The Art of Spanking
So, thanks again
for the love in the cradle
and all of the changes that kept me dry.
And thanks again
for the love at our table
and tannin' my bottom when I told you a lie . . .
It’s a tear-jerker of a song, and the only thing that rescues Ricky Skaggs’ “Thanks Again” from excessive sentimentality is the fact that every word of it is true. But then again, it was a tear-jerker of a story that I was reading when that song started playing in my head.
The story appeared at Salon.com, and it was about parents spanking children, so right there from the get-go you’re bracing yourself for another left-wing diatribe against what my parents, and their parents, and, well, a fair number of the parents I’ve ever known did and do. And let us remember, wise King Solomon told us, “He that spareth his rod hateth his son.”
Kevin and Elizabeth Schatz were of a mind to take Proverbs 13:24 literally. Now I remember Dad’s belt and Mom’s wooden spoon, but neither would qualify as a “rod” in the literalist of senses. A length of quarter-inch plastic plumbing supply line comes closer. It was with such an instrument that the Schatzes (allegedly) beat their seven-year-old adopted daughter, Lydia, within an inch of her life, then proceeded to go another inch or two.
The beating apparently lasted for hours, and after the girl took her last breath, her lungs and heart just shut down, thanks to the amount of damage inflicted betimes.
The couple from Paradise, California, now faces a charge of murder, as well as more abuse charges pertaining to some of their surviving eight children, one of whom was hospitalized with massive bruising.
Another couple from “rural Tennessee” may face charges in connection to this case. It was Michael and Debi Pearl who suggested to the Schatzes that they buy the quarter-inch pipe and gave them a multitude of ideas about “Biblical chastisement.” In fact, they’ve given nearly a million-and-a-half people those ideas, because that’s the number of copies of To Train Up a Child that their representative claims to have sold.
When news accounts of this story first hit, the blogosphere lit up like a Christmas tree, and the Salon author graciously takes note of the fact that it was Christians who were first in line to condemn the ritual rod administration taught by the Pearls and practiced by the Schatzes.
One such condemnation was written by a “Laurie M,” who describes them as the warmest, most thoughtful people you’d ever meet, but tells of how the Schatzes had suddenly left their conservative congregation over an untold doctrinal dispute. “The Pearl Method was the missing link,” writes Laurie. “[I]t appears they were following Pearl teachings very carefully—in doctrine and in practice.”
One of those teachings has to do with “living the sanctified life.” It’s the sort of language that rolls off the tongue with ease among King-James-only fundies who fear Pool Tables and medicinal wine from a teaspoon.
Certainly, Saint James wasn’t joking when he said that “Pure religion” is “to keep oneself unspotted from the world.” But what does that mean? For some it means following neat lists of dos and don’ts. Check off every item on your list, and, congratulations! You are “sanctified.”
Thanks to religious publishing and the world-wide web, American Christianity now abounds in little lists of dos and don’ts, often with the scientific patina of self-help or psychology. “Parenting” itself is treated as a science, and the godly (or “well-adjusted”) child as little more than the right side of an equation.
Skipping ahead, one might counter that books that spell out what it means to “dare to discipline” are necessary in today’s disconnected world. And that what we need are more sound volumes like X or Y or Z, and less of the Pearls.
But what if “parenting” is less of a science and more of an art, something—like the fiddle—that you have to learn literally at the hands of someone else with experience and skill? Something that a thousand you-didn’t-know-my-father’s can’t change. What if the “pure religion” of which James wrote can only be found in a lifetime of struggle against sin within a flesh-and-blood community of families guided by a pastor? How did Israel know what Solomon meant by “the rod”? Why in the world didn’t he, or James, or even Our Lord spell out neatly the seven steps to better finances, or marriages, or parenting?
For taking me fishin,' and flyin' my kites,
And tuckin' me in, yes, night after night—
To my beautiful life-long friends,
Hey, Mom and Daddy, thanks again.
This article first appeared in the April 2010 issue of Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture.
Entries(RSS)
Mr. Wolf,
Thank you for the thoughtful article. As someone who has read the Pearl books, your post highlights an important point, namely, that the Pearl method does not necessarily abdicate the parent of responsible exercise of discipline. While one certainly can read a severity into the text, if approached with the mind of forgiveness and repentance, their method can be used artfully. Your inside into part as an art or technique to be learned is most helpful.
(FYI: The Pearl's advocate using a piece of flexible plastic plumbing supply line or a short length of thick weedwhacker string. Both sting a little but leave no lasting marks. Part of their exercise is to teach the infant or toddler by "licking" yourself with the string and reciting "ouch." The Salon article (and others) intentionally exaggerate the Michael Pearl for effect. He does not advocate metal piping or inflicting physical harm.)
