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Childhood Stress Leaves Genetic Scars
sciencehabit writes "Traumatic experiences in early life can leave emotional scars. But a new study suggests that violence in childhood may leave a genetic mark as well. Researchers have found that children who are physically abused and bullied tend to have shorter telomeres — structures at the tips of chromosomes whose shrinkage has been linked to aging and disease."
Child abuse isn't taken seriously? Here in the states, child services can take your kid away from you if you so much as look at it wrong in public.
Spanking can also help stop a kid from doing something that ends up being even more traumatic.
It's already known that stress can seem to accelerate aging. Ever see those pictures of presidents before a term, then after? 4 years passed for everybody else, but it looks like they aged 10 years.
Psyche and soma are not fully distinguishable.
Sometimes spanking is necessary. It isn't necessarily the first thing I would go to. It depends on the child's personality as well as their age. Also, the whole of the point of discipline and part of the point of raising a child is to modify behavior. I doubt anyone wants to have a jerk for a son.
"Even a dog distinguishes between being stumbled over and being kicked." -Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
While I do not personally use spanking, I think that categorizing it as being for "an adult who knows no other options or who chooses not to take the time needed to solve the situation" is incorrect.
Parents, in the mini society we call the family, perform the role of government. If we, as adults, do things like use violence and intimidation to get our way we will find the police using state sanctioned violence against us. I personally think smacking is an appropriate response to violent, bullying behavior in children and most kids will try that out at some stage. It is better for society that we learn this lesson at the hands of our parents as children rather than at the hands of police as an adult. I do note that it isn't the only method I'd recommend to correct bullying.
Additionally, sometimes behavior correction needs to be immediate. Where disobedience will lead to the child's life being in danger taking "the time needed to solve the situation otherwise" could be interpreted as neglect. If you are in a situation where you need to correct behavior right now, smacking could be the best option.
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I went to primary school in the 60's and throught those 6yrs there was an girl in my level to whom nature had not been kind. ALL the other kids would yell "Allison's germs" and run away when she approached them in the schoolyard. It didn't help that her parents sent her to school with dirty clothes and oily hair, this just reinforced her status as the lepoar of the schoolyard. Sometimes she used their fear against them by delibertely following them, or steal their marbles by chasing them away. These 'attacks' often ended with her falling to the ground in tears. I'd like to say I befreinded her but I too saw the germs and not the Allison.
Everyone remebers what happened to them in the schoolyard, it's much harder to remeber what you did to others. It's neither an remedy or an excuse for this behaviour but I beleive the Stanford prison experiments clearly demonstrated what old time religion had intuitvely known about human nature from day one, how did 'middle class' germans willingly become death camp gaurds, and why are kids so cruel? - Stable, strong societies survive, the "golden rule" found in most societies and religions combined with resrtricing the definition of "others" is a powerful stabalizing force, war against non-others is a powerful strenghtening force.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.