4 ways to smack
John Caldwell has taken the seemingly unusual step of reading the child discipline laws in the Crimes Act before rushing to comment on the section 59 amendment petition and referendum.
Thus his commentary in The Press yesterday morning [off line] is enlightening. It seems we do not currently have an anti-smacking law but a law with more circumstances when the use of force is permissible than under the previous law. (Although now those circumstances are more tightly defined and less likely to allow for abuse)
In truth we have a law that allows for smacking in four defined circumstances compared to the one circumstance of the past. Mum and Dad must be careful not to smack for the purpose of ‘correction’. But Mum and Dad can lawfully use ‘reasonable force for the purpose, for instance, of ‘preventing the child from engaging or continuing to engage in offensive or disruptive behaviour’. That’s probably the motivation behind a lot of parental smacks. In brief our referendum is about whether Mum and Dad need five, rather than four, circumstances in which they can smack with lawful protection Â
Of course it seems to suit some to continue to treat this as if it is a issue of removed parental rights, even though they have not lost any right, just a unwarranted defence against beating children.
August 27th, 2008 at 8:38 am
I wonder how many of those signatories to the call to referendum actually knew what the law change meant, and what it did not mean (as the commentary above illustrates). I suspect very few.
Mostly, well-meaning people have been lead astray by a the views a few extremist opposers and lobby groups who have used emotive rhetoric divorced from the actual intention of the repeal of s59.
Every single person whom I have talked to within our sphere of friends and family have toned down, or reversed, their opposition to the issue once we have had a calm and rational talk about the facts of the repeal of s59.
I hope before next year’s ‘referendum’ there will be many more calm, rational talks over the country.
August 27th, 2008 at 9:13 am
What is the difference between smacking for correction and smacking to:
“preventing the child from engaging or continuing to engage in offensive or disruptive behaviour”.
Isn’t smacking to prevent offensive or disruptive behaviour smacking for correction?
August 27th, 2008 at 10:34 am
# AndrewE Says:
August 27th, 2008 at 9:13 am
> Isn’t smacking to prevent offensive or disruptive behaviour smacking for correction?
I think ‘correction’ is defined in law as punishment after the fact.
Just like how the department of corrections is responsible for locking burglars up. It is not, as the name suggests, responsible for returning the stolen property.
August 27th, 2008 at 11:09 am
Then how do you explain this:
http://www.familyfirst.org.nz/index.cfm/cases.html
August 27th, 2008 at 11:45 am
Mr D
How about: “small number of investigations that did not lead to prosecutions used by paranoid extremists to curtail children’s rights”?
Those incidents hardly constitute any failing of the repeal.
Still, I share AndrewE’s confusion. What is the difference between “punishment” (of undesirable or offensive behaviour) and “correction” (of same).
August 27th, 2008 at 11:50 am
Mr D:
How about: “small number of investigations leading to no prosecution used by frightened nimbys to protract their own state of denial”?
Those cases do nothing to constitute a failing of the repeal.
But I do share Anrew E’s concern: I see no difference between “punishment” and “correction.” I mean, they call it “Department of Corrections” for a reason, right?
August 27th, 2008 at 12:32 pm
Thanks for the link Mr Dennis
I would explain it by looking at it critically and objectivley:
Looks to me like the ammendment is working as intended, with police clearly excercising discretion in these examples. However ‘family first’ are complaining that parents are worried and anxious about being treated as criminals, yet it was ‘family first’ that created this fear to gain opposition to the repeal of section 59.
Now that they have successfully created this fear, it is the fear that is being used, rather than actual examples of “parents being proscecuted”.
Perhaps they should take a hard objective look and apologise for the results of their campaign to manipulate families through fear for their own political purposes.
August 27th, 2008 at 12:36 pm
McTap - yours is an excellent summary of the situation. Good luck with your call for an apology.
August 27th, 2008 at 4:02 pm
As I understand it, the problem with the old act was not the law itself, but the interpretation of “reasonable force”.
Now there can be no misinterpretation of “reasonable force” as the wording has been changed to “force used is reasonable”.
We also have a new part that is subject to intereperetation “for the purpose of correction” as AndrewE pointed out.
