I wanted to make something clear. As someone who has very occasionally smacked her children, my motivation in opposing Bradford's bill is not to retain that right. It's just not that important to me. The protestations of the Christian right, who do appear primarily motivated in this way, don't sit easy with me.
My problem is twofold; making smacking illegal is bad law. Law conceived by someone saying, don't worry, it won't be routinely or consistently policed.
Secondly, and most importantly, I thoroughly object to the idea that child abuse will be reduced (thereby assuaging the conscience of the country). Bunkum. I've expanded on this in a letter sent to the Press responding to their editorial, featured in an earlier post;
You say, "The passing of the anti-smacking bill through its second reading at Parliament was a welcome step towards dealing with child abuse."
I disagree. This bill is covering up a gross failure to tackle the causes of child abuse.
Government agencies were acknowledging child abuse as early as 1967. Child Welfare conducted a survey of the 210 confirmed cases that year. They found was a strong association between illegitimacy and child abuse. Maori children were 6 times more likely to be victims.
Forty years on and policy makers are still refusing to face this reality, wringing their hands over unpartnered, teenage birth and claiming more support is the answer. The focus of that support has largely been financial thereby inadvertently exacerbating the problem. Pay girls to have and keep babies and they will, whether or not they are emotionally capable of parenting them and others that inevitably follow.
The teenage birth rate has risen for four consecutive years. The Maori rate is more than four times higher than NZ European.
Rather than fiddling with section 59 we should be stopping welfare to teenagers, blitzing contraception use and encouraging adoption. Do we have any politicians brave enough to act on these ideas?
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The Green Party believe that banning smacking will end a "culture of violence"; where is the evidence? I'm not saying it isn't there; they just don't produce it. On the other hand the Green Party sees no connection between the rate of illegitimate births and conditions provided to unmarried mothers. Suggestions such as that are termed "Beneficiary bashing"
They don't present the evidence because there aint none ... & there is a lot of evidence showing it (aversive consequences) to be effective.
I guess the next step will be to outlaw reprimands as well.
Unfortunately what is aversive is entirely relative - so a slap is more effective the 'closer' & more verbally interactive the relationship. The more distant the relationship, being effective requires 'the bash,' not a slap.
So, not affirming someone's performance, but doing so to another for a lesser performance coz they are more socially proper, can be very aversive for the former & can indeed ultimately 'bruise the ego/esteem/confidence/motivation' considerably more than fading fingerprints on the thigh, & more durably.
The whole notion of the repeal really is of feminist intuitive origin - & unfortunately it will empower kids because so many parents do not have alternative management practices, cannot conceive of these,cannot comprehend them, & if they do understand, do not believe in them.
The very group of people who are likely to abuse their children, is the very group that child management programmes have repeatedly been shown to be ineffective with ... these people will be left with nothing, & the implications?
It is true that the law won't stop child abuse. But then laws against assault don't stop murders or assaults but that doesn't mean the laws on those issues should be repealed. The question is whether the law should be there to enable legal intervention to prevent or stop the act in question, or punish it after it has been done.
So the real issue is are children human beings with the rights of human beings? Or at least do they have the right not to be assaulted by adults? Or is it permissible to hit others for their own good? Now I wish the Greens respected rights across the board, and wouldn't use force against adults as well. They don't that is their problem.
But when it comes to liberals I'm not sure we ought to be defending the right to hit children. I'm not sure any such right exists. Hitting an adult would be actionable and somehow the idea of hitting a child is far more reprehensible to me than that of hitting a full grown adult.
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