Home > Gwinnett > Rick Badie / My Opinion > Archives > 2008 > July > 27
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Stinging thoughts of school spankings
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I can still see the paddle and the principal who wielded it. Mr. Banks. As old-school as they come.
He had holes drilled in his wooden paddle to cut down wind resistance. To make that sting really bite when wood met behind.
That’s the way it was back in the day, when I was in school. Corporal punishment, at least in elementary school and middle school, was de rigueur.
Now, in Twiggs County, it’s back. The middle Georgia county’s school board recently voted to reinstate paddling. Parents, according to an Associated Press report, will have to sign a permission slip for their kids to be spanked; they also can opt out of the program. Witnesses must be present when the punishment is meted out.
The debate on whether to paddle or not, if it even deters improper behavior, continues to rage on. Generally, I’ve found that pro-spankers base their assessment of the matter on two factors:
It’s the way they were raised. It worked for them, and they weren’t severely scarred or demeaned by it. “A good whack on the behind never hurt anybody,” they say. “That’s what’s wrong with kids today,” they opine. “They don’t fear getting their butts spanked.”
They think paddling kids will help restore order in schools gone wild. Maybe, just maybe, it will fill a vacuum in which too many kids, on too many campuses, show scant respect for their peers, much less teachers. Fear of what’s to come, notably pain, might curb behavior, they reason.
To spank or not to spank. It continues to be the question. Twenty-eight states have banned corporal punishment in schools; Georgia allows school systems to decide whether to paddle.
Make no mistake: Paddling is a quick fix. A sure-fire way to get one’s attention, to briefly change behavior. A consequence, it is hoped, of a last resort that inflicts pain, perhaps embarrasses and sends a message: Your behavior stinks. Stop it. Now.
But old-fashioned values, coupled with old-school strategies like paddling, are archaic in modern society. Twiggs County school officials are paddling against a strong current of pedigreed opposition. Practically every leading association on the planet has screamed “no” to corporal punishment in schools. (Examples: The American Psychology Association, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and the National Association of Elementary School Principals.)
Alphonsa Foward Jr. is director of my daughter’s school, New Life Academy of Excellence Inc. in Norcross. He’s against paddling in American schools, particularly given the country’s diverse populations.
“Discipline is different for different cultures, which suggests a variety of disciplining [strategies],” he told me. “In today’s society, with so many different ethnic groups, it would make corporal punishment difficult.”
Moreover, Foward doesn’t think paddling has ever been as efficient in curbing behavior as pro-spankers tend to believe. It wasn’t the paddling that dictated respectable behavior. The times did.
“Children were taught respect at home, and they knew they had to respect their teachers,” he said. “Values were taught at home.”
I have full faith in Mr. Foward and the way he runs New Life.
But I wouldn’t want him, or any school official, spanking my kids.
That’s my job.
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail: rbadie@ajc.com.
Permalink | Comments (24) | Post your comment | Categories: Rick Badie
