Were YOU spanked as a child?

[UdoKier]

Poll question: Were YOU spanked as a child?

Were YOU spanked as a child?

[trotsky]

1. Push-poll much? n/t

[UdoKier]

4. Wow. I really tried to construct it fairly.

What exactly am I "pushing" for here?

[trotsky]

6. "I'm glad my parents raised me sensibly."

You don't see bias there?

[UdoKier]

8. Considering that I'm NOT entirely an anti-spanking zealot, I thought not.

I believe an OCCASIONAL spanking is okay, and that never spanking is okay too. I'll try to re-word.

[trotsky]

16. Um, how about a simple "No." for the option?

I'll even ignore the problems I have with some of your other responses.

[UdoKier]

23. Because it's not just a yes/no question.

I'm curious about what kind of effect one's own experience might have on their feelings on the subject.

Maybe it really is a cycle thing. My parents very rarely spanked. My wife and I rarely spanked, then we gave it up. I wonder if most people are as similar to their own parents.

[nickinSTL]

2. My parents did with me...

but found out it just made me angry.

They didn't do it with my younger brother since it didn't seem to work with me.

[UdoKier]

17. Similar to our experience.

We did it a half-dozen times with the older son, maybe twice with the younger. It was so counter-productive that we stopped altogether, so the younger one didn't get as much.

[amazona]

46. unfortunately

...this does mean that forever in the back of your mind the older child will always remember the perceived "favoritism" shown toward the younger son.

I won't go into this too much except to say -- I have not seen my younger brother for over 20 years. And I don't care if I never see him again. There is great harm caused by one child being physically beaten and another not being touched except in very rare circumstance and the older child can't really ever forget. It is great to learn from experience but the older child pays the price of the parents' learning.

[chicagojoe]

3. We must keep in mind that...

...there IS a difference between a spanking and a beating.

[undergroundpanther]

9. NO there isn't

The emotional betrayal is the same.The humiliation fear anger and confusion is the same.The abuse of power is the same.And the reason is the same,obedience through fear. An adult is bigger than a child.An adult is everything to a little kid whom they depend on compleately.
If you defile the bodily safety of your kid you still have the same loss of respect,if it's a smack or a beating the respect is lost.And the relationship is ruined by betrayal.


Ever wonder why god in the religious sense is depicted as the all powerful unable to abuse his kids good parent almost nobody on this earth has?

Kids are people too and have a right to not be bullies and assaulted.
Do you believe any bully(other than the excuses bandied about by pro spank parents to pro spank parents ) is telling the truth when he says I just smacked that little manipulator to teach em a lesson?

Kids are not born angry, manipulating,rude or out to make parents suffer,Kids LEARN they to have to do this to survive and maintain thier own dignity when respect is broken..They learn to be jerks from parents who teach them might makes right with thier smacks .

[Jack_DeLeon]

12. bullshit...

there is a difference between a spanking and a beating.

Maybe the kid cant tell the difference yet, but there is a difference.

[chicagojoe]

20. Sorry, but I know I'm right.

A spanking is a swat on the ass. The point of it is to gain attention.
A beating is repeatedly hitting a child in the head, or other parts of the body, either with hands or objects.
As a parent, I can tell you that I never beat my child as he grew up.
On 4 occasions, he recieved a swat on the behind. He has grown up to be a fine young man.

[sariku]

25. um, yes, there is

And as someone who survived serious physical, emotional, and sexual abuse, I take offense at that misguided attitude. There were times when my mother spanked me because I'd gotten in trouble and deserved it (oooh, I remember stealing once...). Then there were times that she beat me from head to toe with a wooden spoon, leaving welts all over my body, or beat me with belt buckles head to toe. There was a difference.

When I was *spanked* for doing something wrong, I knew I'd done something wrong. Did I want to be spanked? Heck no! Did I look forward to it? No lol. But as I said, I knew that I had done something deserving of punishment. After a spanking, I had a sore behind and was upset, but still - and I know I've said it a number of times - I knew I'd messed up.

On the other hand, the emotions left after being beaten were devastating.

[bemildred]

5. It is fallacious to treat verbal and physical discipline separately.

I had far more trouble from my parents verbal behavior than from
their occasional attempts at physical discipline, and there are many
like me. When you single out spanking, you ignore the larger problem.

[UdoKier]

7. I agree. I think verbal abuse can be much more damaging in many cases.

But the poll is in response to the spanking debate, and I'm just wondering how people feel they were personally affected by it.

