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In reply to the discussion: Please someone explain to me how a parent can live in the same house with a child they have raised [View all]politicaljunkie41910
(3,335 posts)spanking. However, I don't have a problem with spanking as a means of discipline, since as I mentioned I was spanked, and my husband was, and we could not come from more loving families. Heck Ward Cleaver spanked the Beaver, though we never saw it, but you could deduce that from the conversations, and no one ever doubted that Ward and June Cleever loved their children. I realize that in this day and age (2012) spanking would not be permitted in most communities and that is just a fact so a parent will have to have other means of instilling discipline which may not include spanking. However, as a parent I remain adament that sometimes I think as a parent you may need to get your child's attention, moreso than a timeout, or a grounding.
I know that the child psychologists like to say that if you spank your children you only make them fear you, but I'm comfortable with that. I know I feared my parents. My parents said what they meant and they meant what they said. The good thing is that they didn't have to spank me very often because I quickly learned the error of my ways. The same with my children. I had no problems with peer pressure, because no one could talk me into or pressure me into doing anything that I didn't want to do. I have no problem with knowing that my kids feared me. My kid also had no problem with peer pressure, and turned out to be leaders and not followers. I could not be more proud of them. And I still to this day hear from people all the time, often strangers about what great kids I have, but than I know that.
As a women of color, I knew that if I didn't discipline my children, the police would. I could not risk losing my children to the streets. I also know that my children would be held to a different standard than their white friends, schoolmates, and neighbors; but that is another subject altogether. I know non-minorities have trouble understanding this, but it's a burden that we bear, and I understand that life is not fair.