My interepretation of subsection 3 is that subsection 1 is pretty much null and void. And there is no way that subsection 2 could not be invoked in any case of a child being smacked.
This then leaves the interpretation of what “force used is reasonable” means, which does not take a genius to realise is exactly the same thing as “reasonable force”.
Once again politicians can’t see the elephant at the dinner table on this one, which is that the spirit of the laws are being misinterpereted and/or misrepresented.
I could give you oodles of examples of both civil and military laws that have been misinterpreted in similar ways.
No amount of word rearrangement will stop that, just like no law will ever be enough to stop someone from beating their child to death.
And the way I read this new law, there are now 3 avenues that a child abuser has to get off any charges, rather than only the one that they had before.
August 27th, 2008 at 5:12 pm
“Correction” and “punishment” are two entirely different concepts.
If I understand the above comments correctly, then the law does not permit a smack for the purposes of correction, but it clearly does permit it for the purposes of punishment, even if we know the punishment will not have the effect of ‘correcting’ the bad behaviour.
The politicians should have left it up to the parents, as they were told to do. This was bad law, badly worded, and badly intentioned.
As previously mentioned many times, the existing laws were perfectly adequate to prosecute parents where real harm was done.
August 27th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
A person was prosecuted successfully for smacking their child for earlier bad behaviour at school. The intent was presumably to prevent/correct further bad behaviour by punishing the child for the earlier behaviour. Yet the prosecution was successful.
The ultimate contention is over whether there should be the use of physical force in child management.
Some would allow for immediate behaviour management in the case of child safety, some would not. Some would allow for management of disruptive behaviour, some would not. Some would allow some general discipline smacking, some would not.
Many agree that the reasonable force definition was becoming problematic.
Personally, I would have allowed reasonable force to include the brief and occasional parental/custodial moderate force smacking of the buttocks or hand by the open palm of the hand for those children under 13. But within a public campaign for avoiding such resort as much as possible.
August 27th, 2008 at 6:25 pm
Xavier Goldie has picked up an interesting angle on this debate that many of us may have missed.
Brian Lohore, in the NZ Herald today re hitting kids. The secret agenda of the spankers is really starting to be revealed.
Check out Xavier’s post on g.blog.
August 27th, 2008 at 6:39 pm
Toad
Please tell me what secret agenda Sir Brian Lochore has?
August 27th, 2008 at 6:42 pm
*deleted for abusiveness*
August 27th, 2008 at 6:55 pm
BB said: Please tell me what secret agenda Sir Brian Lochore has?
The doctrine of parental neglect and abuse, BB.
Not sure what you think about this, but to me it is completely unacceptable for parents to be in the pub or rugby club sinking the piss while the kids are locked up in the back of the car outside.
And to probably drive the kids home pissed too.
As for you, d4j, your comment (while offensive) contains no argument, so will not be offered a reply from me.
August 27th, 2008 at 7:00 pm
Oh PLLLLLLLEASE Toad
Sir Brian used it as an example, hell when we were kids we used to play outside in the mud when the parents were having a quick beer after the footy, we loved it.
Your emotional stance does not help your argument either, nowhere does Lochore say anything about getting drunk, he talked about having a glass or two of beer.
This type of PC crap is exactly what Lochore is on about.
August 27th, 2008 at 7:29 pm
BB - just tell me. Do you, or do you not, support parents leaving the kids locked up in the back of the car outside while their parents are in the pub or rugby club drinking.
I don’t care whether it is a “glass or two” or a keg or two - is the principle not the same?
August 27th, 2008 at 7:36 pm
Toad
It is not a case of yes or no and anyway as you well know Sir Brian was not talking about today he was talking about something that happened in years past as an example of the PC crap that infests modern NZ.
August 27th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
Clearly Brian Lochore is a monocultural dinosaur; a hangover from the (baby boomer) days where it was ok for white men to do whatever they wanted in the belief that there were no threats to the comfortable existence of themselves and their families.
Oh how we all wish life could be so simple again.
Rugby players are a sickening bunch…second only to the baby boomers in their self-absorption.
Lochore ticks both boxes.