I rarely got spanked, and the few times it happened were not all that traumatic. The last time, I was a teenager and could've thrown my mom across the room when she swatted me with a brush in a fit of anger because I wouldn't take my brother somewhere in the car.

She was all red and swatting with all her might, and I could barely feel it. It was all I could do to keep from laughing, so I humored her and gave him a ride. I was more bothered by her hysteria than her pathetically weak swats on my butt.

But there were very hurtful things my Dad said to me growing up that I still remember 25 years later that really cut to the bone. I would rather have had a spanking.

[Nikia]

42. For me the two sort of went together

Anytime I was spanked it also included yelling mean things at me. When I was older, I wasn't spanked but still yelled at. I don't know if I can separate the verbal stuff from the spanking experience though. Together, they were traumatic.

[Jack_DeLeon]

10. No, but I support the right for people to spank thier children...

I was never spanked as a child but I will admit that I was a good kid, and didnt cause too much trouble. I never really did much yelling, screaming, crying, or had any temper tantrums.

Not all parents are fortunate enough to have such good children though so I have no problem if parents spank thier children if they act stupid.

Its so damn annoying when I'm at work, or when you are at a store and there are parents who dont do shit about thier crying screaming banshee children.

[UdoKier]

13. I wonder why kids act that way.

Are we just seeing them on a bad day, or are they always like that?

My kids are generally well behaved, but I suppose on a really bad day, someone might get that impression of them.

My worst problem with them is that if there is an open space, they immediately want to start running around like crazy. Lots of energy to burn and it's pretty hard to restrain.

[DoNotRefill]

19. Kids get like that...

because parents refuse to set limits for them.

[trotsky]

28. Not all the time.

Take a good look at what we now consider autism today. It's not a single disorder, it's a wide spectrum of brain behaviors, some of which include the inability to discern social reactions. I.e., being unable to pick up on the social clues when certain behavior is inappropriate.

I am not against spanking at all, but I just wanted to point out that misbehaving children are not always that way because of their parents' inability to discipline.

[sariku]

27. When my youngest behaves that way...

It is almost always because she is tired or not feeling well (she is 9). And no, she no longer throws fits in public, but her behavior has always been greatly affected by these two things. My solution tends to be to check for a fever, then give her a hug, a talk, and send her off to some quiet time. Then I check her behavior after a good night's sleep and see if it has improved.

[HEAVYHEART]

11. Yes

My father beat the shit out of me at least twice or three times a week.

[lateo]

14. I spank my kids...

But very sparingly and I always give them fair warning that the behavior needs to change before I do it. It is an absolute last resort. My parents used it as a first resort to change behavior.

[DoNotRefill]

15. I was seriously abused....

but believe that spanking, if done right, is a valuable parenting tool.

My wife and I worked out the following system to insure that spanking doesn't cross the line into abuse. It's a simple two-step process. First, the parent who wants the child spanked is NEVER the person to administer the spanking. Secondly, the parent who is to actually spank the wayward child must agree that the child's offense is meritorious of a spanking.

With this simple process in place, the angry parent is never the one to actually administer the punishment, and it takes a unanimous decision from both parents for any punishment to be administered at all.

[UdoKier]

21. We finally gave up on spanking because it wasn't working for us.

But it's interesting you mention anger. When did spank, I wasn't actually angry at all, but I felt I had to act angry, and then as I gave the spanking, I felt bad about it.

I'm not criticizing anybody who spanks, but personally, it made me feel bad to do it, and makes me feel sick to remember it.

[DoNotRefill]

22. whatever works for you....

is good.

I've seen too many kids who never had limits set for them by their parents end up in the criminal justice system, where REALLY bad things happened to them. A (rare) swat on the ass can make all the difference.

[UdoKier]

24. I wouldn't rule it out in a very extreme situation.

But I don't expect that situation to arise. I shudder to think of dealing with kids as adolescents... so much more complicated...

[DoNotRefill]

43. We use it....

only in situations where the conduct could reasonably be expected to cause maiming or death. For instance: running into a busy street.

[sariku]

29. Very thoughtful system...

The problem with spanking is that it should not be done in anger. Conveys the wrong message and runs the risk of anger making it too harsh. So, having the OTHER parent do the spanking is a good idea.

[liberal N proud]

18. Only when I really screwed up and deserved it.

When my mother got the strap out, you knew you were going to get it. All we ever saw of the strap was one belt on the butt.
Sometimes, a good boot to the behind is the only way to get the child to see the wrong of their ways.
I parent had better understand though what they are doing and the consequences of going too far.

