This is too funny not to post. Media Matters reports:
OREILLY: But if you’re beating a kid, there’s no excuse. Then you’ve lost control of the child, you’ve lost control of yourself. Here’s the litmus test: If you lose your temper, and then you do something to the kid physically, that’s abuse. If you lose your temper. Got it? That’s it. If you’re under control, it’s calculated, you’re disgusted, the kid knows, it’s tempered, absolutely your right as a child [sic]. Now in the Great Depression, every American got spanked. And those Americans went to war during World War II and won the very intense conflict and showed bravery across the board, the Greatest Generation. The Greatest Generation, almost down to the man, was spanked, ’cause that’s the way we did it in America. OK?
So I’m not believing all these sociologists, these fruitcakes, who run around going, you know, you look at a kid cross-eyed, he’s going to grow up to be a heroin addict. I’m not buying that. I think you have to do it responsibly, you have to do it in a way that the child understands what the boundaries are, and is given a choice. Stay within the boundaries, or you’re going to get punished. But I think that 90 percent of the time, you could find another way.
Want audio?
I want a falafel.
I think his brain is full of tabouli.
Those spanking enthusiasts who say you should calm down and then do your spanking in a more calculated manner are just creepy to me. The only time I ever swatted my kids is when they scared the crap out of me by climbing up onto the stove or running out into the street. Then it was purely emotional on my part and if I had calmed down I wouldn’t have done it.
I agree. I remember smacking my kid on the head one time when she bit me – I apologized and she apologized, and I don’t think she carries any emotional scars from my loss of temper. But if I had calmed down and then gone and hit her? Felt that I was justified? Creepy, definitely.
and I didn’t turn into a heroin addict.
Cocaine addict, but not heroin.
So I guess he’s got a point . . .
<snark>
What about Rush Limbaugh? Does “Hillbilly Heroin” count?
Christian Parenting Magazine, which would be a treasure trove of inadventent humor to put Readers’ Digest to shame, if only it weren’t serious.
My wife and were in Seattle…actually, my son was having surgery now that I think about it. We were so bored, we were going through all the magazines in the waiting room, and stumbled upon Christian Parenting Today.
The cover article professed to be neutral: “Spanking and the Modern Parent.” But all it was about was how the liberals had taken the paddle away from us good and wise Xian parents. Why, just the other day my four-year-old was “acting up” in Wal-Mart. I did what any good parent would do: I administered a swift and surgical hand to his behind. He immediately fell in line, but the disapproving looks of all the other WalMartians were more than this Xian mom could bear. What’s happened to our society?
It was fucking ridiculous. It’s interesting that O’Reilly’s description as well as that of other abusive parents uses military-ish imagery when describing how they beat their children: “swift, surgical,” and apparently inspring the Greatest Generation to their Greatness.
I say if conservatives want to beat their children, let them all do it at WalMart. Then I won’t see it, and I can blissfully continue ruining my son’s life by not hitting him.
Yes, it’s like Shock and Awe for toddlers. If you really want to have fun go to family.org and read up on Dobson’s view of discipline.
I have to react when I see a parent hitting or being mean to a child.
I can’t be silent … and one time, I almost got beaten myself.
Something else: A couple weeks ago i was in line at the grocery store, and a very tired looking, dressed-for-work mom had two highly active boy toddlers. Boy toddlers can put any parent at their wit’s end. But this mother was patient, calm, not overly attentive or directive … just there and quietly suggesting appropriate behavior. I HAD to compliment her. … if i’d had the money, i would have bought her groceries for her. She was that wonderful.
Did anyone else notice the phrase “down to a man?” Maybe this was just an unthinking use of a stock phrase..but i immediately wonder about the thought processes of someome who uses language in that way when they are espousing such a conservative view.
Don’t today’s conservatives think sociology is bullshit in general? I thought they pretty much returned it back in the 90s to whatever college they bought it from and then took the refund money and went out and bought eschatology.
Eh, either way, every time I think O’Reilly can’t get any more stupid, he just out-stupids himself and makes us both look like morons.
that the government shouldn’t get involved in trying to prevent spanking?
I guess he must think that there is an implied ‘right to privacy’ or some such hogwash in the Constitution.
</snark>
O’Reilly sounds like he’s equating spanking with love and that says a lot about his.. ahem … predilections.
Reminds me of a couple cartoons I wrote once… (to be read in your best David Allen Grier voice) Like ta’ hear it? Here it goes…
Good Vibrations
Ruff Stuff
I adore every single cartoon you do, Spike.
