Misrepresenting Sweden
There’s an op-ed in the Herald this morning about repealing Section 59 of the Crimes Act. While David Farrar calls it “excellent”, I’m less convinced.
Part of its argument is to claim that Sweden following a similar course in 1979 has not achieved what it set out to. By Dave Crampton, the op-ed reads in part:
Those who advocate for a smacking ban often quote Sweden as a role model. Smacking was banned in Sweden in July 1979. A primary aim of the ban was to decrease rates of child abuse and to promote supportive approaches for parents rather than coercive state intervention. Since the law change, child abuse and criminal assaults of minors have increased six-fold. Changing the law won’t significantly reduce child abuse…
A report on a Swedish survey by the University of Manitoba in Canada noted that it was not a smacking ban that made smacking unacceptable. After a public education campaign, public support of corporal punishment in Sweden dropped from 35 per cent in 1971 to 26 per cent just after smacking was outlawed, indicating most of the drop was before the ban…
The report, A Generation without Smacking, published by Save the Children, found that the actual use of physical punishment dropped very little, but child abuse cases increased dramatically. Furthermore, the law has resulted in many parents being harassed by the police and social authorities, prosecuted, sentenced and criminalised, because they smacked their children for bad behaviour. It could happen here, too.
Well, Crampton is completely misrepresenting the study which he cites. Those interested in what it really says can read it here. For a start, child abuse has not increased six-fold since the 1970s in Sweden. Reporting of it has, as public awareness that it’s a crime has spread. That’s one of the purposes of repealing Section 59: to spread the message through the community that child abuse is wrong, and encourage people to report it when they suspect it.
Anyway, back to the report that Crampton relies on. Some important paragraphs:
Support for physical punishment has decreased dramatically in Sweden over the past 30 years and this decline has been accompanied by a reduction in its use. The corporal punishment ban and ongoing public education campaigns appear to have been extremely effective in altering the social climate with regard to corporal punishment…
There has been no increase of parents being drawn into the criminal justice system for minor assaults. Nor has there been an increase of children being removed from parents through the intervention of social workers… These findings clearly indicate that the corporal punishment ban has not resulted in greater criminalisation of minor assaults by parents …
Individuals raised within a social climate rejecting corporal punishment are decreasingly likely to become suspects in child assault cases…
The goals of the ban were to: 1) reduce public support for corporal punishment; 2) encourage earlier identification of children at risk of physical abuse, and 3) facilitate earlier, more supportive intervention. Data collected from a range of official sources indicate that these objectives are being met…
Child abuse mortality rates, which indicate the extent of physical abuse in a nation, are very low in Sweden - for 14 years no children died as a result of abuse in that country…. recent trends in reporting rates reflect increased public awareness of the problem of child abuse, rather than an increase in actual abuse…
The involvement of Swedish youth in criminal activity has declined markedly since the mid-1970s… These findings indicate that Swedish young people have not become unruly or undersocialised as a result of the corporal punishment ban.
So, Mr Crampton’s take on Sweden’s experience is completely erroneous. Even the report he relies on for his argument completely contradicts what he’s saying. There have been many, many positive trends in Sweden since its legislative ban on corporal punishment. The most intriguing for me, though, is that children brought up since the ban are relatively less likely to commit child abuse than those brought up before the ban. The educative effect is working.
But Sweden is but one example. There are 14 others: Austria, Finland, Latvia, Croatia, Germany, Norway, Cyprus, Israel, Denmark, Iceland, Ukraine, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary. Again, I call on opponents of the Section 59 Bill to show me examples of parents being persecuted for lightly smacking their kids after other countries have repealed their equivalents of Section 59. I’m still waiting…
June 21st, 2005 at 1:02 pm
Are people really that dumb, though?
I think you’ll find that parents (or caregivers) aren’t as stupid as you think; people do know the difference between discipline and abuse.
It isn’t a lack of awareness.
June 21st, 2005 at 1:06 pm
good rejoinder/de-bunking, frog….
phil(whoar.co.nz)
June 22nd, 2005 at 8:49 am
dwillis,
I think you’re wrong. I thikn that because it’s not only black and white, and the existence of grey areas permit some people to go further than others think is reasonable.
Also because, 100 years ago, things we’d call ‘abuse’ were certainly considered normal. That hasn’t changed overnight.
Norms involve grey areas, differ between people, and slowly change. This legislation is the result of a slow change that’s been building for a while, and is intended to cause more change in what it considered normal.
June 22nd, 2005 at 8:59 am
icehawk,
So why would(or should) the ‘norms’ of child discipline change over time?
