Father arrested for beating child over bad grades - What do you think?

thats a good point but still beating your child will not control him. It might to an extent, but really there are many other ways to help control him and make him into a good human being.

A man hits his child leaving welts on his backside so hard that the boy cannot sit in school and you believe there should be no jailtime? I didn't read the article but if any parent hits their child and it leaves visible marks on their body(which means force was used) they should be put in jail. Now if a spanking means a little tap on the bottom to get a child's attention because nothing else has worked, (time outs, reward charts, taking away things)I might be able to accept this however when you get to a point that you are hitting your child and leaving marks to make them behave well i would have to say that some type of intervention needs to be brought into the picture...Children learn by example...and their are so many people out there that are parents that shouldn't be parents...It is not a bed or roses, parenting is a hard long road to make sure that our children turn into productive citizens and not a menace to society. I have three children and my oldest who is 18 was subjected to the spanking theory when he was little because I was young and didn't know any better.. My middle child is 11 and my youngest is 6 and they have never ever had one spanking in their whole entire life....I stopped the spanking theory when my oldest was around 8 or 9. Out of my three children my oldest is the most aggressive and hard to handle...I believe that kids learn by example and if we spank our kids out of anger than what are we teaching them and from my experience I remember spanking out of anger and not actually letting myself have enough time to cool down and think about it and if I had i would have realized that there was a better way to handle the situation... My oldest son is now 18 and can be a handful at times but through talking things out and learning how to deal with his aggresiveness life has gotten better..

Thanks for your post luv. It sounds like your experience with your son was similar to mine with my daughter. The spanking just didnt work. It made her angrier.

A parenting class might be a good idea, but he'd need follow up visits from children and families at the very least. The thing is, the dad didn't think he did anything wrong, so I don't know if going to parenting classes would do him any good. You have to want to learn something knew in order for it to work.

From the news clip I saw, I got the feeling he was a single dad. There was no mention of the mom. I didn't like the judge either.

He had the same outdated ideas as the father. On the video clip of that judge it was clear. He sincerely believed what the dad did was okay. I'm glad it went to someone else after him.

I had not heard about the case you just mentioned. I can't believe that was the sentence! It really is amazing how unbalanced justice can be sometimes.

I didn't actually read the article. I saw some news clips on televison. I didn't realise the child was only 8 years old. Somehow that makes it even more deplorable to me than it was before. You KNOW this dad wasn't sitting there with his kid trying to help him along with his homework to help him do better! I wonder how well the dad did in school. Probably no better than his son.

I forgot to attach the link to the story. Here it is. http://www1.wsvn.com/news/articles/local/MI63660/

I don't believe in beating a child, but I do believe in spanking when needed. The news always tells the part that gets peoples interest that is what sells papers.(or keeps them watching the news on TV) Again you never spank when angry and as a last resort. It doesn't tell the whole story only part and we need all the story to make an informed decision on this.

I was waiting for someone to come up with the opposing point of view. I think what he did wasn't "spanking". I believe he used a belt. I sill disagree with what he did, but I was waiting for someone to point out that in the old days this was common practice. I know there are still people out ther who believe in a "good old fashioned a$$ whooping" to keep their kids in line. Although I don't agree with that form of discipline. I don't know that I'd take their children away. From what I saw of this guy in particular though. I truly do think he was out of line. I think he did it out of anger and ignorance. He may have just had a sadistic nature about him. Again, I don't think beating a child will make them do better in school. As some posters have said. Beating the kid isn't gonna make him smarter. A parent needs to figure out the root of why the child isn't doing well in school. Not just hit the child because he gets bad grades.

Thanks for your post derek. Hurting a child because they can't perform to someone elses idea of "sufficient" definitely is NOT the way to teach them to do better. If a kid is struggling in school, they need help with learning. They don't need a beating. The same with music lessons! I can't believe she did that to you. How horrible.

"I think parents should be allowed to spank the kids" Oh I agree with you completely on that...I use to spank my kids when they were younger and I think sometimes a good whack on the behind is necessary as far as I'm concerned...