Why, thank you. I appreciate that!
i only spank grown ups
who beg for it first
this coming sat i will be womanning the spanking booth at the kinky karnival on the 3rd floor of the bike stop in philly….to raise money for charity of course.
9pm to 1am…please come by and bend over for me.
Crap!…the Kinky Karnival is this weekend? I have to miss it again. {sigh}
I’ll send you a brand new whacking ruler to ease the disappointment. 😉
Make sure it has that sharp metal strip along the edge to really slice open the knuckles.
Love,
Sister Margaret Mary
Nah – the nun’s ultimate weapon was the #2 pencil, laid simply on the floor. The child was made to kneel on said pencil to say 2 ‘Hail Mary’s.’ No kid could make it past the first ‘full of grace…’
True story.
Hey, does the Kinky Karnival have a falafel concession stand?
I don’t know about falafel, but they have plenty of other concessions to choose from.
Here’s the right one!
I’m such an idiot sometimes…
USA-Secret WWII Weapon Revealed !!!!
Dateline 10/24/05
German & Japanese officials issue joint communique lamenting the fact that they did not spank their children enough.
I spanked my daughter when she was too young to understand much English or connect cause and effect. It was always a light pop which served to startle her more than cause pain, as I used it very sparingly. It was almost always a safety-related issue.
Once she was old enough to understand simple commands, I never did it again. I used timeouts, sending her to her room, removing privileges, etc.
People constantly tell me how well-behaved she is. Spanking didn’t accomplish that. Punishment in general didn’t do that. Teaching her respect and consideration for other people — which is, after all, 95% of proper behavior — is what made her well-behaved.
O’Reilly might be right in that she wouldn’t make a very good soldier, but I didn’t raise her to be a good soldier. I raised her to be a good person. Everything else is irrelevant.
during anger.
Usually it’s cold and CALCULATED.
Fuck O’Reilly.
Try listening to O’Reilly say all of this with a Daffy Duck voice. Go ahead. Squish up your mouth, and make sounds like a duck. Now, try and say, ‘litmus test’. It really put the whole thing into perspective. As a matter of fact, I thing someone should re-broadcast all of Bill’s commentary with Looney Toons in mind. Porky Pig does the falafel, Bugs Bunny on the Malmedy massacre – it’d be a riot! Followed by my favorite – Road Runner providing commentary. And a resounding ‘Beep Beep’ to you too, Billy!
In the really really old days, maybe not so much in the US, which doesn’t have really really old days, parents, and grandparents employed a disciplinary method much more effective than violence.
It was called “the Look,” and it was more effective because if fear is what you are after, it conjured up more fear in the imagination of any child who had truly misbehaved on purpose than any beating ever could, and if you were a radical maverick sort who preferred that your children respect you, it filled that bill in spades. Even the most incorrigibly naughty boy cannot avoid feeling an immense respect for an elderly lady not even five feet tall who with one Look, can cause erstwhile birdward rocks to fall from grubby little hands or detect even the slightest deviation from the facts in a recounting of events.
The Look even had periscopic and X-ray properties, enabling all who possessed it to know exactly whether, if, how and how many teeth had been brushed and toes had been cleaned – from a different floor on the other side of the house.
The Look was also employed pre-emptively when necessary, intervening in a timely fashion to prevent forbidden acts like interrupting grownups’ conversations for non-urgent reasons or touching objects d’ art.
It produced well-behaved, polite, non-violent children who grew up to be well-behaved, polite and non-violent adults.
Somewhere along the line, it became popular to beat children, which is, to be fair, the only way they will learn that conflicts are best resolved with violence, and the important principle of might makes right, thus whoever is bigger and stronger will always win if they will only make the effort to clobber the smaller, weaker party. And this will help them in their future careers as expendable gunmen in the eternal battle to defend the freedom of rich men to receive more money.
Maybe the Look was better suited to a time when it was more realistic to expect one’s offspring would have a wider array of career choices.
I thought my mother invented The Look. It was especially effective in church, often followed by her fingernails digging into the flesh above my kneecap if The Look didn’t have it’s intended effect.
And it’s so funny, because of course she’s the shortest in the family. Doesn’t matter. I’m 30sumthin’ and it would STILL induce fear…if we didn’t talk doggone near every other day as if we lived around the corner from each other.
Look, the parents spanked me and I’m a good and productive person: loving, generous, progressive, family-focused, happily married, hardworking, compassionate, good-looking … and modest ;<). But they have grandchildren and they’d go to the timeout corner for the few times they had to bed disciplined. You learn better, more effective techniques, and that’s that.
