The 'right' way to beat your child

Recently this 'parenting' book & its teaching has been brought to my attention.

http://www.amazon.com/books/dp/0966378601

Now the Scientist in me knows that I need to read this book for myself. 
Scientist Roo also knows that she need to spend more time researching & reading around the view points.

BUT, based on just the comments within the review section of the Amazon link, the Gut Instinct Roo is mortified at what this man is teaching people & what people think is ok.

From my initial research this man has no background in child psychology, child development, science or anything that I believe would qualify him to be telling people how to raise their children.

He has a BA in History & a Masters in Divinity & what I think is a Doctorate in Ministry (not sure.)

Here are some quotes from the book that I found on another blog:


p.134 “Acquaint your children with authority and submission when they are infants. This training starts the day you bring them home from the hospital.”

 p.142 “You must provide examples of submission for your children. Dads can do this through biblical authority over their wives, and Moms through biblical submission to their husbands.”


p.106 “Watch a baby struggle against wearing a hat in the winter. Even this baby who cannot articulate or even conceptualize what he is doing shows a determination not to be ruled from without. This foolishness is bound up within his heart. Allowed to take root and grow for 14 or 15 years, it will produce a rebellious teenager who will not allow anyone to rule him. The spanking process drives foolishness from the heart of a child. Confrontation with the immediate and undeniably tactile sensation of a spanking renders an implacable child sweet.”

p.151 Tripp describes the whipping procedure: take the child to a private place (so nobody can stop the abuse), make the child confess, tell the child "how many swats he will receive", put the child over your lap (as Tripp says, to "put the spanking in the context of your physical relationship" (!!)), pull the child's diapers or "drawers" down and whip them. Then pull the child up and show affection.


p.154 “When your child is old enough to resist your directives, he is old enough to be disciplined.



Rebellion can be something as simple as an infant struggling against a diaper change or stiffening out his body when you want him to sit on your lap. When our oldest child was approximately 8 months old, we were confronted with parenting our first mobile child. We had a bookshelf constructed of boards and bricks. Fearing the shelf would fall on him, Margy told him not to pull himself up by the shelf. After moving him away from the shelf, she left the room. As she peeked in on him, she observed him surveying the room. Not seeing her, he headed back toward the forbidden bookshelf. Here was a young child, not yet able to walk or to talk, looking to see if the coast was clear so he could disobey. Obviously, he was old enough to be disciplined.”




NGGGGGGGGGGGGGGAAAAARRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!

 
I, personally, feel desperately uneasy with all of this - I want to explore WHY I feel so uneasy about this.

The position I am coming from with this:

* I am not anti-religion - far from it.  However, I believe whatever you believe is personal & I have
   no patience for tub-thumping.
   Extremist-Atheists are every bit as tedious & intolerant as extremist-Whatevers.  Believe in nothing
   or believe in the Great Pumpkin, I don't care. Just don't tell me that you have all the answers &
   everyone else is deluded/evil/blahblahblah
   I am very interested in learning about all sorts of faiths, beliefs, non-beliefs, conspiracy theories. 
   Love it. Want to learn all about all of it .......... WHICH IS HOW I FOUND THIS BOOK


*  I cannot say that I would never smack The Boy. 
    To date, we have never had to.
    But we'd never rule it out but, again, to date, we have yet to come across a scenario when we
    would feel it was
a) appropriate
b) would have taught anything or
c) that THAT course of action would have made whatever the scenario we were in, better.

* I have some, and I did not expect this to happen when I became a Mum, Tiger Mum tendencies.
   I have exceedingly high expectations in terms of behavior &, I have a strong commitment to
   emotional & social intelligence (personally, a work in progress for myself & my job is to help the
   Boy grow in that way as well)


And so, given all that, I'm going out on a limb here (back to that Tree-Hugger Roo perhaps) -

I do not understand, given alllllllllllllllllll we now know about Child Development, the Acquisition & Experimentation of & with Language, the importance of Exploratory Behavior in young children, Emotional & Verbal Expression & the importance those things have on growing Self-Confidence, honing Decision-Making & the making of good choice skills - how anyone can believe that unquestioning  submission to a biologically superior being (and this superiority may be reinforced by physical means if necessary) is ok.

We don't even believe it in dog training anymore*

I don't wish to cause any offence.  Not at all.  I just do not understand.




* a WHOLLLLLLLLLLLE other rant

Write about your passion, they say.

(Well, in that case, this should be an easy post to write.)

OUR STARTING POSITION

It is possible that We are not entirely unbiased on this subject but, Rescue dogs (but, y'know, the species is really irrelevant) have been in my life since, well, Day 1.

Literally, since Day 1 of Me.

The Trousers has dedicated his life to animals too.  Fixing them.  Learning about them & helping them.  Whatever animal, seriously, WHATEVER animal he will want to try to help.  If it needs fixing, he will try to fix it.

Well, that's what vets do, right? So, no surprise there.

Together, we use our respective skills to try to help.

We have done our respective 'things' in a variety of countries, HongKong, UK & now, Dubai.

Even The Kid 'gets' it already, I'm proud to say.
When one of our (rescue, obviously) dogs passed away recently, He said,
"We need to find another dog that doesn't have a home & he can come be in our family"
*SNIFF* (that's ma boy.  He was 5.)

Animal Cruelty is everywhere

Let me be clear, cruelty to animals happens EVERYWHERE.  It is important we remember this.

HOWEVER, it is undeniable that there is still a disparity in legislation or priority given to repercussions when cases are brought to the attention of the relevant authorities, depending on the country.

This could be due to:
EITHER
a) the value or considered role of animals in a given society or culture
OR
b) the country's national economic situation & the strain its people are under.  Feeding One's children  or saving Oneself from the risk of rabies, for example, are not unreasonable priorities.

*enters, stage left, with Soapbox*

That said, on a level playing field, I'm going to go out of a limb (a fairly wide limb, that I can fit my soapbox on to) here and say:

1) It is NOT ok to hurt things for amusement
2) We (as a species) need to TEACH OUR CHILDREN that hurting things for amusement is NOT friggin' OK
3) Other sentient beings (doesn't matter how many legs, doesn't matter if furred, feathered, scaled, whatever) deserve RESPECT. You don't have to love them.  Just respect them.
4) Pets will teach your children valuable LESSONS in responsibility, compassion, care, &, when the time comes, death.  But if you are irresponsible about it, you will teach your kids some fairly worrying things too

'If you See Something, DO Something'

Recently, there have been a number of very upsetting reports of animal cruelty here in Dubai. 
There IS a Law.
It is a really good, comprehensive, thorough law but, the seeming lack of interest in enforcing the Law frustrates many.

Things will  improve & many here will, hopefully, see the campaign "If you See Something, DO Something' over the next few weeks.

By the way, this seems a fairly reasonable mantra to have, wherever you are.  Whatever the species.

No?