Raising Godly Tomatoes

[sparkles]

"Discipline" meted out with premeditated, calculated, cold-blooded glee. Sounds like a perfect description of almost every serial murderer. These animal disgust me.

[Mela99]

The dad also gave the kid a spanking for saying "I come" or "Im coming" instead of "coming" when he called her.

But when it was her turn, our second oldest child said, "Come" instead of "Coming". Dad explained again that he wanted to hear, "Coming" and had them all try again. They all got it exactly right except again, our four-year-old daughter. This time she said, "I come." Dad explained it again. The next time she said, "I'm coming". She couldn't seem to get it right... So Dad got out the paddle. He did not get angry. He simply determined to correct the problem. He spanked her (one firm swat on the posterior, over her clothes), and then told her to try again. It took her six more tries (and six swats with the paddle) before she finally decided to obey and say, "Coming."

She is four, it doesnt really matter what they say to show theyre coming when you call them, or even if they say anything at all, as long as they do what you asked them to.

[notsocommon]

I feel the need to elaborate on the paddle issue. I actually had to google to see what a paddle was.

It's this, right?

I have never seen or heard of this being used in the UK/Ireland. I've heard of the slipper and the belt as handy hitting utensils, but it's usually when my Grandad is telling me all about his nutcase mother.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but people actually make these to hit kids with? They are, so to speak, spanking-specific?

Yes, that is a paddle. Some drill holes in it because it is supposed to hurt more.

[YPestis]

Agree. I don't get it when pro-spanking people say "but we don't hit in anger" to justify themselves. I find the idea of a swat given in frustration or because, say, the child has done something dangerous, much less disturbing than the calm spanking where it's all like "mommy/daddy is going to spank you now because you ran in a busy road".

I'm heard the opposite, that a parent should never hit or discipline in anger. Even when passing out a non-corporal punishment, I always read that parents should be calm and explain why the child is being punished. I always thought if a child gets a swat from an angry parent, they may think it was done of out reflexive anger, rather than as a punishment for misbehavior. However, I think it's understandable if a parent spanks a child out of anger if he runs into a street, especially a child too young to realize the full consequences of that behavior (i.e a toddler wandering into a busy street).

I've had friends who were spanked who considered themselves abused and those who did not. The ones who considered themselves abused always talked about being hit because the parents were angry at something else, not always related to their own misbehavior. The hitting could be spontaneous and unevenly meted out (i.e even small things could set the parent off). The kids who did not feel abused mostly had it done as very young children, some dismissed it as spanking altogether ("just a swat"). The biggest difference was that these kids felt spanking was justified and not done because the parents were frustrated with something else.

I'm still not sure if I will spank my child. I am neither pro nor anti spanking. Statistics show about 75% of parents of preschoolers spank their child at some point. I think it's hubris for me to brag that I would never spank because I've never dealt with unruly children. I don't feel right about condemning the majority of parents as abusive on my childless perch.

That said, I think I'm cognizant enough to realize where the abuse line is. I feel that fundies, because of their fixation on all things OLD, are more willing to cross that abuse line (as defined by modern society). Spanking a child is not a red flag for me. Leaving welts and using heavy implements are. Fundies can try to defend it with bible passages and historical articles, but I feel society has improved and parenting should as well. We no longer sell our children or sent them to work in factories, we should also refrain from inflicting harsh punishment on them.

[Claddagh]

When I first saw the thread I was hoping for comments about what is a Godly and Ungodly tomato.

I am both saddened, greatly disturbed, and angry over what this wingnut is saying.

Is Spanking "Hitting"?

You are striking the child! You are inflicting physical pain to the child that you are supposed to be protecting.

But when it was her turn, our second oldest child said, "Come" instead of "Coming". Dad explained again that he wanted to hear, "Coming" and had them all try again. They all got it exactly right except again, our four-year-old daughter. This time she said, "I come." Dad explained it again. The next time she said, "I'm coming". She couldn't seem to get it right... So Dad got out the paddle. He did not get angry. He simply determined to correct the problem. He spanked her (one firm swat on the posterior, over her clothes), and then told her to try again. It took her six more tries (and six swats with the paddle) before she finally decided to obey and say, "Coming."

