Corporal Punishment for Kids

We've had conclusive proof for the last half-century that striking kids is counterproductive. Corporal punishment makes kids more violent, angry, and likely to break rules when you're not around instead of incorporating rules into their personal values. It's one of the more stupid things an adult can do. Corporal punishment is especially counterproductive as a response to children's behaviors related to mental illnesses or developmental disabilities, as those behaviors are generally a result of anxiety, disregulation, and an inability to understand situations. Punishment increases the anxiety and disregulation, and makes further behavior problems more likely. Punishment of any kind is a terrible way to reduce unwanted behavior, especially for kids with disabilities. Teachers and school administrators should know this.

The American Civil Liberties Union just reported on a study of corporal punishment in schools. The report is unfortunately diluted with emotional anecdotes by people who clearly do not understand clinical diagnoses (not that they should, just keep the junk out of a report). It does have some interesting data in it, though.

Who is doing all this counterproductive nonsense?
It's our good friends in the South. The states that do the most are (in decreasing order): Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Tennessee, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Florida, and Missouri. We recall that these are also the states with the lowest education, most crime, lowest life expectancy, highest teen pregnancy, highest infant mortality, lowest incomes, etc... New England, the west coast, and the north central states have outright banned corporal punishment in schools.

What does this have to do with health care?
For starters, kids with disabilities are more frequently targeted for corporal punishment, which exacerbates their problems rather than treating them. I think this is also yet another symptom of the Southern culture. This is a culture that does not value human dignity, civil rights, or evidence-based interventions. This is a culture that relies more on invalid beliefs and tradition in making policy decisions. This is evident in their overall health care practices, as well as the educational system and so forth. Everyone needs to make decisions based on empiricism. Physically punishing (nearly any punishing, really) kids today is going to create greater ongoing mental health care needs, and the problems are more likely to get passed down generationally. Stop the cycle now.

More Truth about Proposed Plans

Since there are so many lies being propagated by those who oppose improving our health insurance system, the White House has had to create this site to help citizens understand what is really going on. Unfortunately, I expect that the people least likely to automatically recognize that death panels and so forth are lies are also the people least likely to go to the website.

Truth-o-meter

St. Petersburg Times' Truth-o-Meter is a good resource. There is so much misinformation getting propagated, especially by Republicans and other free market ideologists who want insurance companies to stay rich at the expense of America's health and productivity, and Obama shows up on the site very often. Both sides are represented, and it is interesting to see so many comments and sources evaluated side by side. Some statements are true, and some are qualified. The site does a good job going into detailed explanations of its ratings for each statement.