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PaperclipPerfector  2mo ago (text post)   26144 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 25, 2024

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I was disciplined a couple of times by hair-pulling

Jesus, that sounds horrific. There's something intimate and hateful about it?

I was given Tobasco as a punishment for swearing (which led to a long-term love of hot sauce and hatred of Tobasco) and was hit with a spoon maybe once a year. The spoon broke when I was 14, and then after that control was exerted more through money etc.

All that to say I now have a good relationship with my parents.

Within the Finnish cultural context of the era, at least, it was the most common form of physical punishment (already illegal at this point, but these things take time to percolate through culure) and considered a lighter punishment to spanking.

Genuine question, because I don’t know- in countries where it’s illegal, is corporal punishment an ‘everyone does it, just don’t brag about it on social media’ thing, or is there some kind of alternate discipline method in common use, or what? I don’t get the impression of all those kids acting like they never got spanked.

I think those countries generally being more affluent might help.

My parents never used corporal punishment, but we were also well-off, so they had the option of taking away things that less well-off kids wouldn't have had in the first place.

I once remember some younger people (like 20s) expressing astonishment that physical punishment would still happen in middle-class families during my times. I would guess still happens but as a low-class thing, not something that a sensible person would do.

The methods of discipline are the usual - shame, go to your room, no allowance and so on. I guess the modern Nordic societies just rely most of all on internalized discipline and social pressure.

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