When I was four I'd sometimes say the same. My teeth were coming in wonky and I needed speech therapy. If I used the wrong word, ending, or misprounced something I was corrected and life moved on. I was never once spanked for it.

This reminds me of a twisted experiment done in the first half of the 20th century. I forget the doctor's name but he stuttered and would have his assistant accuse orphaned children of stuttering even when they spoke correctly. They were so "trained" in this they began to stutter and have difficulty speaking. Many of those cildren blamed the assistant and doctor for their troubles in communication.

[Emme]

It worries me that they see everything as disobedience, and not age-appropriate behavior. WTF is wrong with these people?

[dairyfreelife]

Elizabeth Krueger is someone who, back when I was a fundie, first thought had some great discipline ideas. Then I read more and more and thought she was a bit...extreme, excessive. She claimed her children didn't need friends because supposedly she and her siblings had fun at her parents cabins on weekends, more fun than with friends. I mean, yeah, I loved camping trips and beach vacations as a child and they were a lot of fun, but I have just as many memories of playing with friends in the neighborhood. She's all about keeping her children near and watching their every move. She also had a story about spanking her daughter, Bethany (I think that was the daughter's name) when she would get excited in her carseat or maybe it was that she would cry, can't recall. I found her extreme even where spanking is concerned, hitting them for the simplest of infractions. (I don't think spanking is okay, just that most people who have spanked in the past didn't do it for every little thing). Elizabeth and her husband do not understand a thing called "picking your battles". Disciplining your child for the every little thing is ridiculous. Even if she did not spank, punishing the daughter for saying "i'm coming" instead of "coming" is flat out stupid.

Not to mention that comparing taking care of a child to growing tomatoes is a bit...strange. Like your children are just objects, not people.

[Guest Anonymous]

Maybe this bitch should confine herself to real, actual tomatoes and not children.

[JesusFightClub]

Weird! The wee girl was right in saying "I'm coming" not just "Coming". And for correct English she is hit with a stick?

How can these children know what is right and what is wrong when they're penalised for doing the right thing and the wrong thing? They will end up with a chaotic mindset where they try to anticipate daddy's wishes, cringing all the while waiting for the next blow. They won't be able to decide correct behaviour for themselves.

I'm one who was smacked as a kid, like Aisling says there was no use of this thing which looks like a cricket bat (horrific). My mum would give me a smack on the (fully clothed) arse. I don't at all feel abused by it but I would not carry it on and smack the weans nowadays. Nowadays we understand better about such things and it's not the best method to use. Small and Smaller can get pretty rambunctious and my brother believes in smacking so he will very occasionally smack them (again fully clothed, on the bum) but I'm not raising a hand. FJ taught me that at least!

[Claddagh]

Maybe this bitch should confine herself to real, actual tomatoes and not children.

I just had the thought that she'd punish the tomatoes if they got tomato worms.

[latraviata]

Agree. I don't get it when pro-spanking people say "but we don't hit in anger" to justify themselves. I find the idea of a swat given in frustration or because, say, the child has done something dangerous, much less disturbing than the calm spanking where it's all like "mommy/daddy is going to spank you now because you ran in a busy road".

I also don't get the idea that squirming or yelling from the spanking are "rebellion", uh, those are instinctive reactions to pain.

I can't imagine to calmly and deliberately spank your child, it is creepy and cruel.

My late younger son had been diagnosed with kidney failure when he was about 5 years old. Shortly after this horrible verdict he became 6 years old and at that day, his birthday I heard a lot of noise comig out of his room, my older son 8 at the time had beaten him up for some reason,I lashed out to my older son (aka Cuteneurorad) and that caused him a nosebleed. I immediately told him that maybe he deserved it but I should never have beaten him. I still cringe when I think about it and I still feel awful about it and Cuteneurorad? He can't even remember and says, well I think you were damn right.....I still disagree and cringe.

[debrand]

She also has advice on tomato staking on her site. Tomato staking takes what appears to be a harmless idea and makes it creepy brainwashing.

