I think it's cute. Also true for many of us, right or wrong.
My father was not a cruel man, but I can remember thinking I hated him for spanking me. Sure it made me behave, but I'm convinced there are better methods of teaching that don't include corporal punishment. He was only doing what he was "taught".
My kids have all turned out great without being beaten.
DonM

Yes, and I remember gettin' whacked on the arse, and if I looked like I might cry, the old man would say, "If you start that bawlin', I'll really give you something to cry about!"

My adopted parents (my birth parents died on Christmas Eve when I was 5 months old) died when I was very young, and I was raised by an Uncle who was very peaceful, non-violent, loved music and encouraged my journey along the road to being a professional musician. I consider myself very fortunate.

I don't believe in corporal punishment...sorry to get a bit off topic.

Ian

I don't know how we (as a country) can revere the 'Greatest Generation' (those that fought WWII and then built the country to its' heights in the fifties) and simultaneously revile the teaching and child rearing methods that MADE them that way...

Discipline in school and the home leads to that character, but we have allowed parenting and teaching to be 'hands off' and we see the results of that all around us.

Rather than address the excesses of the old ways (child abuse at home and school) we simply threw up our hands and took the easy way out and made it so NO discipline gets used. we are reaching a tipping point, with adults raising children that had no discipline themselves as children (having been raised by a generation that was the first to throw out the rulebook) and things are looking bleak for our childrens' education and our county's future.

Why we couldn't find a balance between 'spare the rod, spoil the child' and 'beat the kid all the time, go to jail' beats me...

I have found the process of healing from the excessive ways of disciplining a child to be:
1-To hate My Dad.
2-To love myself.
3-To love my Dad.
4-To appreciate regardless of method what he did for me.
5-To recognize that he instilled in me a strong power of self-discipline which has added so much to my life.

I was in a gathering of men recently – the conversation was the same as above. One man said, “My father really beat me”. As he was saying that he was smiling and his face was filled with love as he spoke.
My thoughts, John C.

I do believe in discipline, Dikki, but I don't believe in striking people I love. There are other ways to do it.
Don

+1

Ian,
OMG, we had the same father...
No problem, I deserved it, I got it, and I'm fine (well, what is normal anyways :-))

But, it was my Mom that I was more worried about..she would get a certain look...and that mean't game over...no more arguing and do what she said NOW!

I think the young parents of today...have a whole lot harder time with it all. I know the teachers sure do!

I guess that's the point... There's a difference between child abuse and child discipline. Or, at least, there USED to be. Nowadays, it all gets lumped in together, because it's just too HARD (sob) to try and figure out the difference. Suspend your reasoning and critical faculties, and you have to make simplistic decisions.

I talk to teachers all the time that say, especially in tougher schools, they have no control over the kids because there is nothing that they OR the parents can do (without apparently being considered a child abuser) to rein them in. And not only does THAT child's education get short shrift, but all the rest of the class suffers too.

The thing is, child discipline has been practiced for thousands of years. Kinder, gentler means has been tried for what? 30-40 years? If those methods truly WERE better, you would think you would have seen some sort of improvement by now, both behavior and test score-wise. The very reverse is the case, though.

Although your Mom may have only needed 'that look', you KNEW what that look meant. Take it further, and there WOULD be consequences. What child today is scared of a LOOK, when they know that that is all they are going to get..?

I got my fair and deserved share of spankings, caning and my father's ultimate, the leather strap. But I never got 'beaten'. I never ended at the doctor's or hospital. Throwing out the spankings so that beatings never happen is throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

I find it curious that we are so willing to toss hundreds (thousands) of years of experience out to try to liberalize child rearing, and have kept at it for forty years or so without any noticeable improvement, but we aren't willing to try liberalizing drug policies (that have been in place for less than a hundred) to see if the improvements already seen in other countries work over here, too. America can be SUCH a schizophrenic country, sometimes!