Now b/c I’m Black and from the South, strict discipline was used as a survival technique–a child wouldn’t be cut some slack if s/he wanted candy and just picked it up or wanted to express him or herself. No, no and no. You could get hurt or killed (Emmet Till, anyone?).
Upthread it was mentioned that a person spoke up when someone was spanking their child. My Mom would have let you have it–I know, because I was that 2 or 3 y.o. that just saw candy and “picked it up.” There was a white woman in line who was just appalled and aghast and asked Mom how she could just spank me. And she said…
I’m going to spank her before you ever get a chance to.
Translation: I’m not going to let her confirm some stereotype for you. I’m not going to let a childish mistake turn into the path for prison. I’ll punish her now so that society won’t do so later.
Let’s just be real: Black children…hell, Black PEOPLE are judged differently. “Finding and looting” and all that. If I was George Bush, Bill Bennett would bark about how lazy and coddled I was before opining that if I wasn’t born, I wouldn’t be the criminal I am…before assuring the audience that that would be morally abhorrent.
In fact, I was in my mid-20s before I stopped asking for a bag for small purchases (gum, candy, etc.) because of course, someone would always think you’re trying to steal it.
But again, you find the most effective ways of discipline and move on. All this misplaced nostalgia is just disgusting to me. And it’s also indicative of people obsessed with feeling superior over someone–you have no control over your life and your work (and we’re not gonna give you any, since it’s in our interest politically and economically to keep you lunging at the wrong targets) but hey … you can lord over your household! Now THAT should make you feel powerful!
“OK, kid. I’m going to beat the crap outta you.. but it’s going to be a beating from Luuuv, not anger… so it’s ok.
Remember this will hurt me more than you”
:/
What is it about the righty echo chamber? Are any of them capable of making an argument that doesn’t incorporate strawmen? Or is it just that they’re aware of how well strawmen work on the general public and they have no qualms about taking advantage of that?
Apparently O’Reilly didn’t get sufficient spankings during his formative years. Perhaps he should make up for that now. Oh, I don’t spank my 6 year old son.
Ok, so…
Can I go spank the President now? And Rumsfeld when I’m done with George?
Will that cause these idiots to become competent, capable, and brave enough to do the right thing and resign so that we can salvage some sort of victory out of Iraq?
… if it is ok to spank a child for lying… ‘k?
Now, I’ve never had kids, but in order to be effective shouldn’t punishment occur right after the offense? So if the angry parent waits to cool off (which in my mother’s case would have taken approximately a week and a half), isn’t the resulting delayed spanking just going to confuse the crap out of a young child?
Mom believed in spanking. More precisely, she believed in breaking a wooden spoon over my ass and upper thighs every once in awhile. All that taught me was fear and hatred. So maybe it’s not surprising that fear and hatred seem to be such motivators for the wingers.
Can you imagine us spanking our son who is autistic? Not a chance.
Sadly there are some that think if only we disciplined or drugged him up – he’d be “better”… more “normal”.
I don’t recall Jesus spanking any children.. in fact didn’t he have a complete conniption fit over the money changers??
Before my nephew was diagnosed with Pervasive Developmental Disorder, my sister told her pediatrician that she was convinced that something serious was wrong. Neal screamed when touched and went entirely ballistic when you changed his diaper. And he just wasn’t developing at the pace that my sister had observed with her other son, who was only 18 months older than Neal.
The pediatrician’s response? “Oh, he’s just a brat. He just needs discipline.”
Fortunately, my sister located a specialist and got Neal the help he needed. We were lucky–his disorder is on the mild side of the autistic spectrum. Even so, I shudder to think of how messed up he’d be if my sister had listened to that idiot pediatrician.
Blessings to you and your son!
Glad he and your sister found real help.
I think the word Discipline comes from the word Disciple which I beliieve means “to teach”.
So that would mean that we are “to teach” our children … not leave welts on them.
Spankings and physical puishments and physical threats only break one’s spirit… and there’s nothing nuturing about that.
Plus, our children have so much to teach us as well.
I was also spanked as a child, ok I was beaten as a child and it didn’t do much for me except I left home at 16 and have only spoken with my mother twice in my life since then and I’m almost 50. Spanking teaches kids nothing except that if your angry get violent. Ok that’s just my opinion and you know what opinios are like.
KEITH O just named Bill O’Reilly “The Worst Person In The World” for this statement!
(Isn’t Ill a previous winner?)
you’re too fast for me! (Had to get off the couch and wake up the computer…)
Loved his comment: “Isn’t he about 4 minutes away from being committed?”
Billy should know a thing or two about getting whacked, since it appears he was whacked quite frequently himself as a child.