That's pretty much the logic that people use for it. Because it does work, and (presumably) you don't do it hard or often and it's definitely not easy to use other approaches. But then if you wanted easy you shouldn't be a parent anyway
Well... I taught my kids sign language at a very young age, so just because they can't speak it doesn't mean they can't understand it. And.... if they're that little and doing something that bad... something bad enough that you would smack them? I kinda feel like you missed an opportunity to stop it before it got that bad.
I don't mean "easy". I'm wondering if most children can literally comprehend that something is very unacceptable, as opposed to just being a nuisance. Of course, some people have a very low threshold for "very unacceptable". I'm not referring to anything malevolent. Kids just don't know any better. They're ignorant. Learning their boundaries.
I think that's probably true. If they did it without you seeing then they probably didn't mean to break the lamp or whatever, and if they did it in front of you then you should have been able to stop them. I think when most people say "it's the only way" what they mean is "it's how you stop them throwing a tantrum in public".
But then if they can't understand it then I guess why are you disciplining them anyway? I mean, they didn't decide to do anything bad, they're just being a toddler. As an adult it's easy to see 'bad' and 'good' but to a kid who can't talk yet that's not something you can expect them to take on board, certainly not so much that you can justify hitting them for it.
That's where I've seen parents use it though; like their kid is bawling on a train or whatever and they can't calm them down and eventually smack their butt. I can't say if it worked, but that's how I've seen parents do it.
To try and get a little more specific, a child of around 3 years of age can differentiate the severity - in discourse - between potentially causing somebody (or themselves) serious harm, versus being an obnoxious brat over a toy at Walmart? Certainly the child cannot be allowed to think that these two things would be of equivocal severity?
That's very cool. You've done major work. (In print that looks like sarcasm. It's not.) I really do appreciate your explaining from your point of view, where you are in the process, because that shit is not easy. From your description, it sounds like, however briefly, there was a point of connection where he recognized that you and he had a shared experience...a some sort of mutual understanding. Do you think you would have arrived at your place of understanding if your dad hadn't recognized what he'd done, though? If there had never been that moment, and your dad went to his grave believing he did absolutely nothing wrong and that you were 100% completely at fault, and that he was a fantastic parent, and that, by the way, you were going to hell and he was not going to, wouldn't it be a just a little harder? Also, if an abuse victim blames his/herself, doesn't that give them an additional potential opening for empathy, by giving them one less layer of anger to trudge through? (Or maybe not? That's why I'm asking.) I get that many, if not most victims of abuse blame themselves, and it's understandable, but even as a little kid I never felt my bad behavior justified abuse. (Which is probably why I'm having difficulty writing a character who does blame herself.) To me it always seemed like bullshit and hypocrisy and batshit craziness, and being a mouthy kid (surprise), I told them so. Maybe 60 years from now I'll have understanding, but less than a year out from her death? Not there yet.
Request: Please be mindful of the original topic of the the thread. The conversation shouldn't cannonball too far away from the original question. Thank you.
Not a parent, but I think little kids are more intelligent than people think they are; they just can't express their thoughts. I can very clearly remember being around 3 and being smacked for some offense or another and thinking, "That's not nice! You're always telling me to be nice!" And smacking my mother back, because, you know (to a toddler's mind), an eye for an eye. ETA: Sorry, Moderator. My internet is slow and alerts are coming in slllllllllow so I didn't see your request.
No, it's not easy. There was, but that was shortly before his death. Yes. I came to that realization around the age of 20 or so. I stopped seeking approval, stopped caring what he thought, and really, it wasn't that hard, because he kicked me out when I was 13 and I was homeless for a... long time. When I realized that he was a human being, with faults and mistakes and traumas and pain of his own is when I stopped taking it personally, I guess. His break through had nothing to do with my realizations. His realization happened about 6 months before he died. He's been gone almost 2 years. (I took care of him, here in my home, for the last 2 years of his life) No? I would think it would give them another layer, not less of one, but I really am not sure, since I don't necessarily know what that's like. I kinda blamed myself, but because once it started I would keep it going, I would keep at him until he knocked me unconscious or he quit. I didn't think mine did either. I was the little girl who wouldn't stay down. Even at 7, I would drag my ass up to standing and ask if he was done yet. I had a goal and I accomplished it well. I do get that. Really.
