Posts by Peter Cox
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Sonic, I believe that it's a local anaesthetic given, so the patient is still conscious and there is an aspect of fear over the ECT seizures (which means you could consider it a physical punishment) Though you're right, it's not so much about pain, so it's true - I could have thought that through a little better..
Neil,
The reason I use 'teach someone' is that's usually the reasoning parents give behind using physical discipline; to teach the child what not to do. Surely the phrase 'Changing a child's behaviour' is just another way of saying 'teaching them what's good for them to do or not do'. I'm not sure what reason there could be good for smacking a child if you're not using it to give the child some kind of lesson.Interesting suggestion about the mental health provisos. It would be interesting to know exactly what they are, to see their reasoning process over what is allowed and what is not, and under what circumstances. Particularly as you would expect them to be scrupulous in the reasoning behind the details.
And good example Weston! Actually I would actually be quite in favour of parents forcing their children to go for a jog as a form of punishment... the pain of exhaustion doesn't seem quite a serious as physically inflicted pain from an outside object or similar, but it is physically a form of pain, so it's interesting that I feel that way. Although in some ways it's probably not that great to create the impression in a child that exercise is less fun, so much as something so awful it ought to be a punishment.
Out of curiosity, how would people feel about a parent forcing a child to stand on one leg, or hold an arm above their head, for thirty minutes until it started to cause pain?
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I know of one situation where it is and that's in the restraint of people suffering mental illness.
Uh, I'm pretty sure it's illegal to deliberately inflict pain on mental patients in order to teach them.
Some, I guess - and without knowing the facts - would debate the use of ECT - still legal, and apparently useful, in the case of depressive disorders. It's debatable as to whether the positive outcomes of ECT are physiological (i.e. it's a medicine that unfortunately also causes pain - but is deemed to be worthwhile), or whether it's the fear of pain itself that forces people to rise out of their depression. Studies have shown that it's physiological, which is why it's still legal. Though certainly if the only justification behind ECT was that it was the threat of pain, it would not be. At any rate, any patients undergoing ECT do so by their own signed consent.
I'd challenge anyone to think of a single instance where it is legal and morally acceptable in our society to inflict a limited degree of pain in order to teach someone. Except parents upon their offspring.
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I can't find it. Is it because I'm using Firefox?
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I think it's reasonable for people to say that prodding is sufficiently different from smacking for the comparison to fail as an argument.
Neil, It may seem reasonable, though not necessarily logical.
Stephen, yes I think you're probably right that I am against inflicting pain to a child in order to teach them, just on principle. I was never physically punished as a child, so perhaps that's why I find the idea so irrational. And do be honest, I can't really understand how anyone would think otherwise.
I don't agree with David that his article wasn't worth thoroughly analysing. I thought we got an interesting debate out of it. It's nice to get the point to at least politely agree about where we disagree. There is a small leap of faith in the logic, necessarily as there is some subjectivity in defining the variables behind out initial emotional response - as David says, there's no perfect formula E=MC2, though I guess simply the idea behind it would be to suggest to someone who was unsure about smacking but DEFINITELY not in favour of an electrical prod, to question why exactly that was the case. Which I think might have been an enlightening exercise.
The alternatives to smacking involve psychological pain - is, or should that, necessarily be any less anathema?
This is why I am less in favour of physical rather than mental punishment: what it teaches the the child; that physical punishment and intimidation are legitimate tools for showing someone you're displeased with their actions.
I can't see much advantage in later life from having that kind of logic instilled at a young (and extremely impressionable) age?
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Much better. Though you probably didn't need the last sentence.
Okay. I'll give this a go by generalising the cattle prod argument as much as possible so we can see the break in logic that you are identifying.
We have basically been saying:
1. People feel using Electrical Prod on child is socially unacceptable = True
2. People feel using Electrical Prod on child is socially unacceptable because of the pure rational realisation that it causes pain to the child = True
3. Electrical Prod and Smacking both cause pain to a child = True
4. Therefore: It is illogical to believe smacking is socially acceptable, when electrical prod is not – because they both do the same thing.
5. Therefore: Smacking should be Socially Unacceptable.
So this is, indeed, technically a false logic - the problem being in point 2, that is: it is not necessarily true that we dislike the electrical prod purely because of a rational dislike to the idea that it inflicts pain. We may dislike the electrical prod because we dislike the concept of using an electrical charge. We may dislike the cattle prod because of socially ingrained (and not necessarily logical) associations of electrical charges being a unusually cold and cruel way to inflict punishment, when, in fact it may not be. It may be hunky dory.
