Child beaters, round two

[Genestho]

Anyone else get the info on the Citizens Initiated Referendum?
The question: Should a smack as part of good parental correction be a criminal offence in NZ?

Voting papers are to be sent out in August, have your say.

[RantyDave]

Having problems with my rude, disrespectful, answer back, LAZY good for nothing stepson and he automatically says "you cant hit me"

Right, so do something else. Does he get an allowance? Stop it. Likes his Playstation? Hide it. Wants steak for dinner? Vegetarian food for a month. Enforce a surreally nasty bed time. Remove his net access. Take his cellphone and cut it in half with a chainsaw. Throw all his shit on the street and if he does it again, burn it. Whatever it is you promise to do, make sure you're actually in a position to be able to do it.

You can hit him, but you shouldn't. You should maintain control some other way but you should definitely maintain control.

Drives me mad. espicially when my old man laid into me and it never did me any harm.

It robbed you of ideas for how to impose control without resorting to violence.

[RantyDave]

The people who did beat their children excesively before all smacking was made illegal, knew they were breaking the fuckin law anyway.

Y'see, smacking was not made illegal. All that happened was that the avenue of using "Parental Correction" as a defence was removed. People had been hitting kids with riding crops, being hauled up to court by CYFS and the rozzers then saying "but it was Parental Correction, as per section 59, and I'm allowed to". And they were right, they were allowed to, that's what the law said and they were getting off scott free.

"I smacked her and she fell down the stairs", a direct quote of yours trying to illustrate something, yet to me, that would be neglagent (and even then at a stretch), NOT abuse.

You have to remember that because s59 was the removal of a defence it only affects cases that go to court and the police, CYFS etc can only truly be arsed taking something to court if they really really have to. The repeal of section 59 has been law for, what, a year now? How many people do you know that have been locked up because of it? Have people come into work with a long face saying they're going down for smacking their kids? No. The sky has not fallen. We are not all in prison. But the people who were going to be hauled off to court anyway now don't have a piece of legislature they can quote to make it all OK.

Dave

[slofox]

Sophistry. Repealing s59 of The Crimes Act withdrew "smacking" as a legal defense for assault or worse, if my memory serves me correctly.

Anybody who thought that this was going to stop children getting abused or killed by brain-dead/over-zealous "care givers" was sadly dellusional. So too was anybody who thought that the Police would be out to prosecute any care-giver who gave a child a "loving tap".

Apart from millions of column cm devoted to this issue, can anybody tell me what has actually changed?

Please check your spelling in future Mr Hitcher...

I do, however, agree that the law change will not stop child abuse.

[Drew]

You have to remember that because s59 was the removal of a defence it only affects cases that go to court and the police, CYFS etc can only truly be arsed taking something to court if they really really have to. The repeal of section 59 has been law for, what, a year now? How many people do you know that have been locked up because of it? Have people come into work with a long face saying they're going down for smacking their kids? No. The sky has not fallen. We are not all in prison. But the people who were going to be hauled off to court anyway now don't have a piece of legislature they can quote to make it all OK.

Dave

There is now a chance that a meddling, know it all, interfering friggin tree hugger, could make a complaint to the police saying that I was hitting my kids. They come see me, take an immediate dislike to me, (as so many people seem to do for some reason), and off to court I go. When I get there I find myself without defence, because some MINORITY group think they have the answer to people being let off with a crime.

Riddle me this, why the fuck are so few "real offenders" being charged still? the answer is simple, chidren and whatever the fuck they call themselves services, are doing little more than they were before, other than trying to defend this whole thing.

[98tls]

Riddle me this, why the fuck are so few "real offenders" being charged still? the answer is simple, chidren and whatever the fuck they call themselves services, are doing little more than they were before, other than trying to defend this whole thing.

"children and whatever the fuck they call themselves services" are on par with Winz or whatever the fuck they call themselves,another Govt dept employing those that would stand no chance of employment anywhere else on earth.