August 27th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
greengeek said
“Clearly Brian Lochore is a monocultural dinosaur; a hangover from the (baby boomer) days where it was ok for white men to do whatever they wanted in the belief that there were no threats to the comfortable existence of themselves and their families.
Oh how we all wish life could be so simple again.
Rugby players are a sickening bunch…second only to the baby boomers in their self-absorption.
Lochore ticks both boxes.”
That is a text book case of bigotry greengeek, well done!
August 27th, 2008 at 8:24 pm
Well said Shunda.
It always makes me laugh at the way the PC generation are so quick to accuse others (from a totally different time when things were different) of committing the most heinous of crimes based on TODAYS judgment values.
The real issue here is the left usual tactic of denigrating those who do not agree with them as they cannot win the argument based on facts or doing what is right.
August 27th, 2008 at 8:30 pm
Speaking of hidden agendas
Green Party file 3 Jeanette Fitzsimons, Covert Socialist?
Green Party file 2 here
If anybody epitomises the Green Party’s deceptive public persona it is long time party leader Jeanette Fitzsimons.
Outwardly gentle, moderate and oh so green, Jeanette Fitzsimons is, for many people, the reassuring face of the Green Party. No Sue Bradford fanaticism, or Keith Locke loony leftism with Jeanette-what you see is what you get. Or is it?
Like all decievers, even Jeanette Fitzsimons lets her guard down occasionally.
At Easter 1994 a large Green Left conference was held in Sydney, organised by the Australian Democratic Socialist Party (DSP). As deceptive as their New Zealand Green Party friends, the DSP, despite their name, is an hard core communist party.
A Democratic Socialist Party march, mid 90s.
Said DSP leader Susan Price in the party’s Green Left Weekly magazine of 26th April 1995 “The DSP is a Marxist-Leninist party, and we don’t think that is a bad thing.”
The Green Left conference attracted left wing activists from Australasia, Asia, Africa and North and South America. Attendees were virtually all Marxist-Leninists or Greens and included several New Zealanders including Keith Locke and Jeanette Fitzsimons representing the New Zealand Alliance Party and the Greens respectively.
From Green Left Weekly 13th April 1994 The International Green Left Conference, held over the Easter long weekend at the University of New South Wales, brought together a wide range of activists and concerned individuals to discuss and debate the ecological and social problems currently facing the world.
The highly successful conference grew out of an initiative of the Democratic Socialist Party. It involved some 900 participants in conference sessions and/or public meetings. They came from all over Australia and around the world.
The conference discussed how to further build and strengthen the movements for social change through panels, workshops and plenary sessions which explored new approaches to increasingly complex challenges. Major themes included socialism, feminism, environmental politics, labour struggles and international solidarity.
International guests spoke of political developments in their countries and how they are organising in new parties and formations. Jeanette Fitzsimons, Green Party member and deputy co-leader of the New Zealand Alliance, described the Alliance’s improved electoral chances under the new, more democratic, proportional representation system in that country…
The panel… “How can we build a sustainable societyâ€?, was one of the best attended and included Jeanette Fitzsimons, Graham Mathews from the Democratic Socialist Party, and Dr Nguyen Khac Kinh, deputy director of Vietnam’s National Environment Agency. The broad and open views discussed highlighted the importance of linking green and left perspectives in reaching common strategies and goals.
Other references claim that Peter Camejo from the US also spoke at this forum. Camejo, was once described by Ronald Reagan as one the 10 most dangerous men in California. He was in 1976, a presidential candidate for the Trotskyiste, Socialist Workers Party, in the early ’90s a leader of the Communist Party USA off-shoot Committees of Correspondence and in 2002, stood for the Green Party against Arnold Schwarzeneggerer for the governorship of California. Camejo openly describes himself as a “watermelon”, “green on the outside, red on the inside”.
Perhaps Peter Camejo is more honest than our own Green Party leader.
Another highlight of the event was the launching at the conference dinner of Links magazine, a “new international journal of socialist renewal and discussion”.