It doesn’t take a smart person to realise that, as you say, the ‘norms’ of child discipline have softened over the last 100 years or so - softened to the point where we are now looking at making any form of physical discipline illegal.
It is also patently obvious that over that same period of time, those of the younger generations are becoming increasingly irreverent, disrepectful, selfish and violent.
You’d have to be a dumb-ass not to make some sort of a connection between these two observations.
June 22nd, 2005 at 10:18 am
As well as child abuse… fighting in general is quite destructive… i think we should make boxing and rugby and other contact sport illegal… and if people want to have a friendly game they won’t get prosecuted for it.
June 22nd, 2005 at 10:28 am
dan..”..It is also patently obvious that over that same period of time, those of the younger generations are becoming increasingly irreverent, disrepectful, selfish and violent…”
good grief dan..you sound like a synthesis of every ageing blowhard that’s ever put pen to paper or rung talkback to whinge about the ‘younger generation’..
(unless i’ve got it totally wrong, and you were indulging in a piss-take)
bring back the bash, eh dan?
June 22nd, 2005 at 10:37 am
hey nice move phil… instead of countering his statement… make some general (and incredibly incorrect) statement about his attitude toward the younger generation.
There is a difference between Child abuse and physical disipline. You can’t just conclude because someone agrees with physical disipline that they agree with “bash”ing.
June 22nd, 2005 at 10:48 am
phil,
You have got it totally wrong - I am a member of the younger generation.
As Jono has said, there is a difference between physical discipline metered out in love(without anger), and physical abuse. It’s actually not that hard to distinguish between the two.
I’m afraid you’re sounding like a synthesis of every cowardly left-leaner, who counters criticism with smarmy personal insult, but without any kind of reasonable counter-argument.
June 22nd, 2005 at 6:30 pm
dan..i said sound like..i didn’t guess your age..
jono..he wants to return to the standards of a hundred years ago..?
i stand by what i said..
phil(whoar.co.nz)
June 22nd, 2005 at 8:40 pm
I disagree that “we are now looking at making any form of physical discipline illegal.”
Sue Bradford personal members bill does not seek to ban smacking, it just makes it so that if someone is charged with assault that they can’t say “oh I was just displining my kids” to get off with it.
I agree that a law that sought to ban smacking would be PC gone mad. This bill does not do that.
June 22nd, 2005 at 9:46 pm
stuey, why dont you read the bill, not just look at the words. How much smacking does Bradfords bill legally allow?
Others, people do know the difference between discipline and abuse - except those who think all discipline is abuse, as to them there is no difference and that was one of the points of my article. I will be responding to Frogblog on my blog some time soon when I get some time. You may be interested to know that EPOCH - supporters of a smacking ban has acknowledged that at least one swedish parent has been prosecuting for smacking a child since 1979, but as all swedish cases appear alongside assault and battery cases they are hard to trace.
Dave
June 23rd, 2005 at 10:44 am
Phil,
Who said the standards of 100 years ago are wrong? I understand how you say that in the past things that were considered normal are now considered child abuse. But I don’t think that means that the standard was wrong… but mearly the interpretation of that standard.
Icehawk said this
“Norms involve grey areas, differ between people, and slowly change. This legislation is the result of a slow change that’s been building for a while, and is intended to cause more change in what it considered normal.”
But I would not tend to agree… just because norms change over time… does not make the norm right.
lets just try some reductio ad absurdum. Murder is becoming more and more common… if this is allowed to continue then it will be normal it hear on the news and hear of friends and family that have been murdered. So then should we just remove the law about murder to reflect the changing norms of society?
June 23rd, 2005 at 11:23 am
jono..i suggest you do some reading on the conditions and norms of 100 years ago..
i mean it wasn’t that long ago teachers were caning and strapping children..do you want to go back to that…
btw..your murder analogy is totally specious..
phil(whoar.co.nz)
June 23rd, 2005 at 11:26 am
phil,
by-the-way, you’re wrong too.
June 23rd, 2005 at 11:43 am
I never said that the condiotion or norms of 100 years ago were good… I said the standard was good.
“i mean it wasn’t that long ago teachers were caning and strapping children..do you want to go back to that…”
I was unfortunate enough to have been brought up in a schooling system since caning and strapping were removed from the school system. I failed to reach my personal potential at school because of my laziness. I would’ve loved to have been brought up in a school that cared enough to discipline me where my own self discipline was lacking.
So yes i do want to go back to that
“btw..your murder analogy is totally specious..”
explain yourself man!