Kristen Gyles | Why a blanket ban on corporal punishment?

No matter how great the parenting style, at some point even the most well-behaved children do the wrong thing. In those critical moments, parents cannot simply do nothing.

Because some parents have been doing nothing, children have been left to raise themselves and each other, multiplying the already existing chaos across the youth population. But the truth is, not all parents know what to do. They know they need to do something, but the only thing they know to do is to offer a spanking when their children misbehave. Now they hear they should cut out the spankings and they think their children will be all but spoilt by adulthood, because they know of no other meaningful or effective methods of discipline.

I spoke with a friend recently about the ban on corporal punishment being contemplated by the government. At a point he asked, “What exactly are parents supposed to do when their children are out of control? Just talk to them?”

As simplistic as it sounds, when done correctly, ‘talking’ can go a far way in correcting a child’s bad behaviour. Psychologists say it is better to avoid lecturing and instead ask more probing questions that will help the child to connect their emotions with their behaviour and address the uncontrolled emotions that led to the bad behaviour.

This can be difficult for parents who struggle with relating to their children overall, on account of the inherent generational gaps. The parent has to know when to listen and when to speak. When they do speak, they need to know what opinions to share and what opinions not to share; when to encourage and when to discourage. If the conversation is to have the intended positive effect, the parent will also need to be calm and controlled and will need to restrain himself or herself from showing clear signs of frustration with the child’s behaviour.

OTHER APPROACHES

There are other approaches to discipline that parents can take. Sometimes, all a child really needs to convince them to stop engaging in a certain negative behaviour, is to experience the consequences associated with the behaviour.

For example, if a student uses inappropriate language at school and winds up with a detention, showing up at the school gate to fight with the security guard, the teacher, the secretary, the principal and every other member of staff communicates to the child that mommy and/or daddy will have them covered no matter what they do. In such a case, the behaviour is almost sure to continue.

And then, not every bad behaviour warrants a response. Children engage in behaviours that are rewarded and avoid behaviours that are ignored or punished. Of course, parents cannot ignore in acute cases where the child is posing immediate harm to others or to him or herself.

So, spanking or beating a child is really not the only way to deter bad behaviour. But the question is, how many Jamaican parents have awareness of these and other useful parenting tools, and how many can appropriately use them? How many parents know what behaviours to ignore and what behaviours to punish? How many parents themselves have the sense of emotional regulation to calmly speak to a misbehaving child without shouting or insulting them in the process?

Spanking is the familiar method of discipline that most Jamaican parents are acquainted with. They recall their own fears of getting beaten when they were young. They also recall the many occasions in which that fear stopped them from doing many of the foul things they wanted to do. They know that if that fear stopped their bad behaviour, it would likely stop their children’s.

Even though the fear of a beating might cause a child to think twice about sneaking out the house during curfew, some research now shows that some forms of physical punishment can leave long-lasting emotional scars. So, because of the negative effects that might come with spanking, it makes good sense to explore other methods of punishment.

WELL INTENTIONED

For this reason, the push towards a total ban on corporal punishment is well intentioned. Either way, the country is not ready to embrace such far-reaching legislative change since much of the social and cultural groundwork has not yet been done. If parents do not know how to use the other disciplinary tools available to them, they will be left growing severely indisciplined children. Then again, any move to outlaw corporal punishment, at this point, is not likely to make any meaningful impact on parenting without the corresponding culture shift, anyway.

On that note, what exactly is the rationale for a total ban? Why not a measured approach? Rather than using a broad brush to paint all forms of corporal punishment negatively, why can’t we do the work of actually identifying harmful and abusive approaches to administering physical punishment and outlaw those?

Certainly, not all forms of physical punishment cause harm to a child yet it seems most conversations on corporal punishment today are muddied by the use of the term ‘abuse’. Not all forms of physical punishment equate to abuse. Furthermore, child abuse in all forms is already illegal. Existing laws punish parents who abuse their children (or other people’s children) emotionally, sexually, physically or through neglect. Outlawing corporal punishment therefore serves no purpose in preventing abuse, which again, is already illegal.

Until parents are equipped to administer discipline using more sophisticated, non-physical approaches, a blanket ban on corporal punishment might not solve any problem but only remove from many Jamaican parents the only disciplinary tool they know how to effectively use.

Kristen Gyles is a free-thinking public affairs opinionator. Send feedback to kristengyles@gmail.com and columns@gleanerjm.com.