This project involves a range of activists from left parties and organisations including the Democratic Socialist Party, the US Committees of Correspondence, Brazilian Workers Party, South African Communist Party, the New Zealand Alliance and the Leninist opposition in the Communist Party of the Philippines. “It is aimed at promoting discussion and greater understanding between the forces for socialism that are actively involved in building parties and organisations.”
According to another participant, US Trotskyist, Committees of Correspondence and Green Party member Malik Miah Links aimed at “promoting discussion and greater understanding between the forces for socialism that are actively involved in building parties and organizations. An exclusive interview with Sandinista leader and former Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega is the lead article in the first issue….two articles on socialist renewal in the Communist Party of the Philippines; a report on left unity in South Africa; an article on left regroupment in the U.S…
The editorial board includes Jeremy Cronin, a leader of the South African Communist Party (SACP)and editor of The African Communist; Langa Zita from the SACP and the South African metalworkers union; Dr. Francisco Nemenzo from the Philippines; Baddegama Samitha from the New Socialist Party of Sri Lanka; and leading members from the New Zealand Alliance, the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN), the Farabundo Mart¡ National Liberation Front(FMLN) and the Fourth International.”
According to Links editor Peter Boyle “This is a project involving the left from the Communist Party, the Trotskyist, Maoist, ex-Social Democratic, independent left and liberation theology traditions. We all have in common a desire for socialist renewal based on support for democracy, feminism, ecological sustainability and internationalism.”
Unfortunately I don’t know whether or not Jeanette Fitzsimons took out a subscription. However her colleague Keith Locke did have an article in the second edition and Alliance colleague Matt McCarten did score a spot on the editorial board.
Jeanette Fitzsimons also spoke at another conference forum on women in politics
According to Green Left Weekly 29th June 1994.Four women from different countries and different political backgrounds discussed their experiences at the International Green Left Conference held in Sydney over Easter. The panel involved Greens (WA) Senator Christabel Chamarette; Luciana Castellina, a member of the Directorate of the Party of Communist Refoundation in Italy and of the European Parliament; Dulce Maria Pereira, a Workers Party (PT) alternate senator in the Sao Paulo State Assembly in Brazil, and Jeanette Fitzsimons, spokesperson for the New Zealand Green Party and co-deputy leader and of the New Zealand Alliance.
The Party of Communist Refoundation is a left split from the old Italian Communist Party which was regarded as too moderate. The Brazillian Workers Party is an alliance of communists, Trotskyists, liberation theologians, black activists and greens-a model in fact for the New Zealand Alliance Party of the ’90s.
While Jeanette Fitzsimons never mentions the “S” word when speaking to the media in this country, she was less guarded when among friends. Fitzsimons told the DSP’s Green Left Weekly number 147, June 1994 “If socialism is to survive as a relevant political movement in the 21st century, it must develop a response to the ecological crisis and a socialist strategy to build a sustainable future. Green Left Weekly provides the tools of information and analysis to make that possible.”
Would New Zealand voters support Jeanette Fitzsimons if they saw her rubbing shoulders with 900 of the most hard core communists on the planet and spouting off about socialism?
What do you think?
August 27th, 2008 at 8:31 pm
Speaking of hidden agendas
http://newzeal.blogspot.com/
August 27th, 2008 at 8:35 pm
Oh yeah, THATS concise!
August 27th, 2008 at 9:05 pm
Saying this does not imply agreement with every little detail of what he said, but Sir Brian Lochore is a refreshing voice of sanity in an increasingly crazy world.
August 27th, 2008 at 9:14 pm
BB - it is too long as a post, for a start. If you want to go there, you know the story - upload somewhere else and link to it.
From what I did bother to read, it is also boring and inaccurate. Surely even you know Trevor Louden is a conspiracy theorist who determines that someone is a communist just because they may have said something somewhere 30 years ago that may have been vaguely supportive of something that was being done in China or the then Soviet Union at the time.
Unlike Trevor, the vast majority of us have moved on.
August 27th, 2008 at 10:11 pm
“Rugby players are a sickening bunch…”
That is offensive and abusive !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
August 27th, 2008 at 10:25 pm
Moved on to what toad
Promoting socialism in a more palatable wrapper?
Using deception as the tool of choice to promote socialist ideals?
