Yes, you'll find this is very much at the core of much of the debate. In the first link I've put here, you'll read how a jury decided that it was reasonable for a father to "hit his eight year old son eight times with a piece of wood 30cm by 2 cm – leaving linear bruising visible for days."Originally Posted by Meier Link
I'm not a parent, but I have been a child, and I feel that alternative punishments would have been effective. I can't speak for all children, however.Maybe I am barbaric in my way of parenting but like I said it is affective.
I read a letter to the editor of my local rag, where a person argued that it was ludicrous that a parent had been put through anger managment classes and monitored by Child, Youth and Family (CYF) for pushing his child onto the ground THREE times, because he didn't want to play in a game of rugby. I felt disgusted reading this person argue that this was good parenting.Now as for smacking kids around, if that is definitive to shoving kids down, bruising or anything that is actually going to cause more then a breif second of actual pain then I am against it. There is no reason to use that much force when disciplining a child.
I better find out if threatening to use force is criminalised as well (unless the submission is successful). It's an important distinction.Dragoon that belt story is halarious and actually hits home on a few levels, my father would something simular. My mother used some of the same ideals, she would make me go get her belt and hang it on a door knob. If that didn't settle me down I had to bring it down the hall and hang it on my door. If that didn't settle me down we had to go into my room and she would use it on me lightly (key word lightly). It was enough to scare the hell out of me to where that belt probably only made it into my room 2 more times in my life haha.
It's quite hard to find something that's low on the legal jargon, but is unbiased, so I'll point out what perspective each link holds.Before I get to much more into this I will put a request out there so I have a more defined responce: Alpha do you have a link to this referendum and the Section 59 of the Crimes Act (1961)?
Children's Issues | Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand (The NZ Green Party states it's point of view here. I'll admit, I'm biased; we all are. I voted Green in the last election, so this is mostly my opinion also. It states issues with the original S.59, but it's not going to state anything to the contrary. Also, the small tag at the end referring to a referenda about confusing language in submissions is in relation to the wording of the topic question, which was written by a pro-smacker. If you analyse it, it implies that a smack is a good thing, when it should try to be a little bit more neutral, IMO.)
Child discipline law update | Families Commission (This is a strange one, same perspective as the first, but strange in that the Families Commissioner (head of this organisation) is actually pro-smacking.)
Ahhh, here we are: Crimes Act 1961 No 43 (as at 01 July 2009), Public Act – New Zealand Legislation (Section 59 itself. PLEASE READ THIS. It will be reposted in the Topic Post. Note how subsection 2 presides over subsection 1. In otherwords, no matter what number 1 says, force cannot be used for correction. Thus it is New Zealand law that a parent/caregiver can be prosecuted for using force to correct a child's behavior. This was inserted 2 years ago, and is what the submission is trying to get removed.)
http://www.familyfirst.org.nz/index....Section_59.pdf (dated in the sense that it was a submission to stop the 2007 change to S.59, but can still be read as an argument to support the current referendum (pro-smacking). Generally, Family First is quite right wing, and doesn't have huge support in NZ.)
www.voteno.org.nz | welcome (goodness, what a well-organised site. It is clearly pro-smacking, and has a good argument for such a stance, very easy to understand, and has some good links.)
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