[davereid]

Y'see, smacking was not made illegal. All that happened was that the avenue of using "Parental Correction" as a defence was removed. People had been hitting kids with riding crops, being hauled up to court by CYFS and the rozzers then saying "but it was Parental Correction, as per section 59, and I'm allowed to". And they were right, they were allowed to, that's what the law said and they were getting off scott free.

No, the law allowed reasonable force.

Pretty clearly using a riding crop was considered entirely reasonable in Dickensian England.

The fact it was considered reasonable force in modern New Zealand possible tells us more about the calibre of our judges than it does about what is reasonable force.

[Mom]

I have given all of my kids the odd, good, hard whack. When deserved and not in anger it is simply the most effective way to make your point known/felt when you have exhausted all other options.

I was raised in a very violent home, mother hospitalised a couple of times with broken bones on top of all the black eyes etc, myself with split lips/ears, fabulous shiners, cut cheeks, blah, blah blah. I was not about to do the same thing to my kids.

I fostered kids too for many years, and you can never lay a finger on them. I never actually had to with my foster kids, though the temptation was strong at times.

I had one family stay with me, 3 little girls. Too horrible a case to discuss here but lets say beyond anything that you might imagine goes on in some homes. I had 3 of my own kids as well. I actually had to pay a woman to come to the house everyday and help me deal with the 5 loads minimum of washing, 2 of my foster kids wet beds everynight, I had the other in nappies, though she was 5, and to keep the house sanitary, otherwise I simply could not have coped. These were amazingly damaged little kids. One used to make a noise resembling a chainsaw at full noise if she was growled at, or one of her siblings thumped her, or if she wanted to. That noise was something I could not deal with.

I had a little pink plastic chair. My naughty chair if you life It lived under my clothesline, and that is where you went to cool off. Poor Jane (not her real name) used to spend a bit of time out there. I was a bit concerned about the neighbours reporting me for abuse because she used to be out there quite a bit making this unholey sound. I talked to the Social worker from CYPS about it. She actually said if she ever got a complaint like that she would ignore it.

Kids are precious future citizens of this world and deserve to be allowed to grow up to enjoy it undamaged. They need to be loved and cherished and encouraged and... They also deserve to be discliplined and educated about what sort of thing is acceptable and what is not. They need firm, reasonable boundaries. All the PC babble around annoys the bejaysus out of me. Kids are kids. Sometimes they need a short sharp lesson.

Lock me up! I have smacked my kids!

[Skyryder]

10 mill down the tube. Key won't change anything............he says the law is working. Bout the only thing he's got right to date.


Skyryder

[98tls]

Best way to stop child abuse is to stop retards having children,simple really.Then again probably way to simple for NZ,retards it seems have more rights than anyone.

[rainman]

Funny this comes up,yesterday i was listening once again to our new next door neighbours kid (12 or 13 at a guess) telling his old man to " fuck" off."dont speak to me like that" just doesnt seem to be working next door so cant imagine it does anywhere else in the country.A thick ear would sort it but i guess A the fathers to lazy or B hes to scared to do it,either way the lack of thick ears in my opinion is only going to do the kid more harm than good.Sad really.

You have to wonder how it gets to this, though. I was infrequently smacked as a kid (and I'm a moderately old bugger) but I would never have dared even think about telling my dad to fuck off. Or to rob a dairy, for that matter. My 14 yo is occasionally a bit cheeky but it's just growing up, never crossing the line. He might when he gets older, but I don't think so. It's mostly in the parenting, methinks.

[MisterD]

Y'see, smacking was not made illegal. All that happened was that the avenue of using "Parental Correction" as a defence was removed.

Er, wrong. Smacking for the purposes of correction is specifically outlawed under Bradford's bill.

People had been hitting kids with riding crops, being hauled up to court by CYFS and the rozzers then saying "but it was Parental Correction, as per section 59, and I'm allowed to". And they were right, they were allowed to, that's what the law said and they were getting off scott free.

Legislating on the basis of a couple of crap jury decisions is and was a stupid idea. The problem wasn't the law it was crap juries and that's whole other kettle of fish.

