"Please don't give me hot tongue, Mommy,"

This is hilarious. Apparently some parents have developed a creative disciplinary technique: Instead of spanking the kid or washing his mouth out with soap when he lies or bites someone, the parent applies a drop of hot sauce to the kid's tongue.

I think that that's pretty clever. But, of course, the parenting "experts" are all up in arms about how it's abusive or something. ::shakes head::

I recently read a novel about the Spartans, the ancient Greek warriors. One of the characters said something to the effect of "We shed tears now to save blood later." It is far more merciful to cause a little bit of pain to a young child when he lies, and thus prevent a pattern of lying from developing, than to let him continue in his sin and let that pattern of sin ruin the child's life.

Now, is putting hot sauce on the tongue abusive? I think not. Punishment, by definition, is painful in some way. Even the ineffective, useless time-out method of punishment involves some small level of pain, the pain of not getting to do what you want. (This is a light pain, easily borne by even a child, and this quality renders "time-outs" ineffective as punishment measures. One wonders if that truth reflects on the general effectiveness of prison terms as punishment techniques.)

However, as one woman who went through this particular variant of punishment pointed out, "I don't need to resort to chemical warfare." Although she makes a gross overstatement of the severity of Tobasco treatment, she is correct; why not just spank the kid properly and be done with it?

(Via Fringe, Via the Carnival of the Vanities)

Posted by Blog Jones at August 19, 2004 12:37 AM | Category: The "Lighter Side"