So basically, none of us can escape the fact that:
People feel using Electrical Prod on child is socially unacceptable because of the pure rational realisation that it causes pain to the child = True
...may be true as much as it may be false. It is impossible to PROVE it logically, because it requires a variable that can’t be independently determined.
So basically, it comes down to is the time honoured practice of philosophical introspection. We have to look very carefully at our own rational processes when deciding for ourselves which of two possible statements are true:
Either
(A) Using Electrical Prod on child on Child is generally deemed Socially Unacceptable because it causes pain to the child.
or
(B) Use of Electrical Prod on child is generally deemed Socially Unacceptable because of a socially ingrained stigma over the use of electricity as a form of punishment.
Personally, after some introspection I feel that point A is the case for me. Though perhaps I may be deluding myself, and am actually the victim of socially ingrained bias against using electricity.
But there is a way to, in part, test the logic of my hunch.
You’ll have to bare with me a little bit here, because aside from electricity it’s hard to come up with forms of causing pain to the same level as a light smack (which is why, I suspect, David used the prod to make his point). But I’ll give it a go:
1. Injection of a small amount neuro-chemical causing pain synapses to fire without the child’s surrounding tissue to be harmed.
2. The same as above but using a pill or perhaps a sticky patch to deliver the chemical.
3. A very light amount of acid applied to the skin.
4. Hypnosis of child so that when parent says the word ‘naughty’ the child feels as if they are receiving pain.
5. A light smack with a hand, a piece of plastic, wood or leather.
6. Small electrical shock.
7. Home spanking service (okay, still a smack, but rather makes the following point even better..)Now, I would suggest that advertising any of the associated products on TradeMe in for any of these punishments, would be frowned upon by the general public (and be quickly made illegal). Except, for some reason, number 5.
I would also suggest (though again nobody can PROVE it because there is no independent variable) that we all dislike these things because the primary thing they all have in common is that they inflict pain to children.
Of course, one could still point out the logical break, as you could with the electricity argument that it is because, with each of these possibilities we have an illogical socially ingrained bias against them, and that if we were thinking rationally all these things ought to be socially acceptable.
Technically, it would be a logical possibility – though, I hope, with the points I’ve made, an increasingly unlikely one.
Phew. Time for a BBQ -
Yeah, in retrospect I probably should have gone with orange.
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Oh, a quick PS - Stephen, I don't think, as you have suggested, that we are uneasy about the cattle prod simply because it is called a 'cattle prod' and has associations with animals.
Renaming the thing 'Toddller Tingler' and making it look like a pink wand with flowers on it wouldn't change the fact that most people tend to view the concept of delivering pain to a child through an electrical charge as something somewhat distasteful. In fact, I would suggest that said instrument would quickly become illegal.
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Hey! It removed all my nicely arranged white space! Sorry- makes it a little harder to follow. I guess that's what you get for being cocky about the preview function :)
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Stephen, I hope I am not being presumptive by making this short précis of David's article:
Your average New Zealander is disgusted by the idea of using a lightly charged cattle-prod to discipline children, whereas a light smacking or caning, we find less repulsive, even normal.
By pointing out that these two methods of punishment physically harm the child to the same degree, he dismisses the idea that the issue is about how 'light' the damage is. For example: a cattle prod that delivered a dose of energy even less that a 'light smack' would still make people queasy.
The fact that we are all repulsed by the cattle-prod shows that we are all somewhat uncomfortable with the idea of systematically causing pain to a child in order to teach them whatever lesson the adult feels is important.
The conclusion is that: our conception of whether a punishment delivered to a child is acceptable or not, is more to do with social conventions of 'normal' rather than a rational analysis of the physical harm done to the child, or whether causing pain to a child is a legitimate method of teaching (if indeed, the teacher is a parent, headmaster, or whatever).
So Stephen, given that - I must say I find it very difficult to follow your argument rebutting David's article. I would also politely suggest that your posts are often overly rhetorical and unnecessarily complicated making them appear rather muddled and, at times, patronising to the point of embarrassment.
I think you would win more (well, more than zero) converts with some strict editing.
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Anyone who physically punishes a child would tend to say that they were doing so in order to teach them to do what the parent wants (followed up by the assertion that the lesson is in the child's best interest)
However, the main lesson the child learns is: Physical punishment and intimidation are legitimate tools for showing someone you're displeased with their actions.
So who agrees that one will have some kind of advantage in later life after having that kind of logic instilled in them at a young (and extremely impressionable) age?
So, aside from the obvious concerns about actual physical damage to the child, in my mind there is little difference between a 'light smack' and something more severe. The same lesson is learned by the child. And it is a lesson that, on some level, they will carry into other relationships they form.