There’s no place like home — if you’re a kid in Kansas. You
may have read about a new bill introduced by Rep. Gail Finney, D-Wichita, that “expands” on caregivers’ rights regarding spanking,
allowing parents to hit their children a defined number of times (bruises and marks and welts, oh my!) and letting any teachers who’ve been given permission take a swing,
too. But what you’re not hearing enough about are all those good reasons it should be totally
fine to spank a kid. Let’s clear those up for once and for all.
But first. CNN reported
that this bill specified the following:
The legislation specifically would allow for
spankings “up to ten forceful applications in succession of a bare,
open-hand palm against the clothed buttocks of a child and any such reasonable
physical force on the child as may be necessary to hold, restrain or control
the child in the course of maintaining authority over the child, acknowledging
that redness or bruising may occur on the tender skin of a child as a
result.”
The reason: Kids are waaaay out of line
today, and their parents need to be able to hit them enough to get the job
done, but without provoking a call from child services. As Finney noted in her
statement:
The lack of an unambiguous statutory definition of
parental corporal discipline has led to the inconsistent application of
administrative child in need of care (CINC) enforcement and criminal charges,
allowing some clear instances of child abuse to go un-prosecuted and un-abated
and other clear instances of parental corporal discipline to result in
administration officials removing children from the home and / or criminal
charges against parents.
I’m all for making sure clear instances of child abuse are
prosecuted, but the solution to make it crystal clear would making hitting
children illegal, not defining an absurd, arbitrary number of thwacks that are
totally fine, so long as it’s only 10 and not 12, which is definitely logically too much.
Consider please that even in Kansas, it is already illegal to hit former children,
also known as adults. As in most places, they have
a law, K.S.A. 21-5413, which states that battery is
knowingly causing physical contact with another person when done in a rude,
angry, or insulting manner. So basically, SPANKING AN ADULT
ONE TIME (without consent) would be battery. Just once.
But 10 times for a kid? Totally cool. Welts optional. Let’s call a spade a spade: This bill attempts to legitimize a
terrible practice that has long been shown as ineffective. It wrongly reinforces
the idea that there is such a thing as a good kind of spanking. It suggests there is a
bad, abusive kind that should be illegal, but also a
good, loving kind that only causes bruises and welts but must be tolerated
because it helps nurture more effective, obedient citizens. It’s just a different “style” of parenting, no better, no worse!
Yeah, a “different” style that just happens to be legalized assault. Even worse, it indefensibly suggests that there’s some kind of logic to hitting that can be measured in actual strikes — 10 you’re fine, 11 you’re a child abuser? Should we let the domestic abuse shelters in on the secret? As if parents are actually thinking clearly when they spank, and not just making a shitty, bad parenting choice in the heat of the moment because of their own limitations.
Luckily, the bill died in committee, but the important thing to note here is that while corporal punishment is banned in schools in 31 states, it’s allowed in domestic settings in 49. Let us all look to Delaware, who designated spanking as child abuse in 2012. Make no mistake: There is no such thing as “good
hitting” versus “bad hitting.” There is no positive outcome from
violence toward children. Inflicting pain may curb bad behavior in the short term, but it also teaches violence as an effective means of conflict resolution. The spanker is not an “old-school
disciplinarian” who needs protection from false abuse charges, it is a
weak-minded person who mistakes compliance for understanding, who never learned impulse control and as such knows no other way to ensure
obedience. Spanking is not a well-reasoned, cool-headed strategy serving the
big-picture of healthy childrearing, it is a deeply misguided failure of patience, compassion, temper, and good ideas, and it is practiced and protected only by cowards.
Said Finney to the Wichita
Eagle:
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