10 mill down the tube. Key won't change anything............he says the law is working. Bout the only thing he's got right to date.

Bollocks, smacking is now outlawed, but people are ignoring that fact. Not exactly the mark of a good law is it? Kids are still dying at the hands of their "care-givers"...

MasterD at 3 yrs old gets a smack on his bum when required...anyone who has a problem with that can come around and I'll demonstrate the difference between a parental smack and a punch in the teeth.

This has been a public service announcement for the benefit of meddling nanny-staters everywhere.

[PrincessBandit]

"Should a smack as part of good parental correction be a criminal offence in New Zealand?"

With any luck the government will look at the overwhelmingly strong "no" in the light of the question that was actually asked and it's complete irrelevance to the repeal of section 59 when telling the pitchfork carriers that they can't have their legal right to beat children back. Perhaps "should children be afforded the same legal protections as adults?" was a little too factually correct for the proposing parties. Or maybe even "since the repeal of section 59, has the sky actually fallen in?". Or "since the repeal of section 59 are the prisons crowded with middle class parents?". Or maybe even "Is it OK to hit a child with a riding crop?".

And if s59 comes back in, where do we draw the line? I smacked her? I smacked her with a paddle? I smacked her with the pipe off the vacuum cleaner? I smacked her for an hour and a half? I smacked her and sold the video to someone on the Internet? I smacked her and she fell down the stairs? All legal, you want your name on that?

The good news is that we have a new canonical example of a contradiction in terms: "smack" and "good parental correction".

So bring it on, child beaters. Register your ongoing interest in raising another generation of violent criminals with a red rep, just as before. It's the one with the, like, justice scales thing in the corner. Y.. Yeah ... that one.

Dave

So RantyDave, what actually was your point?

I smacked both my kids occasionally when they were little and they are both lovely well behaved thoughtful young adults today. I feel very say for parents who face ill disciplined selfish offspring; who are often scared of their kids; but I suspect that often the frustration comes from trying to instill the "discipline" too late in a child's development. Kids need loving guidance with firm boundaries from the time they are TINY, not once they've reached the age of 7, 8 10 12, whatever. The horse has long since bolted by then and reaction to trying to bring them in line with ANY form of discipline by then will only meet with resistance at best, outright hostility at worst.

[Winston001]

Just for clarity, here is the previous S. 59 Crimes Act 1961:

Part 3
Matters of justification or excuse

Section 59
Domestic discipline

(1) Every parent of a child and, subject to subsection (3) of this section, every person in the place of the parent of a child is justified in using force by way of correction towards the child, if the force used is reasonable in the circumstances.

(2) The reasonableness of the force used is a question of fact.

(3) Nothing in subsection (1) of this section justifies the use of force towards a child in contravention of section 139A of the Education Act 1989.

[Winston001]

And simply to prove that smacking is not mentioned anywhere, nor is it outlawed, here is the new law:

Part 3 Matters of justification or excuse

59 Parental control

(1) Every parent of a child and every person in the place of a parent of the child is justified in using force if the force used is reasonable in the circumstances and is for the purpose of—


(a) preventing or minimising harm to the child or another person; or


(b) preventing the child from engaging or continuing to engage in conduct that amounts to a criminal offence; or


(c) preventing the child from engaging or continuing to engage in offensive or disruptive behaviour; or


(d) performing the normal daily tasks that are incidental to good care and parenting.

(2) Nothing in subsection (1) or in any rule of common law justifies the use of force for the purpose of correction.

(3) Subsection (2) prevails over subsection (1).

(4) To avoid doubt, it is affirmed that the Police have the discretion not to prosecute complaints against a parent of a child or person in the place of a parent of a child in relation to an offence involving the use of force against a child, where the offence is considered to be so inconsequential that there is no public interest in proceeding with a prosecution.


Section 59: substituted, on 21 June 2007, by section 5 of the Crimes (Substituted Section 59) Amendment Act 2007 (2007 No 18).