A mother has divided the parents after suggesting that “every loving parent” should be willing to slap their misbehaving kids in order to discipline them.
As Scotland-based Journalist Claire Muldoon said during her appearance on This Morning talk show, she is supportive of the use of “reasonable” force to teach children a lesson despite the UK coming to an agreement to ban spanking of kids.
“They [children] are given exactly the same rights… Every loving parent would use some form of physical chastisement,” Claire defended the use of physical punishment.
“This whole thing stems from love. If you had a friend who was doing something that was harming themselves – you would hope that a friend would say look let’s be honest your behavior is wrong.”
While plenty of parents agreed with Claire and her idea of ‘traditional’ parenting techniques, Rebecca Wilcox, a mother-of-one who also appeared in the show, recalled the moment she slapped her boy and felt wrong about it.
“My biggest guilt as a mum is smacking my four-year-old, and it was all about my loss of control. I’m the adult I should know better. What did I do? The biggest hypocrite in the world… the fear in his eyes and the relationship changed,” Rebecca said.
Joining the debate about spanking kids on Twitter, dozens of other mothers spoke out and shared their views.
“There must be 100 other things I would try before smacking my child would ever enter my mind. Makes me sick just thinking I could inflict pain on him at any age. Reasoning, explaining, empathy and compassion all the way,” Hayley Saunders wrote.
“I don’t smack my children. They are well behaved. We have a reward system in place that I am also part of as we don’t always get it right as adults. They respect the fact that I am human and make mistakes. Open communication is key,” Celine Clark added.
Not everyone, however, was convinced that holding back on slapping kids is always a good idea.
“I’m on 50 50 with smacking. I admit if my child pinched me i pinched them back. But i do agree kids don’t have the respect for the police. My husband works nights and got followed by a group of teenagers. They were taunting him and saying you can’t touch me ect,” one user wrote.
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Replaced!