Spare the Rod...

So I’ve been rambling the last few posts. I figured it’d be nice to get an organized post together.

This is not the original article I saw, but it’s the basic story. I saw a clip from the CNN story with Don Lemon, where they had a therapist on reputing the need for corporal punishment, spanking. http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2011-10-06/news/os-child-abuse-video-arrest-20111006_1_child-abuse-video-youtube

There’s a story in the news about a 25 year-old black man who is accused of abuse. He posted a video on youtube (his dumbest crime) of his teaching a mentee a life lesson for acting out in school. He cut off the little boy’s hair and eyebrows (a bit extreme), spanked him, and made him do a series of bootcamp exercises (possibly also a bit extreme). Now I am not sure what the little boy did, and if the crime really fit the punishment, but these are the facts as I know them (which means very little). Soon the National Center for Missing and Exploited Childrenen tipped off local authorities and this guy is being charged with child abuse. The mentor maintains that the purpose of all this was to teach the little boy a lesson and help him not become a statistic (another jail-bound black man). A noble lesson that hopefully is learned despite the circumstances.

First, it breaks my heart while teaching this lesson, the mentor will fall short of visions I’m sure he had for himself. Once he is convicted he will be caught up in the very cycle he was trying to keep this little boy out of. Yep, I said once he is convicted, he’s going down for this, which is unfortunate I think. I’m sure he felt his heart was in the right place, but the whole thing was poorly executed. It does concern me that the little boy was not his child, but he had been mentoring him for a year, so hopefully they had developed some time of bond. A bond where the child understood and appreciated the standard held, and understood the consequences of not abiding by those standards.

I honestly think his guy’s main crimes were his inability to be more discreet in teaching his lesson, and the extremity of the punishment itself. Part of me feels the punishment was extreme, but I don’t know the crime. I am a firm believer in corporal punishment by way of spanking, to help aid in teaching and correcting. I believe it is important to use physical punishment in combination with verbal lessons (no profanity, or yelling, needed), so that the child understands their wrongdoings and is able to make better decisions in future situations. However, I also am quick to add that, punishments should be tailored to the child, not every child needs a spanking. Parents/Guardians should consider this when disciplining.

The main problem I have with the original snippet I saw was the therapist point of view. Some may think that spanking is not necessary and call it abuse. And I believe spanking can be taken too far, and has been many times before, but I also think it a legitimate way to discipline a child. I hope this guy, and his mentee, have learned some important life lessons. Everyone doesn’t agree with spanking and, in general, we can agree to disagree, “but as for me and my house…”