Lets debate these ideals instead of the wrapper they come in!
August 28th, 2008 at 8:32 am
Shunda
Once again you are right, it annoys me when I read Green party people talking about hidden agenda’s when they are far from being squeaky clean themselves.
I have always been of the opinion that climate change is simply the vehicle the Greens are using to slowly bring in their dream of a socialist state.
August 28th, 2008 at 8:47 am
big bro - it annoys you when you read Green people …why then, I wonder, do you come here to a place where you’ll see ‘Green people talking?? Are you bored elsewhere? Do you like to self flagellate? Why not go to a site where you see people of other hues talking and avoid getting annoyed? It’s not that you are not welcome here - you’re funny and we love a laugh
August 28th, 2008 at 9:09 am
greenfly
I look at it this way, there is an old saying that goes something like
“evil flourishes when good men do nothing”
I see it as my calling in life to 1) further the cause of animal welfare and 2) expose the Green party hidden agenda that ultimately wants to drive NZ into a socialist state under the banner of combating climate change.
August 28th, 2008 at 9:16 am
bb - admirable! I’m guessing the the former (animal welfare) calling came earlier in your life than the latter. After all, the banner of combating climate change has only been flown in recent years. I’m picking that your first mission is gold, the secong, lead. To borrow your saying and reshape it a little,
‘emissions flourish when good men do nothing (about climate change)
August 28th, 2008 at 9:18 am
i’m with big bro on number one..,
and number two is an accurate..(if reverse) list of reasons why i don thigh-high waders..and nose-plugs..
..and enter the foulstench/scum..
..that is the comments section of kiwiblog..
phil(whoar.co.nz)
August 28th, 2008 at 9:25 am
phil - you are big bro’s doppleganger! (kinda!) btw - don’t use felt-soled waders in the kiwibog! Nasty things soak in and transfer to cleaner waters (like those here in the frog pond) on your return (see the didymo/felt soles debate down south)
August 31st, 2008 at 1:09 pm
Sort got off the subject haven’t they?
SPC says
“I would have allowed reasonable force to include the brief and occasional parental/custodial moderate force smacking of the buttocks or hand by the open palm of the hand for those children under 13. But within a public campaign for avoiding such resort as much as possible.”
The s59 is useless if it is not backed up with help for parents who wish to comply. There is a confusion between ’smacking’ and normal mammalian physical communication; observe cats with their young for instance. Note that well looked after cats never injure their young.
Up to about age three children have no more ability to conceptualise than a chimpanzee so physical communication accompanied by verbal reinforcement is appropriate.
There are times when physical communication is needed for young children (or the immature) when they are overexcited. In most cases this needs to be accompanied by a firm tone of voice saying “no” for the child to learn what “no!” means. From my recent experience in a school, many children do not know what “no!” means.
The problem, for many people, is to distinguish between physical communication and physical abuse. For example if a 2 year old is hitting a large glass window with a hammer they are in danger and if there is no response to “No stop!” it is appropriate to forcibly take the hammer off them and in a firm voice say “Stop it will hurt”. For a child who responds rebelliously, as SPC says, this may need to be accompanied by a slap on the hand.
In conclusion Parental control (PC) is best achieved by starting with the very young with Physical Communication (PC) and in most cases by the age of 4 the child will only need non-physical control techniques; except for hugs and similar.
The abusive bloggers really mean Politically Fashionable (PF) when they use PC as a term to denigrate. Perhaps their anger comes from resentments when they were beaten as a child. I have successfully helped a wife abuser to eliminate his anger from childhood trauma. He no longer has an emotional need to be abusive.
September 2nd, 2008 at 11:59 pm
you & john caldwell have misinterpreted this, just as you did when it was discussed what kind of force would be used to stop a child running in front of traffic. it’s disturbing that so many people imagine that in a situation where a child is being offensive or disruptive, the first thing that comes to their mind as a way to stop the kid is to inflict pain on them.
force does not just mean impact, or infliction of pain, in this case the force reasonable for the purpose would be restraint, or possibly removing the child from the scene, or as e-prophet pointed out, prying the hammer out of the kid’s hands