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Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families Podcast.

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Speaker 2: It's the podcast for.

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Speaker 1: The time poor parent who just wants answers now.

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Speaker 2: Professor Higgins said Australian states and territories should follow the

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Speaker 2: lead of sixty two other countries and close defense loopholes

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Speaker 2: making it legal for parents to hit their kids if

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Speaker 2: they use quote reasonable force.

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Speaker 1: And now here's the scars of our show, My mum.

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Speaker 2: And dad today on the Happy Families Podcast, a conversation

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Speaker 2: about something that really gets people going. It's a tough

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Speaker 2: one to talk about. We're going to do it respectfully,

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Speaker 2: but we do need to talk about smacking. Hello. This

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Speaker 2: is doctor Justin Coulson. I'm the founder of Happy Families

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Speaker 2: dot com dot iu, the author of seven books about

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Speaker 2: how our families can be happier, and the parenting expert

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Speaker 2: and co host on Channel nine's Parental Guidance. I'm here

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Speaker 2: with Kylie, mum to our six kids, and my parenting

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Speaker 2: podcast partner, and we're going to talk about an article

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Speaker 2: that appeared in the paper just a couple of days ago.

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Speaker 2: This is a two minute read. I'm going to read

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Speaker 2: the whole thing Kylie, and then we're going to discuss

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Speaker 2: the issue of smacking. I did media interviews up to

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Speaker 2: my eyeballs last week about it once it showed up

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Speaker 2: in the paper, and there's just so much to talk about.

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Speaker 2: So it was written by Susie O'Brien. We've had her

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Speaker 2: on the podcast before. She writes for The Herald's Son

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Speaker 2: in Victoria, although sometimes her articles end up nationwide, and

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Speaker 2: she wrote that really great book about how we should

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Speaker 2: just ease off a little bit with our parenting. Here's

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Speaker 2: what she writes. Six in ten Australians. Sorry, young Australians

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Speaker 2: have been smacked repeatedly by their parents and are nearly

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Speaker 2: twice as likely to develop anxiety and depression as other

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Speaker 2: teens and adults, according to new research. The shocking findings

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Speaker 2: of a national study of eight and a half thousand

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Speaker 2: Australians have led to calls for the removal of the

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Speaker 2: legal defense of quote reasonable chastisement in Victoria, which allows

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Speaker 2: parents to use physical violence on their children. Children is

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Speaker 2: of equal protection against physical violence as adults. One of

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Speaker 2: the lead researchers, Australian Catholic University professor DARRYL Higgins, said,

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Speaker 2: in Australia right now, you have better protection from violence

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Speaker 2: as a female adult or a pet than you do

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Speaker 2: as a child. He said, if you want to reduce

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Speaker 2: population level anxiety for women and men, don't hit them

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Speaker 2: as children. There is a very real connection between corporal

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Speaker 2: punishment and current and lifelong experience of mental ill health.

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Speaker 2: Professor Higgins from the Institute of Child Protection Studies said

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Speaker 2: the findings come as other Australian studies are found fifty

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Speaker 2: to eighty percent of parents admit to smaking their child,

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Speaker 2: with many uncertain about where to draw the line or

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Speaker 2: what constitutes abuse. The preliminary results from the Australian Child

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Speaker 2: Male Treatment Study shows sixty one percent of Australians aged

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Speaker 2: sixteen to twenty four experience corporal punishment from their parents

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Speaker 2: on more than three occasions as a disciplinary strategy while

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Speaker 2: growing up. That was sixty one percent. Initial findings to

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Speaker 2: be presented at the Australian Institute of Family Studies conference

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Speaker 2: on Thursday show females who experienced corporal punishment from their

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Speaker 2: parents were one point eight times more likely to have

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Speaker 2: a major depressive disorder in their lifetime and two point

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Speaker 2: one times more likely to experience generalized anxiety. Males were

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Speaker 2: one point six one point seven times more likely to

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Speaker 2: develop anxiety and depression, respectively. Let me wrap up here

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Speaker 2: with the last couple of things that this article highlights.

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Speaker 2: Professor Higgins said Australian states and territories should follow the

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Speaker 2: lead of sixty two other countries and close defense loopholes

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Speaker 2: making it legal for parents to hit their kids if

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Speaker 2: they use quote reasonable force close quote during discipline. And then,

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Speaker 2: because this is in the Herald Sun, she goes straight

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Speaker 2: to Victoria and says Victoria does not have specific legislation

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Speaker 2: regarding parents using physical punishment on their children. Common law

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Speaker 2: offers parents and caretakers and defense for parental use of

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Speaker 2: physical punishment. Meanwhile, in New South Wales, it is illegal

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Speaker 2: for parents and guardians to strike children on the head

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Speaker 2: or neck. A child's pain should not last longer than

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Speaker 2: a short period if a parent hits them anywhere else

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Speaker 2: on their body. Queensland's domestic discipline legislation states both teachers

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Speaker 2: and parents can use force that is reasonable under the circumstances,

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Speaker 2: but doesn't provide further detail. Professor Higgins said the current

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Speaker 2: survey also shows attitudes of violence are changing. The study

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Speaker 2: shows support for corporal punishment as a form of discipline

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Speaker 2: for children dropped from thirty seven point nine percent among

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Speaker 2: those aged over sixty five to fourteen point eight percent

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Speaker 2: for those age sixteen to twenty four. Isn't it interesting

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Speaker 2: the older generation is all for hitting, the only generations

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Speaker 2: not so much. Professor Higgins said violence cannot be excused

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Speaker 2: as a one off or just one hit, because the

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Speaker 2: study showed it had a negative impact. The only benefit,

