qondio.com/sJUt

Self serving research - Parents Beware!

By Arthur Webster of My Local Gazette

There is a whole raft of sad and abusive treatment of children but it beggars belief that a parent who smacks a child should be automatically promoted into the ranks of child beaters, child molesters and child abusers.

The world of psychiatry is populated by people with letters after their names that simply indicate that enough study was done to pass an exam that cannot be failed.

My own professional qualification in Economics is very similar to that of psychiatry. As long as you can postulate a theory and produce enough logical reasons to support it and enough precedent (ie. the work of other people) to add 'authority', you cannot fail an Economics exam. This is probably why it is not graded very highly in respect of the rest of the professional qualification.

A remarkably disturbing aspect of many of the pundits who try to tell parents how to look after their children is that they themselves are childless.

Another aspect that is equally disturbing is the way that they can look at the work and promote the work of others without checking them out.

For example (and he is not unique by any means) Konrad Stettbacher was a very highly regarded voice in the world of child abuse and the results of early age trauma. People as 'qualified' as Alice Miller espoused his work and based much of their own opinion upon his treatises and published papers. They had to very rapidly withdraw when he was charged with many counts of child sexual abuse!

Creating a theory and then producing 'surveys' that in any other field would not even be accepted as a mathematically representative sample is a way that many charlatans create fear and aquire massive lists of patients from whom to extract great wealth. It is not possible to estimate the damage that psychiatrists do in their imaginary world of ideal circumstances.

It is not so long ago that the whole question of the results of child abuse was raised amid concerns that the massive wave of 'me too' claims was being created by the way that questions were asked of children and the 'toys' that were used to stimulate the imagination and required responses of the subject children. There has never been a full rebuttal of the claim that adults claiming to have been damaged by 'brutal' parents were actually being fed memories that they did not really have. It was seen that on many ocassions a very tiny incident that an adult could remember was latched onto by the psychiatrist and milked for all it was worth. This was very rapidly swept under the hypothetical carpet.

The child abuse industry is massive marketing and brain washing by 'professionals' who have little or no day to day contact with children except as laboratory guinea pigs.
It is my belief that the suggestive power and the naïvety of subjects unfortunate enough to fall under the evil influence of malignant self interest are the real worms in our apple.

Political correctness and the massive industry that has been created around it is an evil that Satan himself wiould be proud of. Whenever the still, small voice of reason tries to make itself heard, the howls and derision from the 'interested marketing parties' indicates quite simply that they are not reasonable, are not willing to hear anything that might challenge their cash cow and do not allow that any other opinion but their own has any value.

How on Earth has western civilisation managed to survive all these years with so many ordinary adults being ruled by their suppressed memories of abuse?

Isn't it time that the hysteria about 'every parent being a child beater' came under close scrutiny by a panel of experts - PARENTS!

My own experiences as a child were fairly typical. I was smacked when haughty but it never, ever occured to me that my parents were being cruel. I knew that they loved me and I knew that it was my own fault that I had been smacked (indeed, I would often realise while I was doing something that I would have to set the illicit pleasure off against the temporary sting of a smack).

Parents were aware of a very simple matter. A smack tells the child in no uncertain terms that it has behaved unacceptably. The sting of the slap is not a major trauma - the biggest trauma I ever felt was shame that I had done what I should not have done. My punishment was apt and instant.

Compare a smack with half an hour of nagging and whining about why 'we don't do that' and I think that most rational people will see the sense of instant and effective punishment.

While the subject of child correction or discipline is shaded by the hysterical shrieking of (often) childless theorists, any parents who love their children enough to give an instant response to bad behaviour will be branded as a child beater, a brutal parent or, even worse, a criminal.

PLEASE VISIT THE CONTRIBUTOR'S WEBSITE

My Local Gazette for Costa del Sol
Local news for Costa del Sol
www.costadelsol.mylocalgazette.com

Arthur, I agree with you in general. "PC" run amok has way too much influence in our society today. It makes you wonder how we ever managed to survive before the advent of "PC".

Hi, James,
Maybe you should be asking - how will we survive PC?

I completely agree. Smacking has become demonised over the decades-possible too many Dr Spock followers out there. I believe smacking a child has its place in society, though like anything it must be kept in balance of course, like any form of discipline. Physical punishment didn`t do me any harm at school nor at home.

Ooooh, be careful, you might have to stand in the 'naughty boys' corner' - and you know how traumatising THAT is. You'll never have another decent night's sleep for the rest of your life (unless you join my course, $195 an hour, three hours a week).

We see Mom/Dad walking across the parking lot,texting on their cell phone, while their three children are walking behind them. Should we smack the parent for not supervising their children????
Thanks for sharing, Arthur.
Best to you.
Frederick

Hi, Frederick,
The answer is 'Yes we should' but far too many people simply say "Just look at that. Don't they care about their kids?"

If children are being neglected in a busy place, I will approach them and ask them where their parents are, in a loud voice. To hell with 'polite', car parks are among the most dangerous of places for unsupervised kids to be strolling around in.

It's a tough issue for sure. I certainly think too many children are truly abused and as a society we need to address the problem. I perpetuates itself and can be soooo damaging. On the other hand, to tie a parents hands isn't the answer.

I don't believe in general smacking and such but a thoughful approach that includes spanking if necessary seems reasonable to me. I guess the answer is better parents who understand discipline so that it doesn't turn into something abusive.

Isn't it strange how a simple word 'smack' can be demonised? The word means 'to strike with the open hand'. I see that it is now held to be a synonym for 'beating', 'hitting', 'paddling', 'spanking' and other forms of child abuse.

It beggars belief that intelligent people cannot understand plain English. A smack is a single event. It requires no repetition and the level of force used in correcting children by responsible parents would hardly leave a mark. It is the intent, not the act, that will show the child its error.

Unfortunately the child abuse industry and those making money from it will not allow the return of corporal punishment until such times as they have reduced civilisation to a festering concourse of self seeking greed and mayhem. When it is time for the pendulum to start the return swing it will be too late but those now espousing licence will be in the vanguard with their 'new' theories on how to impose discipline.

Some are very happy to quote the Bible but don't forget that, if they want to use that, God himself often used the ultimate capital punishment - He wiped out whole nations if they displeased Him.

There has always been child abuse and it will never end as long as there are bullies to pick on the weak. Although I agree that a lot of psychiatrists go overboard and try to find something "wrong" with a child (or adult) with emotional problems, I'm glad to see that child abuse is no longer a hidden or shameful subject. Just like rape, where women were usually thought to be "asking for it", abused children are victims and people who witness the abuse should have the courage to report it.

There has always been and always will be aspects of human behaviour that are unacceptable.
One of these aspects is the 'holier than thou' attitude of so-called experts who can turn any event into a world catastrophe simply by ranting about it and fooling the idiots in high places to accept their crazy posits.
There are too many fish wives shrieking about too much for the noise of sanity and the genuine concern of parents to make temselves heard.

The copyright for this content entitled "Self serving research - Parents Beware!" has been specified by the contributor as:

This content may be copied and distributed (but not modified), as long as the original author is acknowledged with a link back to the content page. If you use this content according to the license specified, you must link to the following URL: