The New Dare to Discipline Read online

  I believe that if it is desirable for children to be kind, appreciative, and pleasant, those qualities should be taught— not hoped for. If we want to see honesty, truthfulness, and unselfishness in our offspring, then these characteristics should be the conscious objectives of our early instructional process. If it is important to produce respectful, responsible young citizens, then we should set out to mold them accordingly. The point is obvious: heredity does not equip a child with proper attitudes; children learn what they are taught. We cannot expect the coveted behavior to appear magically if we have not done our early homework.

  The kind of advice Dr. Woodward and others have offered to mothers and fathers through the years has led to a type of paralysis in dealing with their kids. In the absence of “permission” to step in and lead, parents were left with only their anger and frustration in response to defiant behavior.

  That thought immediately brings to mind a family I knew with four of the most unruly children I had ever met. These youngsters were the terrors of their neighborhood. They were disrespectful, loud, and aggressive. They roamed in and out of other people’s garages, helping themselves to tools and equipment. It became necessary for neighbors to remove the handles from outside water faucets, because these children enjoyed leaving the water running when the families were gone.

  It was interesting to observe the method of discipline used by their mother, if only because it provided a memorable example of what didn’t work. Her system of controlling her brood boiled down to a simple formula. When they became too noisy or cantankerous in the backyard, she would rush out the door about once every hour and scream, “I have had it with you kids! I have just had it with you!” Then she would turn and go back into the house. The children never even glanced up at her. If they knew she was there they gave no indication of it. But she apparently felt it was sufficient to burst out the door like a cuckoo clock every so often and remind them she was still on the job. There must be a better way to handle the awesome task of parenting that God has assigned to us.

  If both extremes are harmful, how do we find the safety of the middle ground? Surely, there is a logical, reasonable philosophy of child rearing that will guide our day-by-day interactions at home. Can’t the social scientists come up with a workable game plan? Perhaps this will sound like heresy coming from a man who spent ten years of his life in behavioral and medical research, but I don’t believe the scientific community is the best source of information on proper parenting techniques. There have been some worthwhile studies, to be sure. But the subject of parent-child interactions is incredibly complex and subtle. The only way to investigate it scientifically is to reduce the relationship to its simplest common denominators, so it can be examined. But in so doing, the overall tone is missed. Some things in life are so complicated that they almost defy rigorous scrutiny, and parental discipline (in my view) appears to be one of them.

  The best source of guidance for parents can be found in the wisdom of the Judeo-Christian ethic, which originated with the Creator and was then handed down generation by generation from the time of Christ. This is what my mother, my grandmother, and my great-grandmother understood almost intuitively. There was within Western culture a common knowledge about children and their needs. Not everyone applied it, but most people agreed with its tenets. When a new baby was born one hundred years ago, aunts and sisters and grandmothers came over to teach the new mother how to care for her infant. What they were doing was passing along the traditional wisdom . . . the heritage . . . to the next generation, which would later perform the same service for the newcomers on the block. That system worked pretty well until the 1920s and thereafter. Slowly, the culture began to lose confi- dence in that tradition and shifted its allegiance to the experts. Behaviorist J. B. Watson was one of the first and most influential gurus to come along. He offered what he called a “foolproof” method of child rearing, and mothers bought it hook, line, and sinker. If only they would follow his advice, he said, they could produce any kind of a child they wanted . . . “adoctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief, and—yes—even a beggarman and a thief.”

  Watson advised parents, if they wanted the best results, to show no affection for their offspring. He wrote:

  “Never hug and kiss them, never let them sit on your lap. If you must, kiss them once on the forehead when they say good night. Shake hands with them in the morning. . . .

  “Remember when you are tempted to pet your child, that mother love is a dangerous instrument. An instrument which may inflict a never-healing wound, a wound which may make infancy unhappy, adolescence a nightmare, an instrument which may wreck your adult son or daughter’s vocational future and their chances for marital happiness.”3

  This advice from Dr. Watson comes across today like pure nonsense, and indeed, that’s just what it is. In fact, it’s difficult to believe anyone gave credibility to such advice even in 1928. Yet Watson was enormously popular in his day, and his books sold in the millions. Mothers and fathers worked diligently to “condition” their children in the way recommended by this half-baked hot dog.

  Then came Dr. Sigmund Freud, and Dr. Benjamin Spock, and Dr. A. S. Neill (see chapter 7), and Dr. Tom Gordon, and Dr. Ruth Westheimer, and Phil Donahue, and Oprah Winfrey, and the Ladies’ Home Journal, and Cosmopolitan, and Red book, and finally, a newspaper for “enquiring minds who want to know.” With every new, off-the-wall suggestion that came along, I asked myself: If their new approach to child-rearing is so wonderful, why was it not observed until now? How come 20 billion parents across more than five thousand years failed to notice the concept? Certainly, the accumulated experience of all that mothering and fathering should count for something!

  My primary purpose in writing this book, both the 1970 version and this recomposition, has been to record for posterity my understanding of the Judeo-Christian concept of parenting that has guided millions of mothers and fathers for centuries. I am convinced that it will prove successful in your home, too. Let’s move on, then, to examine five underpinnings to commonsense child rearing.

  1. Developing respect for parents is the critical factor in child management. It is imperative that a child learns to respect his parents—not to satisfy their egos, but because his relationship with them provides the basis for his later attitude toward all other people. His early view of parental authority becomes the cornerstone of his future outlook on school authority, law enforcement officers, employers, and others with whom he will eventually live and work. The parent-child relationship is the first and most important social interaction a youngster will have, and the flaws and knots experienced there can often be seen later in life.

  Respect for parents must be maintained for another equally important reason. If you want your child to accept your values when he reaches his teen years, then you must be worthy of his respect during his younger days. When a child can successfully defy his parents during his first fifteen years, laughing in their faces and stubbornly flouting their authority, he develops a natural contempt for them.

  “Stupid old Mom and Dad! I have them wound around my little finger. Sure they love me, but I really think they’re afraid of me.” A child may not utter these words, but he feels them each time he outsmarts his elders and wins the confrontations and battles. Later he is likely to demonstrate his disrespect in a more blatant manner. Viewing his parents as being unworthy of his respect, he may very well reject every vestige of their philosophy and faith.

  This factor is also of vital importance to Christian parents who wish to transmit their love for Jesus Christ to their sons and daughters. Why? Because young children typically identify their parents . . . and especially their fathers . . . with God. Therefore, if Mom and Dad are not worthy of respect, then neither are their morals, their country, their values and beliefs, or even their religious faith.

  I was shocked to see this close identification between God and me in the mind of our son when he was two years old. Ryan had watched his mother and me pray befo
re we ate each meal, but he had never been asked to say grace. One day when I was out of town on a business trip, Shirley spontaneously turned to the toddler and asked if he would like to pray before they ate. The invitation startled him, but he folded his little hands, bowed his head, and said, “I love you, Daddy. Amen.”

  When I returned home and Shirley told me what had happened, the story unsettled me. I hadn’t realized the degree to which Ryan linked me with his “Heavenly Father.” I wasn’t even sure I wanted to stand in those shoes. It was too big a job, and I didn’t want the responsibility. But I had no choice, nor do you. God has given us the assignment of representing Him during the formative years of parenting. That’s why it is so critically important for us to acquaint our kids with God’s two predominant natures . . . His unfathomable love and His justice. If we love our children but permit them to treat us disrespectfully and with disdain, we have distorted their understanding of the Father. On the other hand, if we are rigid disciplinarians who show no love, we have tipped the scales in the other direction. What we teach our children about the Lord is a function, to some degree, of how we model love and discipline in our relationship with them. Scary, huh?

  The issue of respect is also useful in guiding parents’ interpretation of given behavior. First, they should decide whether an undesirable act represents a direct challenge to their authority . . . to their leadership position as the father or mother. The form of disciplinary action they take should depend on the result of that evaluation.

  For example, suppose little Chris is acting silly in the living room and falls into a table, breaking many expensive china cups and other trinkets. Or suppose Wendy loses her bicycle or leaves her mother’s coffeepot out in the rain. These are acts of childish irresponsibility and should be handled as such. Perhaps the parent will ignore the event or maybe have the child work to pay for the losses—depending on his age and maturity, of course.

  However, these examples do not constitute direct challenges to authority. They do not emanate from willful, haughty disobedience and therefore should not result in serious discipline. In my opinion, spankings (which we will discuss later) should be reserved for the moment a child (between the age of eighteen months to ten years old) expresses to parents a defiant “I will not!” or “You shut up!” When youngsters convey this kind of sjpg-necked rebellion, you must be willing to respond to the challenge immediately. When nose-to-nose confrontation occurs between you and your child, it is not the time to discuss the virtues of obedience. It is not the occasion to send him to his room to pout. Nor is it appropriate to postpone disciplinary measures until your tired spouse plods home from work.

  You have drawn a line in the dirt, and the child has deliberately flopped his bony little toe across it. Who is going to win? Who has the most courage? Who is in charge here? If you do not conclusively answer these questions for your strong-willed children, they will precipitate other battles designed to ask them again and again. It is the ultimate paradox of childhood that youngsters want to be led, but insist that their parents earn the right to lead them.

  When mothers and fathers fail to take charge in moments of challenge, they create for themselves and their families a potential lifetime of heartache. That’s what happened in the case of the Holloways, who were the parents of a teen named Becky (not their real names). Mr. Holloway came to see me in desperation one afternoon and related the cause for his concern. Becky had never been required to obey or respect her parents, and her early years were a strain on the entire family. Mrs. Holloway was confident Becky would eventually become more manageable, but that never happened. She held her parents in utter contempt from her youngest childhood and was sullen, disrespectful, selfish, and uncooperative. Mr. and Mrs. Holloway did not feel they had the right to make demands on their daughter, so they smiled politely and pretended not to notice her horrid behavior.

  Their magnanimous attitude became more difficult to maintain as Becky steamrolled into puberty and adolescence. She was a perpetual malcontent, sneering at her family in disgust. Mr. and Mrs. Holloway were afraid to antagonize her in any way because she would throw the most violent tantrums imaginable. They were victims of emotional blackmail. They thought they could buy her cooperation, which led them to install a private telephone in her room. She accepted it without gratitude and accumulated a staggering bill during the first month of usage.

  They thought a party might make her happy, and Mrs. Hol-loway worked very hard to decorate the house and prepare refreshments. On the appointed evening, a mob of dirty, profane teens swarmed into the house, breaking and destroying the furnishings. During the course of the evening, Mrs. Hol-loway said something that angered Becky. The girl struck her mother and left her lying in a pool of blood in the bathroom.

  Away from home at the time, Mr. Holloway returned to find his wife helpless on the floor; he located his unconcerned daughter in the backyard, dancing with friends. As he described for me the details of their recent nightmare, he spoke with tears in his eyes. His wife, he said, was still in the hospital contemplating her parental failures as she recovered from her wounds.

  Parents like the Holloways often fail to understand how love and discipline interact to influence the attitudes of a child. These two aspects of a relationship are not opposites working against each other. They are two dimensions of the same quality. One demands the other. Disciplinary action is not an assault on parental love; it is a function of it. Appropriate punishment is not something parents do to a beloved child; it is something done for him or her. That simple understanding when Becky was younger could have spared the Holloways an adolescent nightmare.

  Their attitude when Becky rebelled as a preschooler should have been, “I love you too much to let you behave like that.” For the small child, word pictures can help convey this message more clearly. The following is a story I used with our very young children when they crossed the line of unacceptable behavior:

  I knew of a little bird who was in his nest with his mommy. The mommy bird went off to find some worms to eat, and she told the little bird not to get out of the nest while she was gone. But the little bird didn’t mind her. He jumped out of the nest and fell to the ground where a big cat got him. When I tell you to mind me, it is because I know what is best for you, just as the mommy bird did with her baby bird. When I tell you to stay in the front yard, it’s because I don’t want you to run in the street and get hit by a car. I love you, and I don’t want anything to happen to you. If you don’t mind me, I’ll have to spank you to help you remember how important it is. Do you understand?

  My own mother had an unusually keen understanding of good disciplinary procedures, as I have indicated. She was very tolerant of my childishness, and I found her reasonable on most issues. If I was late coming home from school and I could explain what caused the delay, that was the end of the matter. If I didn’t get my work done, we could sit down and reach an agreement for future action. But there was one matter on which she was absolutely rigid: She did not tolerate sassiness. She knew that backtalk and what she called “lip” were a child’s most potent weapon to defiance and had to be discouraged.

  I learned very early that if I was going to launch a flippant attack on her, I had better be standing at least twelve feet away. This distance was necessary to avoid an instantaneous response—usually aimed at my backside.

  The day I learned the importance of staying out of reach shines like a neon light in my mind. I made the costly mistake of sassing her when I was about four feet away. I knew I had crossed the line and wondered what she would do about it. It didn’t take long to find out. Mom wheeled around to grab something with which to express her displeasure, and her hand landed on a girdle. Those were the days when a girdle was lined with rivets and mysterious panels. She drew back and swung that abominable garment in my direction, and I can still hear it whistling through the air. The intended blow caught me across the chest, followed by a multitude of straps and buckles, wrapping themselves around my mid
section. She gave me an entire thrashing with one blow! But from that day forward, I measured my words carefully when addressing my mother. I never spoke disrespectfully to her again, even when she was seventy-five years old.

  I have shared that story many times through the years, to an interesting response. Most people found it funny and fully understood the innocuous meaning of that moment. A few others, who never met my mother and had no knowledge of her great love for me, quickly condemned her for the abusiveness of that event. One Christian psychologist even wrote a chapter in his book on the viciousness of that spanking. Another man in Wichita, Kansas, was so furious at me for telling the story that he refused to come hear me speak. Later he admitted he had misread the word girdle, thinking my mother had hit me with a griddle.

  If you’re inclined to agree with the critics, please hear me out. I am the only person on earth who can report accurately the impact of my mother’s action. I’m the only one who lived it. And I’m here to tell you that the girdle-blow was an act of love! My mother would have laid down her life for me in a heartbeat, and I always knew it. She would not have harmed a hair on my fuzzy head. Yes, she was angry at my insolence, but her sudden reaction was a corrective maneuver. We both knew I richly deserved it. And that is why the momentary pain of that event did not assault my self-worth. Believe it or not, it made me feel loved. Take it or leave it, Dr. Psychologist, but that’s the truth.