Cannot be allowed to think is a bit of a problem there. They can think for sure, and they can understand some things, but you can't make them think anything. Most of the time when they are potentially hurting themselves or others it's because they don't know what they're doing. And like I say, I do understand the rationale. I just don't think it holds up in practise. I think that if you think about why kids do stuff then you'll end up seeing that this kind of discipline is just going to make stuff worse.
Thank-you for your input. I'll get around to making a separate thread, likely in The Debate Room. That way this one can get back on track.
I find it tricky when I'm writing characters who don't see topics like racism and sexism the way we do nowadays, because they are living in the 19th century. It's not so much that they're actively racist or sexist, but simply that certain things don't evoke the same responses we have towards them today. On the one hand, I don't want to give them attitudes they wouldn't have had, or put words in their mouths that they wouldn't have said, or thoughts in their heads that would take a century or so to fully develop. I also don't want to turn the story into a polemic on unfair practices of the 19th century and thank god we've moved on (or some of us have, anyway.) On the other hand I don't want to just let certain things pass either. So it's a bit of a balancing act, especially as I want my main characters to be likeable people. For example, most settlers of the American west didn't feel particularly guilty about settling on land that actually belonged to indigenous people who had been violently displaced. I feel terribly guilty about what my forebears did, but my characters wouldn't have, particularly. They might well have felt compassion towards the situations some of the Indians found themselves living in, if they were aware of it, but that wouldn't have kept them clinging to the Eastern Seaboard either. The land was free and open for the taking if the settlers (from the eastern states and from other countries) were willing to take risks and work hard. That's their story, and that's what mattered to them. My story is set in 1886, and by that time most of the tribes had been forced onto reservations that were conveniently 'out of the way,' so the Indians who still were alive didn't interact with the settlers all that much. They were already consigned to myth. It was interesting in that with all the first-hand accounts of real people of the day, there was very little mention made of the Indians or what had happened to them. I don't think, by that time, that it was of any great concern, really. So I am trying to portray the situation for my fictional characters the way it would actually have been for them at the time. (The situation regarding the genocide and incarceration on reservations doesn't go unmentioned, by the way, but it doesn't figure into my story either.)
These are the same things we struggle with from time to time. As an atheist, it's sometimes tempting to insert my beliefs, or shade the thoughts and words of characters to match my outlook on the world. As our WIP has a convent of wayward nuns at the center of the mystery, and the three protagonists are devout Catholics, it is a challenge to keep my beliefs to myself. There's also some value in having protagonists that have not-so-nice views of the world around them, but grow with the story and come to a better understanding of people who are from different walks of life. They should progress as we often do... as a result of regrets and guilt.
That's really all you can do. It's what I try to do, because I think you have to be true to the character and the character's life experiences. You really can't expect your character to be all broke up about the plight of the Native Americans because that's just not how they felt. From their perspective, the Indians weren't human. They were these savage heathens that no one understood or cared to. They were different and were, basically, animals. It would take some serious focus for me to write a story like yours, because my relatives were on those reservations, but I agree that it's important not to let modern thinking corrupt a story of the past. And, really, if people are offended by the way things used to be, they probably shouldn't be reading things that are set in that era.
Oh, my characters aren't that bad! In fact, my main female character's father did what he could to assist the band of Blackfeet whom he encountered ...but that's backstory and happened about 10 years before the 'present' story takes place. It's not that my characters are indifferent and they certainly don't believe in the savage heathen theory. But the Indians are no longer visible in the area where the story takes place, so they don't figure in it, beyond a couple of mentions. That may get rectified in a sequel, by the way. I have planned a couple....
Well, I needed them to be likeable people, and I just couldn't have made them racist. And not everybody back in those days hated or feared the tribes either. In fact, the one main thing I've learned while researching this novel is that MOST myths about the 'wild' west are exactly that. Myths. The truth is much more complicated and a hell of a lot more interesting than the old regurgitated myths.
I hear you. And I ... kinda agree. Not everybody did, that's true. But more did than didn't. Of course, I'm also looking at it from the other side and from passed down stories and such so, I'm sure my view is a little different than the general, published, views.
The word "respect" seems to take on many forms, but in this context it often means "to avoid harm" or "have due regard or consideration for the feelings, wishes, rights, or traditions of". Does telling the truth sometimes hurt somebody's feelings? Does the truth sometimes not have regard for tradition? Does the truth sometimes not care about wishes? I'd wager that truth doesn't care about any of those things. If it aligns with them, that's fortunate, but that's not because it has to. I'm not speaking for Homer. Only putting in my opinion.
