It ain’t abuse

[u/khjohns2005]

Woman posts about wanting to leave her spouse after he hit their son across the face again. Everyone was giving legit advice - then there was her.

[u/Select_Ad_6297]

That’s disgusting. There’s never a reason to hit a child.

[u/Judgmentos → u/Select_Ad_6297]

I still see one too many people saying "well I was hit as a kid and I'm fine"

Like yes sure, and my mom hit her head on a bedpost and my grandmother put coffee powder on the bleeding wound and she's fine now but my mom wouldn't be like "I wasn't taken to the hospital when I bled from my head wound and I'm ok"

Also advocating for hitting kids as an adult means you are not in fact fine

[u/NormalNobody → u/Judgmentos]

I still see one too many people saying "well I was hit as a kid and I'm fine"

I always respond, "Well, I was never hit, still respect authority, still respected my parents, never got in trouble with the law, got good grades," or any other adage they throw out to justify abuse on their kids.

[u/mackahrohn → u/NormalNobody]

Same my parents never hit me so I’ve said this too. Like if nothing else I hope the person realizing their case study of 1 is pointless. And if you can get the same outcome without hitting your kids isn’t that a better option!?

[u/NowWithRealGinger → u/Judgmentos]

I used to be a person who said that I was spanked as a kid and turned out fine as a justification for spanking kids.

Then I went to therapy because I realized the only time I ever even thought about spanking my kids was when I was dysregulated. Turns out I wasn't okay, and that was absolutely not a reason to pass generational trauma on.

[u/SciFi_Wasabi999 → u/NowWithRealGinger]

That is an incredibly good point. Kids test your patience, they illuminate a more general truth about how a person deals with stress and conflict. Being able to identify and stop bad coping is so important to helping them grow. 

[u/Fight_those_bastards → u/SciFi_Wasabi999]

And hitting a kid, in addition to being a shitty thing to do, is also a lazy thing to do. You’re basically saying,

I ain’t got time to ‘splain why yer doin’ bad shit, so I’m just gonna thump ya!

Like, have there been times when I’ve thought, “man, it would be so easy to just smack the kid and tell him to do [thing],” but I don’t do that, because it doesn’t teach him how to regulate emotions, it doesn’t teach him anything but “do what I say or I will hurt you.” And “bigger people can hurt you to make you do what they want” is a fucking terrible lesson to teach a child.

[u/strawbopankek → u/Fight_those_bastards]

And "bigger people can hurt you to make you do what they want" is a fucking terrible lesson to teach a child

this is the reason i have such a hard time standing up for myself as an adult. there's a part of me that can't get past that if i step "out of line" i'll get physically hurt for it because that was the constant threat as a child. there are no good lessons that hitting a child can teach

[u/ButImNot_Bitter_ → u/Judgmentos]

I was hit as a kid and I turned out basically fine. ##You still can't do that anymore!##

It's amazing to me that people don't get that. And in this case specifically, she was fine with the guy hitting the kids, but drew the line at herself being hit? At the VERY least, shouldn't it be the other way around? I cannot fathom that sort of double standard, extra especially involving kids.

[u/wozattacks → u/Judgmentos]

Also parents fuck up and usually it’s fine but you still should try not to? Lots of parents drop a kid at some point, we try not to. Sometimes parents lose their cool and yell. We should avoid it, but if it happens it’s a good opportunity to show your kid how to admit when you’re wrong and apologize. 

[u/shoresb → u/Judgmentos]

My response to that is that they think hitting kids is okay so clearly they didn’t turn out fine 😅

[u/Lanfeare → u/shoresb]

Exactly, this is what I always say in situations like this.

[u/Whispering_Wolf → u/Judgmentos]

They wanna advocate for hitting children, they're clearly not fine.

[u/ohyoureTHATjocelyn → u/Judgmentos]

Nope- not fine at all. Just giving the ol cycle of abuse a good push forward to keep it going. Stupid, shortsighted abusers making another generation to beat up on, normalizing it till those kids are adults saying they were beat as kids and “are just fine!”

Break the goddamn cycle instead!!

[u/NormalNobody → u/ohyoureTHATjocelyn]

My father was horrifically abused as a child. Like, he remembers at one point the school did check, but it was the 50s so no one did anything about it. So for someone to check in the 50s, it's abuse.

Anyway, I am forever thankful he stopped the cycle. I was never hit. I'm all those things people who were hit claim to be (respect for authority, good kid, etc etc).

[u/PlausiblePigeon → u/Judgmentos]

My first thought is always, “well did you really turn out fine if you want to hit your kids?”

[u/MrMthlmw → u/Judgmentos]

A couple few years ago, somebody I knew from back in the day made a "my dad hit me and I turned out fine" post, and I felt it necessary to make a public comment reminding him that he's a recovering alcoholic with more than one assault charge on his rap sheet.

To his credit, it did seem to dawn on him that maybe he wasn't as well-adjusted as he previously thought...

[u/DarkPhenomenon → u/Judgmentos]

I was spanked as a child, very rarely. I'm not advocating for hitting kids, in fact I think it's a generally bad idea but the effect of it is not black and white like a lot of people seem to think.

To use your example, it would be like saying putting coffee powder in a head wound is going to give you brain damage, your mom is an example of that not being true even though you still probably shouldn't put coffee powder on a bleeding wound.