Michael Pearl on cracked.com

[AmandaP]

The top 5 "Creepiest 'Progressive' Parenting Fads"

Not sure how beating your children qualifies as 'Progressive' but I'm glad he's number one!

http://www.cracked.com/article_19721_th ... -fads.html

[CanadianHippie]

Not sure how beating your children qualifies as 'Progressive' but I'm glad he's number one!

It's the new and improved way of beating your kids!

[donks]

Yeah. Plumbing line, who'd have ever thought? I got the shit beat out of me with hands, wooden spoons, hair brushes, spatulas, fly swatters and a belt.

Progressive indeed.

[Rosa]

At the very end of this article they talk about Michael Pearl, and of course in comments his defenders jump out of the shadows. Anyone with a login there care to take a minute over there? I don't have an account and I hate to make one just for this, because talking about Michael Pearl makes me so angry I sound like a raging lunatic every time I engage.

http://www.cracked.com/article_19721_th ... ds_p2.html

[holierthanyou]

How the f does cracked magazine have Pearl supporters??? Are there a lot of born-again, homeschooling, patriarchs with Cracked.com accounts?!?

[Rosa]

Nah, the world's full of people who believe what Pearl says - if you're calm, it's not abuse! And it's not a beating, it's a SPANKING.

I didn't read very far, I came over here & posted because I just can't cope with knowing that about the world.

[WanderingStar]

How the f does cracked magazine have Pearl supporters??? Are there a lot of born-again, homeschooling, patriarchs with Cracked.com accounts?!?

It's probably more like Pearl's supporters found out about him being included in the article through FJ, and of course they instead vent their anger through the comments on Cracked.com rather than here because they'll be virtually torn to shreds here. Either way, it's ironically hilarious.

[Kitchen Princess]

I get Cracked in my FB feed, so I had read that article, but I stopped when I got to #4. I just couldn't read it again. I'm sure somebody found it via some rabbit trail (or Google alert), and called the dawgs.

[fluttershies]

The thing that bothers me the most is that most parents who use corporal punishment wouldn't dream of using a switch on a baby less than a year old. A swat on the butt with an open palm is not the same imo.

[DistantStar]

The baby beaters call it "spanking" because if you don't know the details, most people's idea of spanking is just that, a swat or two on the behind with a hand. It's something of a lie of omission. They know a lot of people (in the US, at least) are going to think "spanking isn't so bad" without knowing the Pearl definition of "beating infants and small children into submission."

[Lostie]

The baby beaters call it "spanking" because if you don't know the details, most people's idea of spanking is just that, a swat or two on the behind with a hand. It's something of a lie of omission. They know a lot of people (in the US, at least) are going to think "spanking isn't so bad" without knowing the Pearl definition of "beating infants and small children into submission."

That's a good point that I hadn't thought about before. I'm not in the US, but I'm pretty sure it's exactly the same here in Canada. Most people wouldn't look farther into it and thus it keeps happening since people don't know what's really going on. I think most people can't even imagine Pearl style parenting.

[DistantStar]

I'd expect it'd be the same in Canada and probably most of Europe as well. But I didn't want to speak for anybody else.

By my definition, I got a few spankings here and there as a kid. Hand on clothed bum. Not many. As far as I can tell, no harm was done, and I can see why the idea is so hotly debated; I'm pretty sure I'd have been fine without them. I don't have kids and am not going to jump into that quagmire any further than that. But Pearl-style beatings are indefensible by any decent human being's standards. Mixing up the term "spanking" into that cesspool of parenting is the purest of bullshit.

[flojo]

The problem is, they prey on the gullible. It's the attitude that it's the one and only Christian way to raise children. That's dangerous when you ce across someone insecure in their parenting.