It was the same on Reddit, people openly say disturbing things against children. What prompted me to post this is someone saying that babies should be put in overhead bins inside airplanes. Even if they’re joking, this is a disgusting thing to say. I won’t say that about anything else.

Would they say this openly about dogs or cats? I doubt it. If they do, people will be ready with pitchforks.

But no one gives a fuck when it’s said about children? Why is that? I though that the general consensus were that children are cute. Maybe annoying sometimes, but still cute. But with the amount of hate I see about them here, I’m really concerned. Does anyone have any thoughts about it?

  • kava@lemmy.world
    68·
    1 year ago

    I don’t believe this. You talk about scaring a kid with a belt or flip flop on reddit and everyone will call you a child abuser. Hell, you play a prank on your dog by jumping out behind a wall and they think you’re an animal abuser and should not have pets.

    I personally was raised with the occasional threat of physical discipline. Really I only got hit with the belt maybe 4 or 5 times in total growing up, all before the age of ~10. I don’t really see it as that big of a deal. I probably wouldn’t do it with my kids, but also I don’t think it’s traumatic or damages the kid.

    I think there’s a fundamental difference between hitting with the belt on the butt just to scare and then actually hitting the kid in anger with intention to cause pain. I think most non-psychopaths, even boomers, would agree with the first and not the second.

      • kava@lemmy.world
        23·
        1 year ago

        From what I understand if it’s done in the first manner it isn’t harmful. This is according to the research I’ve read. The issue is that the majority of times parents hit their kids in anger. So it’s generally advised to just avoid it altogether. Which I more or less agree with. Like I said, I probably won’t use it with my kids.

        • Shalakushka@kbin.social
          5·
          1 year ago

          What you understand is not consistent with what has been researched. That is to say, it’s a belief rather than an understanding.

          • kava@lemmy.world
            2·
            1 year ago

            I’m going off of research. Physical punishment of the child is dangerous on a societal level because most parents end up getting emotional. For example read this

            Interviews with physically abusive parents about the abusive events for which they were referred to child-protective services expose a startling and compelling theme: Nearly two-thirds of the abusive incidents began as acts of corporal punishment meant to correct a child’s misbehavior.49 The authors of a review of 830 substantiated cases of abuse observed that “no factor was so universal, so ubiquitous, as some identifiable behavior on the part of the child which precipitated the parent-child interactional sequence culminating in abuse.”50 A review of physical-abuse cases in the 2003 Canadian Incidence Study of Child Maltreatment revealed that seventy-five percent of these substantiated cases were intended by the parents to be corporal punishment.51 Similarly, an older review of maltreatment cases in the United States found that sixty-three percent of the incidents of physical abuse developed out of intentional corporal punishment.52 A study of abusive parents in Mexico found that these were more likely than a group of comparison nonabusive parents to use conventional corporal punishment (for example, spanking or slapping) and to use more-severe methods (for example, kicking, biting, or burning),53 which suggests that more-frequent and more-severe use of corporal punishment makes physical abuse of children significantly more likely.

            Vast majority of “abuse events” start with what was intended as simply corporal punishment. This is the crux of the problem. It’s hard to separate the effect of mild and conscientious punishment versus what often ends in abuse.

            Which is why it’s easier just to say “corporal punishment is bad” because it will dramatically reduce the rates of abuse in society.

            But there’s more nuance to it. Corporal punishment tends to not be damaging depending on frequency & intention of the parent. If the frequency is low (<5 times a year) and there is a feeling of warmth between the parent and the child, the kid doesn’t experience a meaningful mental health impact. However, in every other case (vast majority of cases) there are negative mental health impacts. Higher rates of ADHD, misbehavior, future addiction issues, etc.

            Which is why the advice “don’t spank your kids” is a good one because you simply can’t trust every parent to be a fully rational actor with the long term perspective of their kids best interest in mind. Just safer not to do it.

            I wouldn’t do it either

    • Peruvian_Skies@kbin.social
      34·
      1 year ago

      I think there’s a clear subjective difference between consciously spanking a child as a form of discipline, as a rational decision and with the absolute minimum force required for it to work, and hitting a child as a form of punishment guided by negative emotions. In the first case, you’re doing it to improve the child’s life in the long run. In the second, you’re just being violent towards someone weaker than you because you’re the lowest of the low.

      It’s like the difference between a tasteful nude photograph meant to highlight the beauty of the human body and porn, or between using dissonance in music to create tension and using it because you’re a bad composer. There isn’t a set of general, objective rules to distinguish the two, but if you see it, you immediately know which one it is.