[SudieJD]

26. Severely Abused

As a child, I (as were all my sisters) was beaten and verbally abused on a daily basis. We were also starved for a week at a time and kept home from school.
It took two years in therapy to learn that it was not my fault or anything that I did.

In the end, I forgave my father for what he had done.

Sudie in MN

[noonwitch]

30. I got spanked occasionally by my mom, my sister got beaten

My dad rarely disciplined me and he never hit me. He beat my sister with a belt once, and felt really badly about it afterwards and never did it again.

My mom did most of the discipline. She hit me with her hand (swat on the butt) a couple of times, washed my mouth out with soap once, but I was basically an obedient child and did not require discipline frequently.

My little sister was a whole different story. My mom beat her on a regular basis with a wooden spoon. My sister was a high-energy kid with a big mouth. She'd mouth off, then run up the stairs and hide under her bed. My mom would grab her legs, pull her out from under the bed, put her over her knee and just whale on her with that spoon. It wasn't very effective, because my sister preferred to get beat than to have a time out and have to be still for any length of time. She'd always tell mom "It doesn't hurt". It had to hurt, it left marks, but she could take it. The beatings never really corrected her behavior any, a time out works better with those kind of kids. I witnessed most of it, so it did affect my behavior because I didn't want to get hit like that.

I don't think that this had any long term effect on us, ultimately, except that my brother and sister do not spank their children, nor would I if I had any. None of this was outside of community standards at the time, and many kids in our neighborhood got it much worse. I don't think we would have been better off in foster care-my dad paid for my college tuition, the state wouldn't have covered it all like that.

[ecstatic]

31. Well, it looks like most spanked DUers turned out pretty OK

Not referring to those who were abused.

[Der Blaue Engel]

52. Depends on what you mean by OK

I suffered irreparable damage to my self esteem and a constant seething rage under the surface that has never left me due to "non-abusive" spank-controlling parents.

My turning out okay (as in, I'm a law-abiding citizen holding down a steady job and not seriously dysfunctional) is in spite of the method of discipline, not because of it.

To be honest, I have in fact spanked my own child when at my wits' end, but it never felt right, and it never accomplished anything. I wouldn't judge anyone who chooses to discipline young children with an occasional open-hand swat on a clothed behind, but I think people should really look into the psychology of the issue before making it their discipline of choice.

(on edit: not *very* young children; I meant toddlers/preschoolers)

[DS1]

32. Only in school

:shrug:

[muriel_volestrangler]

33. Currently more who were abused, than never spanked

does that seem accurate? I would have not expected it (I never was, and I know others who weren't, but I don't know anyone who was abused - to my knowledge, anyway).

But do people who were abused vote more in these kind of polls (I can see they would).

[sariku]

39. Maybe

I know that I tend to avoid them because of the emotion involved in them.

[amazona]

47. in my generation no such thing as "never spanked"

I don't think there would be any measurable numbers of "never spanked" who were born before the 1980s.

[muriel_volestrangler]

49. I was born 1967 (n/t)

[mondo joe]

53. I was born in '64. Never was spanked, never have spanked.

[SarahB]

34. Rarely.

I don't think an very occasional swat in the tush only is that horrible. I dealt with something more along the lines of continual criticism and emotional neglect. :(

[youthere]

35. Only very occasionally

was I ever spanked. It had to be a very serious infraction for my parents to use physical punishment.

[Guitarman]

36. As required

Need another choice. "As required" Yep, from both my mom and my dad. Mom with the hand, dad with the hand and the belt. The sound of a belt clearing belt loops will instill the fear of God into any child.

And I deserved it more often than not. And I did not suffer any ill effects. In fact, the fear of being spanked was a very effective deterrent.

[T Town Jake]

37. I was only swatted on the rear twice as a child...

...and both times I damn well deserved it. And it was exactly that both times: one swift open hand to the rear, more meant to get my absolute attention focused on the serious nature of what I'd done than anything else.