My oldest son was diagnosed with ADHD. He was very active. When he was three or four, I often had him remain close to me because I knew, he could find trouble anywhere. We used to joke that if the house was too quiet, he was up to something. Anyway, having him close meant that I could correct him quickly. Usually, I just told him things like, "No, don't climb on the back of the couch." "Don't slam your little brother's head in the door." I really didn't have to do this with any of my other three kids.

raisinggodlytomatoes.com/ch07.php

How much wiser to be your child�s tomato stake from early on, keeping him close to you beyond infancy, training him constantly to be as you want him to be -- a godly child and eventually a godly adult. If you do this, eventually, when he is grown, he will be strong in the ways you have trained him and will not easily be persuaded toward the viewpoint and ways others.

and

1. Intense Tomato Staking: Keeping your child within three feet of you (because he can't be trusted four feet or further from you), enabling you to "train" him to behave well, watching and correcting every infraction, and noticing and praising good behavior. After-the-fact discipline does not work nearly as well as the immediate discipline made possible by serious Tomato Staking such as this.

2. Occasional Tomato Staking: Keeping your child near you (how close and for how long depends on age and situation) to correct a repeated or habitual infraction. Here�s an example of this type being put into effect: "Because you pushed your brother just now, and you know better, you must come inside and sit here quietly at the kitchen table while I cook dinner. You will not play outside anymore until I see a change in you and know I can trust you."

3. Loose Tomato Staking: This is for daily use with well-trained children. Younger children are always within eyesight and earshot, usually in the same room, but not necessarily right next to you. In this kind of staking, you do NOT send children to the bedroom to play where you can't see or hear them, relying on occasional checks to monitor behavior. When they are outside, you are with them, or able to see and hear them. You do not pack them off to the neighbors or elsewhere for an hour or two to play without your personal supervision. You do not sign them up for group activities that do not include your parental participation.

4. Mentoring and Lifestyle Tomato Staking: Elements of all the other modes are interjected briefly, when needed, into this type, and this type should always be used along with the others. Involving far more than training for behavior, and more than "discipline," this is a way of living that also involves mentoring, nurturing, loving, teaching, fellowshipping with, and abiding with your child. Here, you are not only keeping your child with you, but you are including your child in your day's activities. You are building an intimate relationship with your child, teaching him to be like you in mind, spirit, beliefs and actions. You are diligently teaching godliness on the most basic, practical level. This is a lifestyle. This is our aim in our family and what I highly recommend to everyone else. If you employ the other types of Tomato Staking, but neglect this one, you will experience only partial success with your children. They may grow up being outwardly obedient, and perhaps even godly in their own hearts, but your children may not be fully equipped to reproduce godliness in their own offspring.

[debrand]

Paddles were used in all my schools up until high school. Some teachers drilled holes in the wood so that it would hurt more.

My neighbor has rarely spanked her son but they have a more light weight paddle then is in the photo. I think that it was the remains of one of those paddle and ball toys.

In my home, adults used switches and belts, not paddles. Outwardly, we were all very polite. However, I really don't think that it had any effect on our behavior when adults were away.

[Peas n carrots]

Might as well just make clones of yourself Elizabeth. No cherishing of indiduality. Her children are all meant to be mindless automatons to her.

Those kids are going to need lots and lots of therapy when they are older. They are going to be so fucked up.

[celestial]

I found out my one friend was paddled when I went over to her house and saw one hanging on the wall of the porch. It looked exactly like the one pictured above. She told me what it was and I was somewhat shocked. We were 11 by that point. She told me not to ask her mom about it, and I wasn't about to. We quickly changed the subject but I never forgot that weird incident. But from what I hear that would be considered totally normal in some places.

[CrazySister]

Elizabeth is a vile monstrous excuse of a mother. She's a close personal friend of Michael Pearl who decided that the only real flaw with his system is that a WOMAN should be telling mothers how to properly beat their children, not a man.

