Should UK also Ban Smacking?

[Davelfc]

I fail to see how this will stop bad parents that beat their children from beating their children? There's already a law for that, and still kids are beaten. 

 

I do agree that there are many other punishments that can be a lot more effective than using violence, or the threat of it on children. They often mean a parent has to do some actual parenting and work to enforce. I also agree that many see a swift smack as the far easier option. 

 

I used smacking as a deterrent for my children, but a raised voice along with a line that they knew they should not cross (that didn't move with my mood) ensured that this was rarely administered. I think that fathers have an easier time because in my experience anyway the kids didn't misbehave for me. Maybe being massive and with an authoritarian employment background helped, I dunno. 

 

I am a grandparent now and I would never raise a hand or threaten violence to my grandchildren, I often think that with the wealth of knowledge I have now I would be a different parent to my kids. I think a lot of grandparents go through that thought process. But it's one thing having the grandkids for a few hours and having them permanently. I actually prefer the grandparent role to the parent, I can just spoil them with no consequences. Unfortunately I do see parents in that role and there used to be a saying 'making a rod for their own back' 

 

I speak to my kids about it now and they claim I smacked them very rarely and that their mother smacked them considerably more, but that they were never punished unless they'd done something wrong. They all work, none of them have ever been in any trouble and they're polite decent humans. I'm not saying that you can't have those without smacking. 

 

 

Time will tell on this, it's another of those fucking stupid polarising subjects where some will scream at you if you take what they consider to be the wrong side. They are the ones that need the slap!