Physical Punishment

[NeitherExtreme]

The following are some of my wonderings... I'm not actually advocating anything here, I'm just exploring an issue.

As far as I can see, causing physical harm to another person (or animal!) seems to be one of the (if not the) ultimate evil in American (Western?) society. The idea of actually inflicting physical pain on someone, no matter what the crime, seems like an unimaginable barbarism.

Why would it wrong to "beat" a person for driving drunk (or whatever), make sure they'll recover fine, and send them on their way? Why would locking them in a confined area with other criminals for months on end be more fitting?

Why is it "ok" to send a child into timeout, thereby removing them from relationship and enjoyment, yet to give them a small (but memorable) amount of physical pain is looked down upon?

Why is it "ok" to kill a person for their offences, but it is wrong to do so with any physical discomfort?

Why is it at times even considered wrong for a person to attack an intruder in their own house? Isn't it the intruder who put themselves in the situation?

What gives? I've actually been thinking on this for quite a while now, and I'm a little confused. I have a few vague ideas of my own, but I really want to hear what you all think...

[Justin]

Originally Posted by NeitherExtreme

Why would it wrong to "beat" a person for driving drunk (or whatever), make sure they'll recover fine, and send them on their way? Why would locking them in a confined area with other criminals for months on end be more fitting?

Tough question. This is two questions actually. Just difficult to answer. If they are driving drunk and putting others in harms way, laws are put in place to prevent this or lock them up so they can't harm anyone or themselves. Difficult one to answer for sure, maybe rewording it directly would help.

Why is it "ok" to send a child into timeout, thereby removing them from relationship and enjoyment, yet to give them a small (but memorable) amount of physical pain is looked down upon?

I've done this with my child as well as I've also been the one to go to time-out. I think it gives them time to think about what they did to arrive there. It's a new age. Spanking a child is no longer accepted in American society and can get the parents in a lot of trouble.

Why is it "ok" to kill a person for their offenses, but it is wrong to do so with any physical discomfort?

Lol... you are asking tough questions. Each of these questions would seem more appropriate to deserve their own discussion thread. I don't believe there's an answer that would be suitable. Discussing these issues yes, but giving a direct answer to questions like the above is very difficult.

Why is it at times even considered wrong for a person to attack an intruder in their own house? Isn't it the intruder who put themselves in the situation?

The law. The laws control the people and in this instance, if an intruder entered my home, I would do everything in my power to prevent harm to my family and pets. Right, wrong or indifferent, there's a fine line here.

What gives? I've actually been thinking on this for quite a while now, and I'm a little confused. I have a few vague ideas of my own, but I really want to hear what you all think...

Share some of your ideas. Maybe opening these up into separate threads would offer more discussion. I can only speak from where I was raised on these subjects and according to the laws in America.

Good luck getting answers to these, tough questions. I'd suggest starting with one topic and opening it up for discussion.

[NeitherExtreme]

Thanks for the response Justin! And thanks for pointing out the possible-to-come confusing discussion... I see that each of these could well be a discussion on their own. But to me there is a common theme which is what I'm wondering about. Is there a "why" (or "whys") behind it all...

Hope that makes sense.

I guess maybe a place to start might be to try to define the common "value" that has emerged, the "value" that I am asking "why" about. I have yet to put good words to it, other than the ones I used to introduce the idea. So I just gave some examples to demonstrate and am hoping that others can figure out what I'm talking about. I'm hoping you all can help me out, because as you can see I need some help.

Originally Posted by Justin

It's a new age. Spanking a child is no longer accepted in American society and can get the parents in a lot of trouble.

Why? That's my question. In our society those things are considered wrong (at least by many). I'm not sugesting that they are wrong. I'm asking why we think they are.

[<daleader>]

Originally Posted by NeitherExtreme

The following are some of my wonderings... I'm not actually advocating anything here, I'm just exploring an issue.

Plot:

As far as I can see, causing physical harm to another person (or animal!) seems to be one of the (if not the) ultimate evil in American (Western?) society. The idea of actually inflicting physical pain on someone, no matter what the crime, seems like an unimaginable barbarism.

Questions

1-Why would it wrong to "beat" a person for driving drunk (or whatever), make sure they'll recover fine, and send them on their way? Why would locking them in a confined area with other criminals for months on end be more fitting?

Well it is not ok to beat someone just because they are drunk and they drove. There are many civil laws prohibiting that actions. Why is it ok to lock them up in a confined space, it is suggested as a punishment. I guess it is ok since they are not only physically being punished by the inmates but alsow mentally since after they are not soober anymore they well hopfully realise that action comes with reaction and hopfully not do it again!

[NeitherExtreme]

Originally Posted by <daleader>

Well it is not ok to beat someone just because they are drunk and they drove. There are many civil laws prohibiting that actions. Why is it ok to lock them up in a confined space, it is suggested as a punishment. I guess it is ok since they are not only physically being punished by the inmates but alsow mentally since after they are not soober anymore they well hopfully realise that action comes with reaction and hopfully not do it again!

Thanks for the response! As Justin pointed out, I might not have made myself as clear as I could have...

My question is why would American (Western?) society in general see the beating as wrong. Why is physical punishment "out of bounds"?