My Daddy didn't use a rod a razor strap or belt. But I never got it when I did not deserve it. He also took me fishing and built and flew kites with me and I knew he loved me. I miss him very much.
Republishing Dr. Wolf's column is rather timely in light of the Tulane U. study released yesterday that children who are "spanked more" are more aggressive at age five, even if you control for factors like socioeconomic status.
That perhaps parents who discipline more (i.e., spank) are less tolerant, and more cognizant, of undisciplined behavior and that might explain why they self report "more aggressive" behavior was not considered, of course. Much less the idea that you can't actually reduce parenting to scientific models.
My daddy spanked me only twice, a belt and a bitter weed: once, when at the age of three, I touched a gun I was forbidden to touch; that was the belt. Then, when at the age of four, I lied to my parents while they were cooking supper, saying I was just going outside, but then walked nearly a mile down a dirt road to a neighbor's house, the house of my friend. The friends parents called my daddy who himself walked over and "drove" me home by spanking my legs with a green bitter weed.
I had a healthy fear of my daddy, a foreshadowing of that healthy fear we are to have of God. When mama had had enough, she would threaten to tell daddy. That was enough to keep us well at bay.
Mama always whipped me with the back of an old hair brush.
Granny (maternal) whipped me with a peach-tree switch. She always kept one hanging, a fresh one, for the grand kids. She did not whip often; but when she did, it counted.
Grandma (paternal)whipped me with the same hickory paddle with which she had whipped her kids. The only time she whipped me was when I dug a hole with a post hole digger with the plan of trapping one of her chickens in it. Well, she nearly fell into the hole.
Aunt Alice whipped me only once: with the back of the hand. She was wheel-chair bound. She lived with my grandmother in an old Victorian house. A spring thunderstorm was upon us, and the electricity was out. I hid behind a door and scared her as she came wheeling by. She got such a fright that she just grabbed me and spanked me with the back of her hand.
Auntie whipped me when I was about two. She had planted about 100 bulbs. While she was washing, I found that there was satisfaction in feeling each bulb "pop" out of the ground, much like the satisfaction of popping the packing bubbles. She was very angry but merely warned me and planted again. I again pulled them up. I got a tanning with a sweet gum limb. To this day, I have an aversion to bulbs.
Recounting whippings and loving and being grateful to the wonderful folks who gave them to us are good Southern pastimes.
The juvenile police officer in Berea,Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland, self published a book about spanking. It was his observation that the juvenile delinquents that he dealt with were not spanked. The kids that behaved, were spanked. I contacted Judith Regan about publishing his book before she was discharged from Murdoch's outfit. She did think it would sell because his finding were unfashionable.
"I had a healthy fear of my daddy, a foreshadowing of that healthy fear we are to have of God."
You know, that is a much larger point than any that I made in my piece. I remember a good Baptist pastor who once said that today's parents are committing the sin of idolatry with their children—making them into little graven images of themselves and looking to them for approval. That is love, but it's wicked self-love.
Bullying and childish belligerence are signs of weak and / or immature character. But, I often wonder if "more aggressive" is coded language. Does it mean acting like a punk, or does it mean masculine and willing to stand (even physically) for a right conviction?
Dr. Wolf @ 7
My father knew what his principles were, conveyed them to me at an early age, and showed himself to be uncompromising. He was not interested in "relating to me." He demanded that I relate to him on his terms.
Fred Reed has written a book with the subtitle of Find Your Inner Self and Drop It down a Well. My father might well have authored that. Inner self and self esteem were alien to my father.
My father always conveyed my duties to me very politly but uncompromisingly. "Son, would you mind ...." instroduced almost all of his directives. I knew that there was no choice and that had best not mind or at least not articulate in word or gesture that I minded.
His last words to me were of that order. The night on which he died, we both knew that death was at the door. I sat up all night with him; and, fortunately, he remained lucid the entire night, so that we talked and talked. At the approach of dawn, he said to me, "Son, don't you think that you need to wash your face and get some sleep?" I knew that this was actually not a question but a directive. I turned and washed my face. In that twenty seconds, he slipped away, just as he used to do when mama was looking for him, whereupon she would say, "Your daddy is always off like a jug handle!"
I learned that I had a will and was free to control it because of being spanked. Those things I wanted so badly to do but didn't, fearing a stinging swat, made me realize I was in control of my behavior.
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Parenting algebra would have been invented by the Greeks if parenting were a science. When I was a child I was a creative little devil at times: I would disobey hoping for only a good swat, which would sting and go away. My parents changed the punishment when they realized swats (no matter how they stung) were becoming ineffective. Parenting algebra? I would have figured it out and known how to work it for my benefit.