That said, I've never had cause to use corporal punishment on my kids. For starters, they've never misbehaved in such a serious manner as might justify a spanking. And in the second place we've found it quite effective to discipline, when it has been necessary, our children with a combination of revocation of privileges (T.V. watching; game-boy playing; X-box confiscation etc.) with timed "groundings" - or what is now popularly called "time outs" - that involve reading so many pages (usually about fifty) of a book from Dad's library during the "time out." Since these are almost all volumes on history, historical figures, or social movements, they're pretty dry reading for a kid not interested in the slightest in the economic and social ramifications of the Sherman anti-trust act. I require a full verbal report on the material covered before the grounding is lifted, too. :evilgrin:

But even that kind of punishment has been about as rare as hen's teeth in our household; my kids know the limits on their behavior that have been set, and have rarely gone beyond them. Most of all, they know that we love them, and understand (I'm pretty sure) that those limits are imposed in the interests of their safety, emotional well-being, and/or domestic harmony.
It's a touchy area, I know, and I fully understand both sides have a valid point of view. That's just my humble input. Sorry for the longish nature of the post.

[donheld]

38. It was one of my parents first responses

they thought it was a cure all. My brother got it at least once a week, me not so often, but far too often.

[undergroundpanther]

40. When I trusted an adult

I didn't want to see them unhappy with me,I was devistated by my own actions when they looked sad and dissapointed in me.I wanted to do anything I could to make things right. I was a good kid.

But I ran into bad adults.One was a neighbor who was a pedo
And my own parents.

My parents were cruel caprecious narcissists.My father was an insane monster.My mom was his dormat a carpiung woman with a tounge like a razor..At least she cared enough to clean my wounds off after my fathers tempertantrums.But she was not kind.
The neighbor was dangerously insane. He won my trust by being kind to me something unheard of because all the adults I reguraly interacted with were control freaks or bullies. I soon found out he was like the others he lost my trust and hurt me badly.

I had a child shrink growing up too.Today looking back she was pretty damn incompetant.. But when I was a kid I saw stuff differently, and I adored her.As a kid I needed an adult who was not dominating who treated me like a human being more than ANYTHING in this world. I was lucky to have her,as after I left her I tried to kill myself at age 8 I never wanted to deliberately displease her simply because she was so kind,I went through crazy harmful tests by her.

Because she didn't break my trust.She didn't bully me like all the other adults. Sometimes I think I would have willingly gone through anything because I trusted her,and I trusted her because she did not force,did not belittle hit or teach me lessons by fear and cocercion.

[Karenina]

41. My parents (shrink and educator)

had this sytem:

Pick it up and put it away. ONE
Pick it up and put it away. TWO
Pick it up and put it away. THREE (here the belt gets unbuckled)
Pick it up and put it away. FOUR (here it gets whipped out of the beltloops)

AWRIGHT AWREADY, DON'T HAVE A COW, I'M DOING IT.

I let my dad get to FIVE once and ran. He chased me up the stairs, I dove under the bed. He moved the bed, I squiggled out of his grasp. He caught me, turned me over his knee and delivered 3 STINGING WHACKS. Neither I nor my siblings EVER pushed the envelope again.

I swatted my oldest ONE TIME after warning 3 TIMES him NOT to yank his brother down off the top bunk. Caught the kid inches befor his head hit he floor. ONE SWAT on a bare butt. Big brother was too astonished to cry. "You HIT me!" We discussed it for 45 minutes, but I NEVER had to hit either of them again. (Just threaten :evilgrin:)

[mondo joe]

51. I was never spanked, and I have never spanked.

[UdoKier]

55. It is good that your parents gave you a chance to take action

before actually spanking.

Some parents just spank, making the the kid helpless to change anything or correct his behavior.

[shesemsmom]

44. It don;t think it hurt me

:crazy:

[Groggy]

45. My dad spanked

me once with a brush because I lost my glasses. He cried after. I'll never forget it. He said he was sorry and I told him it was okay...I was like nine or so. ;(

[Placebo]

48. I was spanked once.

I think I dragged the needle on my father's turntable over a record or something.

I didn't care for the spanking, it hurt like a mofo.

[baldguy]

50. Once. That was enough.

I was 15 & called my dad a motherfucker. He was a 6ft 2in, 265lb former semi-pro football player. All muscle.

He didn't say a word to me. He just picked up the srawney little kid that I was with one hand & threw me against the wall.

[gollygee]

54. If you asked my parents

they'd tell you they only spanked occasionally and never lost control.

But they have fuzzy memories . . .

They didn't spank all the time but they spanked more often than they remember. And they most certainly did lose control, and sometimes even started hitting us with other things.

[BiggJawn]

56. Do floggings count as "other"?

You ain't been "spanked" until you've had a sled-dog harness wore out on your backside....

Didn't warp me TOO much.