She was chased off breastfeeding.com where she was actively recruiting as she was building her book and website for a vile incident where she spent about 36 hours openly debating the spanking issue before using her sick child as an example of why first time obedience, garnered through harsh spanking was so good. She had called her son to her as he began to vomit and managed to keep him from vomiting all over her floor and forcing her to clean it up. And while she had been debating everyone, she had kept him on a towel in the bathroom next to the toilet where he was only permitted to vomit into the toilet or clean it up himself. And he did all of this without complaint, even while sick because she had properly trained him to obey her.....versus being a mother and tending to her sick child instead of treating him like a puppy dog so she could debate and garner an audience to make money off her endeavors.snipped

Elizabeth (because I have no doubt you google yourself and will read this) - the only thing you're prooving by doing this first time obedience bullshit is that 1) you're a bully, and 2) you don't give a damn about what's in your children's best interest, you simply want parenting to be convenient for you. YOU, and people like you, are the very people who should NOT be having children. You are a vile woman who knows nothing of the gentleness Jesus taught and lived and you have the gall to teach others your anti-what-Jesus-taught bullshit is the best way and pretend it's what he taught. I hope your children leave on their 18th birthday and discover true grace and freedom because they certainly aren't learning it from you.

[GiggleOfGirls]

I have no idea how one would even manage to spank a child without hitting them, by definition.

Pro-spankers' reactions when spanking is called hitting is very telling, IMO. The word spanking is just a nice cute, sanitized version of "hitting" that is supposed to bring to someone's mind a socially acceptable punishment instead of what it really is - hitting.

[guidedbybobafett]

But when it was her turn, our second oldest child said, "Come" instead of "Coming". Dad explained again that he wanted to hear, "Coming" and had them all try again. They all got it exactly right except again, our four-year-old daughter. This time she said, "I come." Dad explained it again. The next time she said, "I'm coming". She couldn't seem to get it right... So Dad got out the paddle. He did not get angry. He simply determined to correct the problem. He spanked her (one firm swat on the posterior, over her clothes), and then told her to try again. It took her six more tries (and six swats with the paddle) before she finally decided to obey and say, "Coming."

This is legitimately insane. These people are pathological. I have met some control freaks in my life, but this fucking takes the cake. Can someone please tell me why anyone would care about something so absolutely and totally inconsequential?? And if they do care, how are they managing to fucking survive in this world, since surely every day things must make them just lose it? Do they actually think that by policing their children this way they are helping them? Because I'm absolutely positive this kind of nightmarish bullshit is hurting, not helping.

[Sprocket]

Okay, I guess I must be odd cause I throw up in the toilet. There is nothing better (to me) than laying on the cool floor and barely having to move in order to throw up. Throw up in and of itself makes me throw up so I really dislike having a trashcan full of throw up beside my bed or the like. No, I'd rather throw up, flush it, and it be gone. But I've always been weirdo...

[Inanna]

Paddles were used in all my schools up until high school. Some teachers drilled holes in the wood so that it would hurt more.

Yeah, that's what I was just thinking... the picture in this thread looks exactly like the paddles they used in my schools when I was growing up in the south. Only we had them in high school, too, with the caveat that only female teachers could paddle female students at that point. Keep in mind, this was the late 90's.

I remember when I put the oldest in school (no longer in the south) I was like "Ok, where's the form that I can sign that says that he cannot be paddled under any circumstances?" and the principal and teacher were like "... wut." Apparently no one out here has paddled in schools since the 70's or something.

[Abi]

Elizabeth needs a fucking whack with a plank of wood, see how she likes it :angry-cussing:

[Dark Matters]

I feel the need to elaborate on the paddle issue. I actually had to google to see what a paddle was.

It's this, right?

I have never seen or heard of this being used in the UK/Ireland. I've heard of the slipper and the belt as handy hitting utensils, but it's usually when my Grandad is telling me all about his nutcase mother.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but people actually make these to hit kids with? They are, so to speak, spanking-specific?

This is quite similar to what my mother used on my sister and me. It was a cheese or bread board though, not a paddle specifically. I don't remember her using it on me and only remember only one instance with my sister (who flattened herself on her back on the floor, thinking to outsmart my mother - it didn't work) and it was used mainly as a threat for bad behavior.

[Aisling]

They use them in schools? Still???

[Inanna]

They use them in schools? Still???

I had to look it up, but yep: http://ideas.time.com/2012/10/01/should ... n-schools/

[Abi]

I had to look it up, but yep: http://ideas.time.com/2012/10/01/should ... n-schools/

:shock: