Posts by mark taslov
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time I just wish people didn't smack their kids. I also feel anyone posting on here doesn't want to take away points of view held by others, Ciao.
You definitely got me thinking today. I've always had a pretty ambivalent attitude towards smacking but your non compromising passivism is an example to me. I'm pretty much one of those munters who'd say 'it never did me any harm', but when I think back maybe that was part of the reason I hit my younger sisters when I was a young 'un, sure I learned to control that eventually, but your version does seem eminently more enlightened, consider me a convert.
This conversion was also duly reinforced by Ian's
but was able to detach myself from the punishment.
I can definitely identify with that feeling.
Mark: Now I am more confused. Firstly my point was and is that my question above was what the repeal boiled down to. That was the reason for the Repeal of S59!
Secondly I cannot therefore reconcile the No in the referendum to your position. I am sure that many/most of the NO votes were given on the grounds of disagreeing with the repeal - weren't they?
If a significant number of the NO vote thought as you do, then that would totally change the implications of the total No vote.
Therefore thankyou Mark. You have got me thinking!To be honest Ian, I just kind of take the referendum as it's worded, I mean I'm clear that smacking and whipping are in no way comparable and so I assumed most would see that too.
I"m a little naive not to to see it as part of the larger battle. Maybe their motives were more sinister but what they put their name behind in the referendum still seemed pretty moderate (at least in terms of my bent earlier in the day prior to my reconsideration and conversion to a more refined passivism during that cracker of a game).
Having said that I do feel a great deal of empathy with Ben's line today.
Ultimately I have come to see this as much more of an education issue than one for the courts. So long as people know that smacking is not the only option, and can be a bad option, then they get help. But no-one is going to seek help under the current laws, because they have to admit to criminal behaviour, rather than just....
as you said Ian;
"I have had 4 children and when I smacked them, rarely,it was my incompetence/impatience/lack of coping rather than the "crime" of the kids."
It shows compassion and awareness. Incompetence is a strong word. There's no way you're coming across as criminal Ian. I do think having this issue flung in people's faces for a number of years has done a lot of good for opening up the issue and allowing us to reconsider our attitudes.
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as I see it the a no vote on this referendum in no way conflicts with the spirit in which the section 59 repeal is being administered.
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Mark: If you (or someone) hit the child with a whip for being naughty, would you like to be able to escape conviction by saying you were only using reasonable force to correct the child? YES/NO?
That Mark is what the Repeal set out to remove as a legal defence. Thats all. I cannot believe that you would say Yes!firstly, why would I do such a thing? Secondly NO, thirdly, I support the repeal and the way the law is being administered. What's your point?
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ion but I am concerned mostly that the ones that do hurt their kids have just been given permission to get away with it if the law reverts.The media has just allowed people to cream their pants (for want of a better term) about fighting with your kids. I think it's ignorance.
I know what you mean Sophie, but I don't think they've been given permission to do anything other than smack them as part of good parenting. Which in itself is a good conundrum to sow in the population ie. can the two coexist? I think that this was already the case and the law is rendered in this spirit. The police made it clear a while back that they're not focusing on trivialities. There is no reason for the law to revert, Key said it won't, please hold him to that. Personally I feel that there are many ways to hurt kids and a good proportion of them are totally non physical, and therein lies the more pertinent issue.
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sorry..I meant minority and it wasn't clear. what i mean is. If they asked "should murder be a criminal offence in new zealand" and the results were the same, about 40+% abstention, tiny minority of people vote yes, then it would seem pretty clear that few think murder should be a criminal offence.... Just as here, it seems that those who believe smacking should be a criminal offence are a tiny tiny minority.
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Time to go watch Richie and Co.,Ltd smack the shit out of those wallabies.
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majority...
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Maybe just thoughtless and a bit reactionary?
or maybe just have different ideas about parenting....
for me the issue is not smacking,one could replace 'smacking' with any word on that referendum and the issue seems to be "should the government be criminalizing specific elements of good parenting?" Smacking children is an arbitrary focus. the emotional violence is the crux. I don't agree Danielle that it's thoughtless and reactionary to agree with the notion that smacking can be part of a good parenting.I think such a notion criminalizes far too many of our older generation.
What are the rest saying? Don't smack your child, but pat yourself on the back and send them off out on to a rugby field to get bruised up every Saturday? Don't smack your child and but call them every unforgiving name under the sun? Obviously extreme examples, but they are realities for many children. The smack is almost a non issue, compared to the accompanying motivation, reaction, and outcome. Smacking in its various forms is not the inherent problem, but more so the symptom of a deeper problem.
All this referendum is saying as I understand it is that parents feel they can better decide how to be good parents than dicks in a beehive who should remove their beaks from the collective new zealand family living room.
democracy won on the day once again the ineptness of the leadership was obscured by the polarization of the nation, who knows what it really meant, but it sure was entertaining. I recall having an argument a fews back with a guy who was staunchly anti smacking, and i proposed the idea of including a decent proportion of children in some kind of referendum and he laughed it off. Call me radical or whatever but It's that kind of arrogance by those on both sides who profess to care about this issue that undermines the whole debate. For me I feel that the disrespect of saying "but children can't decide, their brains is too small" is merely an extension of the idea that it's ok to commit physical, sexual and emotionally violent acts against children, it's either total respect for their rights or a lack of total respect. 10-18 year olds could handle the kind of question the referendum asked.
I don't think it's necessarily a poorly worded question either. It does ask, quite clearly "Is smacking sometimes OK?"
Nice Ben. In saying 10-18 year olds could handle that question, I also feel they could handle it a lot better than those abstainers and those who found criticizing the question a more worthwhile exercise than contributing to the vote. It seemed that there is a demographic in society who will look at the wording of these types of referendums (similarly with the sentencing one a few years back) pick apart the syntax and totally ignore the very clear intent of the referendums. Perhaps they're over educated, perhaps just pedantic. Personally I see the issue there, but beyond that, far far beyond, I can see what the question is driving at/the general point/ the gist/ . To implore abstention based on pedantry was not getting it. and perhaps not getting it worse than those who didn't get that the question was flawed.
ie. in the case of this question and the way it's worded, an abstention also seems to contribute to the "no" swathe, because it's obviously a total non issue for so many. Just as if the referendum asked "should murder be a criminal offence in NZ" and we got this same result. A tiny tiny majority voting that smacking children should be a criminal offence.
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History is awesome, there's just so much of it, I can't get enough. I'm certain if I ever went back to school it'd be to study history, technology has really opened that fucker up for me, so I can't truly justify the cost of going back when I can learn so much for free right here on the computer hooked up to the phone socket, but if I ever did...
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A two-year survey by researchers at Peking University found over 20 percent of 140,000 high-school students interviewed said they had considered committing suicide. And 6.5 percent of the students surveyed said they had made plans to kill themselves.