MOTHERING

The Upper Hand

by Fern Kupfer

People are talking again about spanking. On the talk shows. On CNN. Inthe American Medical Association's Archives of Pediatrics and AdolescentMedicine. A university study concludes that the more a child is spanked,the more antisocial behavior follows when that child is older. InSweden, spanking and public humiliation have been banned. Anti-spankingauthorities include many child development experts and a host of parentswho deeply believe that violence only begets more violence.

In this country, the pro-spanking lobby includes those parents whohave smacked a few behinds in their day and say "hogwash" to thetheorists. Many conservative Christians believe that undisciplinedchildren are the cause of society's ills.

To spank or not to spank is the question. My general feeling is thatyou shouldn't. Frequent hitting as a response from frustrated parents(you know -- the kind of mindless cuffing you occasionally witness atthe grocery store) doesn't have long-term positive results. And real"spankings" -- the kind of event where parents say, "This is going tohurt me a lot more than it will hurt you," seem to have an element ofsadism.

When I was a little girl in the Bronx, I had a friend who wasspanked in this way. There was a wooden spoon hanging from a hook in thekitchen that Judy told me was used for more than stirring soup. One timeI was witness to this alternative and I've never forgotten.

Judy and I were about 9 years old and were late coming home from thebakery where she had been instructed to buy a loaf of bread for dinner.We couldn't have been gone that long, because I recall that the rye wasstill warm when Judy offered me an end. But we were gone longer than hermother expected. There was no yelling or reprimand. The spoon was takendown from the wall and Judy was instructed to take down her pants.

I stood transfixed in the doorway. I recall the thwaps as wood metbare skin. The red welts on Judy's white buttocks. And her muffled sobs.Afterward, I was much more shaken than my friend. The taking down of thepants impressed me as more horrible than the beating. That's how I thinkof it now. Not as a spanking, but as a beating. There was somethingcold-blooded about her mother's apparent lack of anger.

Should you spank your children? I don't think you should. But thekids don't have to know exactly where you stand on this either.

My brother and I were never spanked. Yet we children thought of myfather as strict. He said "NO" with a conviction that did not invitenegotiation. We were expected to do what he told us to. Certainly wewere never sent for "time-outs," a peculiarly modern kind ofdisciplining that seems to involve a parent's keeping track of the time(little scofflaws have rarely mastered this skill) and giving moreattention to a bad behavior than is rightly due.

My father used to say: "If I have to get up from this chair, you'llbe sorry." This was his immediate response to a directive not beingfollowed. A variation was: "If I have to stop this car, you'll besorry." Or yelled from another place in the house: "If I have to come upthose stairs, you'll be sorry."

I don't know what my father would actually have done had he gottenup from the chair or stopped the car. As I said - my brother and Iwere never hit. But we didn't, for a moment, believe that we would notbe.

Should you spank your children? I don't think you should. Well,except sometimes.

I spanked my daughter once that I recall. She was about 2 1/2 at thetime and had been told never to go into the street. One morning, olderchildren playing in the road caught her attention. She looked over hershoulder at me and then boldly walked out to join them. I grabbed her:"You are never, never to go into the street without my permission!" Isaid placing a number of equally firm slaps on her behind. I had neverhit before. I believe this action was necessary at the time and clearlycaught my daughter's attention.

My husband hit his older daughter once when she was a teenager andthought it would be "cool" to simply stay out all night. At 2 in themorning, we called her friend's parents. At 3 we called the localhospital. At 4 we called the police. Then a friend called and squealedto us where the party was. When her father picked her up at dawn, sheimmediately began to concoct a lie. As they drove away in the car, myhusband gave her a couple of hard smacks to her shoulders. Afterward, hetold her he was sorry, he should not have ever hit. She understood,apologizing for the anguish she had caused. (She was not sounderstanding about the month's grounding, which followed.)

Parents have power. They should use it wisely. Infrequently thismight involve spanking a child, but a threat made with some convictioncan also work well enough. Situations are different. Spontaneouslysmacking the tush of an errant toddler a couple of times is differentfrom beating a 9-year-old in front of her friend. Both are differentfrom the slaps administered by an exasperated parent toward a teenagerwho has stayed out all night. Should you hit a child? I don't think so.Well, maybe sometimes.

Fern Kupfer is a novelist and writing professor at Iowa State University. She is a frequent contributor to Working Moms' Internet Refuge.

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