[<daleader>]

2-Why is it "ok" to send a child into timeout, thereby removing them from relationship and enjoyment, yet to give them a small (but memorable) amount of physical pain is looked down upon?

Childhood is a very critical time in a human life. From the age 4 to age 14 a child would remmber many things. Most important is from age 4 to 7. Punishing a child using the "naughty mat" is and Operant conditioning where the child learns that behavior that has good consequences will tend to be repeated, and any behavior that has bad consequences will tend to be avoided.( i forgot the actual terminology in psychology). Not sure what you mean by the physical pain sorry.

2-Why is it "ok" to kill a person for their offenses, but it is wrong to do so with any physical discomfort?

The whole point of capital punishment comes down to three reason.
1-Giving the family of the vicitim a sense of comfort that the guy who have perfomred the crule action is death and no longer can do what he or she did to there loved ones to others.
2-The goverment hopes to scare people by showing that such and such acts well equal to have no sweet life. Once again knowing that you are going to die in less than 3 week is more than enough pain to bare. I guess there is pain. The reason that they do not want the murdere to feel pain is that once again civil laws forbbied the act of voliene and pain upon someone who is helpless in that case the murder since the murder is not doing any act of volience.

3-Why is it at times even considered wrong for a person to attack an intruder in their own house? Isn't it the intruder who put themselves in the situation?

Well that law have being always contrivesal. The main reason is that in many cases when there is an act of volience is performed, it is usually the vicitm that is the one which gets hurt since if the intruder had the guts to come into your house that he well surely have the guts to kill you if he have to. But never the less who it is a normal reflex action and in many case the act of volience against the intruder is forgiven.

I hope that helps

[NeitherExtreme]

Originally Posted by <daleader>

Not sure what you mean by the physical pain sorry.

Haha, I should have elaborated a bit more. I'm talking about spankings, and why are they now looked down upon. I'm not really interested in the "timeouts", except to point out that punishment itself has not been abandoned.

Originally Posted by <daleader>

1-Giving the family of the vicitim a sense of comfort that the guy who have perfomred the crule action is death and no longer can do what he or she did to there loved ones to others.
2-The goverment hopes to scare people by showing that such and such acts well equal to have no sweet life.

Where in those reasons does the discomfort of the person being killed become unethical. Practically speaking, I think it would augment both of those goals to add physical pain to the equation. (keep in mind I'm not suggesting we follow through on that idea...)

I think the intruder scenerio might not fit quite right with my other examples, and maybe not with my topic in general. As you pointed out, that's a life or death reactionary situation. Though I still wonder why the physical well-being of the intruder is given such high priority that he could sue (or at least try to) if harmed. But I think that might be better dealt with as a separate topic.

Maybe another way to start this discussion would be to ask if there would ever be a time, in the eyes of American people (not law), where premeditated, intentional physical harm of another human being for the purpose of punishment would be appropriate. If not, why?

[<daleader>]

I think in order for us to get a good answer for your question is give a good definition of what is 'common sense' to us?

Not sure should we have a different topic for it or we can discuss it here. But I dont want to ruin your topic as they are good question than need to be answer.

[Quatl]

Originally Posted by NeitherExtreme

Maybe another way to start this discussion would be to ask if there would ever be a time, in the eyes of American people (not law), where premeditated, intentional physical harm of another human being for the purpose of punishment would be appropriate. If not, why?

How about this:
A man rapes and tortures your child, in front of you (in other words you know with no doubt that he's guilty.) At trial he gets off on a technicality. So you track him down and kill him, doing your best to cover the evidence etc (1st degree "willful murder") so that your child can still have a parent.

I think this one would qualify in most folks eyes as a justifiable act. Surely at minimum an "understandable" one.

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The major legal reason normally given for things like the death penalty is prevention:
If the existence of a given punishment for a certain crime, influences many people's cost-benefit analysis in such away as to cause them to choose not to commit such acts, then the small(er) evil of the punishment is thought to be a good trade.

That's why the law also allows the "insanity defense" as the argument goes, criminally insane folks are not dissuaded by the existence of punishments. Note that most forms of crazy do not count. The defense must usually show that the accused did nothing to hide evidence for example.

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As for the rest, it's just societal convention.
(In my opinion we are very concerned about pain in general, because most of us don't actually have many real problems these days. This gives us time and resources to obsess over every little annoyance.

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also be cautious of conflating law and ethics, they are not always the same thing.

[NeitherExtreme]

Originally Posted by Quatl

As for the rest, it's just societal convention.
(In my opinion we are very concerned about pain in general, because most of us don't actually have many real problems these days. This gives us time and resources to obsess over every little annoyance.

I think that's a great insight. Thanks.

Could it also be that the fact that most of us are so far removed from real physical discomfort or pain that such things are outside of our paradigm of what the human experience should include?

Originally Posted by Quatl

also be cautious of conflating law and ethics, they are not always the same thing.

Also a good point. I realized after a few posts this would have been better in the ethics section... Anyway, while on the subject of law, I wouldn't be surprised if the fact that we don't have any laws that allow physical punishment would over time condition a society to believe that it is ethically wrong to do so.

Another reason I've been thinking about is that physical punishment seems to be easily prone to abuse, so maybe that could be a reason for a society to reject it wholesale...

Thanks all for bearing with me... Sometimes a little input helps sort out the thoughts!