thelocal.se, 28th november
A Swedish court has jailed the parents of three children who were regularly beaten since the age of three in what they claimed was a method of discipline prescribed in the Bible.
The couple, from Karlstad in central Sweden, were imprisoned for nine months apiece, according to a Sveriges Television (SVT) report.
Corporal punishment, formally outlawed in Sweden in 1979, was a regular feature of three of the couple's four children's lives, the Värmland district court heard.
According to the court transcripts, the parents "explained that they had used, what they themselves described as spanking, physical punishment as part of their methods for raising the children."
The court heard that the couple had used a hairbrush, a wooden plank or a hand to punish their three eldest children, SVT reported.
The father explained that when the children did something wrong they were given a first warning and then a second and if they, for example, carried on cycling in the street without permission, they would then receive a physical punishment.
The court found that "despite the details of the case at hand" the parents "had a loving and caring relationship to their children", but that the systematic treatment metered out was in breach of the law and deserving of a custodial sentence.
The parents were furthermore order to pay damages of 25,000 kronor to each of the affected children.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
Might makes right?:
ReplyDeletePeople used to think it was necessary to "spank" adult members of the community, college students, military trainees, and prisoners. In some countries they still do. In our country, it is considered sexual battery if a person over the age of 18 is "spanked", but only if over the age of 18.
For one thing, because the buttocks are so close to the sex organs, anal region, and so multiply linked to sexual nerve centers, striking them can trigger powerful and involuntary sexual stimulus in some people. There are numerous physiological ways in which it can be intentionally or unintentionally sexually abusive, but I won't list them all here. One can read the testimony, documentation, and educational resources available from the website of Parents and Teachers Against Violence In Education at www.nospank.net.
Just a handful of those helping to raise awareness of why child bottom-slapping/battering isn't a good idea:
ReplyDeleteAmerican Academy of Pediatrics,
American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry,
American Psychological Association,
Center For Effective Discipline,
Churches' Network For Non-Violence,
Nobel Peace Prize recipient Archbishop Desmond Tutu,
Parenting In Jesus' Footsteps,
Global Initiative To End All Corporal Punishment of Children,
United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child.
In 26 countries, child corporal punishment is prohibited by law (with more in process). In fact, the US was the only UN member that did not ratify the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
The US states with the highest crime rates and the poorest academic performance are also the ones with the highest rates of child corporal punishment.
There is simply no evidence to suggest that child bottom-slapping/battering instills virtue.