenarios makes them angry and possibly psychotic.

The fact that op feels they benefited from it is actually laughable... You turned out good because you are a good human being not because you got your bottom smacked. Even if your parents didn't hit you, you would still be the same if not better as you would have used advice and logic to do the right thing.

Adults aren't beaten so neither should children be.
If you have to resort to beating you shouldn't be a parent.

I'm neither pro nor anti-smacking. Somewhere in between. It can be abusive but to suggest it always is, is wrong.

Some of the anti-smacking arguments that seem so readily accepted now are absolutely ridiculous though.

1) You wouldn't hit an adult so why hit a child?
Well, I wouldn't hit an adult but neither would I send them to the naughty step or take their favourite toys away (and that by force without consent would be considered theft by law). So that argument is completely null and void.

2) Hitting teaches children that violence is the answer.
This one is really rolled out a lot. But it makes no sense. If smacking is done as a punishment for bad behaviour it no more teaches children that violence is the answer than any other disciplinary technique would. Does using the in vogue naughty step teach kids that a naughty step is the answer to every dispute they may come across? Of course not.

3) If smacking worked you'd only ever have to do it once.
Yes. Of course. The measure of a disciplinary technique is that it works first time every time in correcting behaviour. I mean one stint on the naughty step is all any child will ever need....oh.....

4) Smacking leads to abuse.
Well it does. Of course it does. But there is some evidence that actually child abuse goes up after smacking is legally banned. Think logically if an adult gets so frustrated with their child that they abuse them, whether smacking is legal or not is unlikely to matter. And most abuse actually arises from external factors. Usually the adults' mental state, alcoholism, drug taking etc. And whether the defence of reasonable chastisement is present in law or not that won't make a blind bit of difference in those cases.

I doubt I would smack my own kids ever, because frankly I can't bring myself to do it. But then if they pushed me to a place where I felt I hadn't got other decent options then I might.

A few years ago we lived next door to a family with two young kids. One of their kids at the age of about 5/6, if he didn't get his way over something, would run out into the middle of the road and lie there rigid. It wasn't a busy road, but there was a fairly tight bend about 50 yards away so it was entirely possible a driver not paying attention could run him over before he'd be able to react. He did this probably once a month, though tried it lots of times - mostly aborted by his mum or dad catching him before he escaped. His parents were entirely reasonable parents and were not ones who readily dished out many punishments but preferred to use reward charts and the like. Anyway, he did the lying in the road act a few times, each time his mum or dad would come out and simply pick him up take off one of his stars from the reward chart and explain to him why he mustn't ever do that again and that would be that. One day however, he did it and a car did come round the bend and had to stop fairly suddenly, before his mum could reach him. Thankfully he was ok, but his mum clearly was panicked. She lectured him and said that although she didn't want to, if he ever went into the road again like that she would smack his bottom. This was quite a severe thing to say as I don't think they'd ever threatened either child with a smack before let alone actually smacked them. Of course he did do it again and his mum, to my surprise did follow through with her threat. After much crying and torment from his mum as she felt so guilty things settled down. And he never, ever once, repeated his lying down in the middle of the road act.

That story is anecdotal and not submitted as evidence for a pro-smacking argument. More as an example that life isn't always as easy as we'd like to think. Nor as clear cut. If my child was doing something similar and I'd told them off and tried other things to stop them, would I smack them? Probably. Should that be a criminal offence? Absolutely not.

Educating parents on how to manage their children's behaviour is very valuable. But I think that is better than a change in law, it is also better than automatically condeming and criticising parents without the full story.

Nope it's barbaric... Most Muslim families inflict fear into their children to keep them on their path and well that didn't turn out well did it.

If I saw anyone hit a child whether they slightly hit them or worse I would publicly shame them.

A child will be bad regardless, it's in their personality, but with smacking they are more likely to do it out of sight of their parents.