Status Report
In article ,
George M. Middius wrote:
MiNe 109 said:
Maybe you can decode Neiwert's or Blumenthal's thoughts.
It's Blumenthal, transcribed from a Democracy Now! interview. I quoted
selectively to emphasize the S&M bit. The child abuse claim is from his
best-selling book Dare to Discipline in which he advocates spanking.
Blumenthal again: Where did Dobson's fortune come from? How did he erect
this empire? It came mainly from one book, which I quote from
extensively in my book, Republican Gomorrah--Dare to Discipline, which is
essentially a manual for corporal punishment, for beating your child. In
this book, he says pain is a marvelous purifier that a child should
be--that pain goes a long way with a child, that pain should be dispensed
sufficiently enough to make a child cry, but then the child will crumple
to your breast, and you should welcome the child with warm, open arms.
This is a recipe for sadomasochism.
Obviously parents differ on this, but "most child-care experts today
disapprove of physical punishment." says the NYT, quoted in the wiki
article on Dobson.
Aren't we in canard territory here? I thought the "disciplinary" aspect of
child-beating was long discredited as window-dressing for sadism.
If you want a book to justify it, Dobson has one to sell you. If you
write him for advice, he has a staff to reply to you and put you on his
mailing lists.
Stephen
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