Last week, an Indianapolis woman cited Indiana’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act in court as justification for administering corporal punishment with a coat hanger to her seven-year-old son. The beating resulted in 36 bruises on the boy’s neck and back.
She then quoted Proverbs 13:24, which says, “Whoever spares the rod hates their children, but the one who loves their children is careful to discipline them.”
In addition to the RFRA, a 2008 Indiana Supreme Court ruling gives parents the right to use cords and belts for corporal punishment.
So, thank you, conservative Indiana, for giving this woman a legally credible defense.
To be fair, the woman is a Burmese refugee, and experts quoted in the Indianapolis Star did say corporal punishment of this degree is commonplace in Myanmar. Combine the cultural differences, a language barrier and obscurely written religious freedom laws, and it’s no wonder the woman would assume that her actions were legally justified.
But if corporal punishment were outlawed in the United States, there wouldn’t have been such confusion, and she would have no plausible defense.
The United States could join the 43 other nations, which include Sweden, Norway, Denmark, New Zealand, Germany and Iceland, that ban corporal punishment against children, but I suspect America’s Christian conservative bloc would have something else to say about it.
For this issue, we’re probably more likely to find concrete answers in scientific research than in the Bible.
Based on decades of research from more than 30 countries, the American Psychological Association unanimously passed a resolution opposing “the use of severe or injurious physical punishment on any child.”
In 2014, CNN published an article detailing the effects corporal punishment has on a child’s brain structure. Children exposed to harsh corporal punishment — defined as “at least one spanking a month for more than three years,” usually with a belt or paddle — had less gray matter in the prefrontal cortex, which can cause depression, addiction and other mental health disorders.
A correlation between corporal punishment and lower IQ scores in the children abused was also observed.
Research has identified increased aggression — solving problems by hitting siblings, classmates, friends, etc. — and a lack of self-control as effects of corporal punishment. The sad irony is hitting a child for lacking self-control causes them to have less self-control.
If your child hits their sibling and you punish them by hitting them, you’re an enormous hypocrite.
If you think Proverbs 13:24 is an acceptable Biblical defense, I encourage you to read the Bible again.
It’s commonly believed King Solomon wrote — or assembled — the Book of Proverbs. If you assume Solomon took his own advice and raised his son Rehoboam with the rod of corporal punishment, then even the Bible proves its horrific effects.
After the death of King Solomon, King Rehoboam became a widely hated ruler. First Kings 12:18 tells how Rehoboam fled to Jerusalem to avoid being stoned to death by his own people.
And 1 Kings 12:14 makes a direct correlation with Solomon’s corporal punishment when Rehoboam says, “My father chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with scorpions.”
Physical punishment is an exponential cycle. When it doesn’t work, parents think the solution is increasing it.
In reality, the solution is to do away with it altogether.
tshowal@indiana.edu
@TherinShowalter