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Speaker 2: he says, is immediate compliance. But we know it's clearly

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Speaker 2: linked to long term harm. Parents and caregivers need to

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Speaker 2: be using positive pairing techniques rather than outmoded forms of

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Speaker 2: discipline that cause harm and are associated with other forms

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Speaker 2: of abuse. So that's the article. I know there's a

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Speaker 2: fair bit in there, but I think that we need

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Speaker 2: to unpack this and spend some time on it. Because

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Speaker 2: Australia still doesn't make smacking illegal. Australian parents are still

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Speaker 2: allowed to hit their kids up. By the way, Sweden

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Speaker 2: was the first country in the world about law all

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Speaker 2: forms of corporal punishment, including in the home. That was

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Speaker 2: back in nineteen seventy nine and Kylie sixty two countries,

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Speaker 2: like I said, have followed suit since then. The Republic

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Speaker 2: of Korea and Columbia of the latest nations to ban

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Speaker 2: physical punishment for kids. They did that last year, and

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Speaker 2: in Spain, where parents are also banned from smacking, corporal

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Speaker 2: punishment hitting your kids actually falls under the country's definition

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Speaker 2: of violence against children. It'd seen as domestic abuse. So

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Speaker 2: strong words, strong language, important article. So, Kylie, where do

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Speaker 2: you want to start with this?

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Speaker 1: This is this is a really really hard conversation to have.

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Speaker 2: I've watched you as I'm reading this, and I'm watching

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Speaker 2: you slouch in the chair. Your composure, your demeanor, everything's

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Speaker 2: changed since we began, Like this is a topic that

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Speaker 2: really affects you.

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Speaker 1: Having grown up in a home where there was quite

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Speaker 1: a heavy hand of discipline dished out, the argument that

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Speaker 1: it never did me any harm doesn't wash very well

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Speaker 1: with me at all. This conversation is really grating on

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Speaker 1: I guess memories and experiences that I had as a child,

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Speaker 1: and without painting my parents as being these awful people,

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Speaker 1: because I know that they were doing the very best

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Speaker 1: that they knew how to do with the skill set.

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Speaker 2: That they had. And your parents are good people.

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Speaker 1: And they are good people, and they loved me. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: but it was still it was still a really really

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Speaker 1: difficult upbringing coming out of it at the other end,

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Speaker 1: and I guess moving forward being the parent who having

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Speaker 1: been raised in that regard, finding herself in the same

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Speaker 1: position multiple times over the years with our children, where

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Speaker 1: impulse takes over and you find yourself, you know, doing

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Speaker 1: things that you never wanted to do or never thought

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Speaker 1: that you had the capacity to do because you're at

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Speaker 1: your limit, or you're at your wits end. You have

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Speaker 1: you don't know what other options are available.

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Speaker 2: So we've never claimed that we're perfect parents. And as

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Speaker 2: much as we hate to admit it, the whole reason

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Speaker 2: that I do what I do is because I lost

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Speaker 2: it with our three year old one day and I

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Speaker 2: walloped her. I mean I was by definition I was

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Speaker 2: violent towards her. I was physically violent. I whacked her,

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Speaker 2: and I whacked her again, and then I whacked her

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Speaker 2: again because she wouldn't go to sleep, as if she

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Speaker 2: was going to go to sleep when I was hitting her.

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Speaker 2: I've written about that. As much as I hate to

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Speaker 2: talk about it, I hated to write about her. I

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Speaker 2: wrote about that in the introduction of twenty one Days

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Speaker 2: to a Happier Family because I didn't want our family

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Speaker 2: to be like that anymore. That's why I went back

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Speaker 2: to school and spent the next eight and a half

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Speaker 2: years studying and became an academic and do the work

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Speaker 2: that I do now. But we do need to talk

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Speaker 2: about it. Grateful that you've shared what you've shared. What

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Speaker 2: about after the break we talk about the common reasons

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Speaker 2: that people say that kids need to be hit, and

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Speaker 2: bit by bit, I'll pull that apart and highlight that

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Speaker 2: there is a better way. That's next on The Happy

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Speaker 2: Family's podcast.

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Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families Podcast, the podcast for the time

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Speaker 1: poor parent who just wants answers now, And today we're

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Speaker 1: having a difficult conversation about smacking. It's come up again.

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Speaker 1: Countries around the world are banning it as a form

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Speaker 1: of discipline for children.

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Speaker 2: And Australia's staying firm in their right to abuse children,

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Speaker 2: or to hit children, or to be six times larger

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Speaker 2: than your kid and to hit them anyway, which is

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Speaker 2: I guess I'm being a bit provocative when I say that.

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Speaker 1: But I think the reality is that most parents who

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Speaker 1: would utilize smacking as a parental tool would never suggest

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Speaker 1: that they never feel that they're being abusive. You're exactly right,

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Speaker 1: and would acknowledge it's just a tap or do you

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Speaker 1: know what I mean? I don't. I think that the

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Speaker 1: majority of smackers wouldn't be what we would consider your

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Speaker 1: heavy handed corporal punishment, no parental force if we had

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Speaker 1: grown up with when you.

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Speaker 2: Think about that time, and it's not the only time, unfortunately,

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Speaker 2: but when you think about the times where we've whacked

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Speaker 2: one of our kids, people wouldn't have looked at us

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Speaker 2: even back then and gone, oh my goodness, those people

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Speaker 2: are so horrible to their children. I mean, we were

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Speaker 2: a loving family. We treated the kids with love and

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Speaker 2: kindness and respect all the time, except those few occasions

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Speaker 2: when can rom everything. We lost the plot and flew

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Speaker 2: off our handlers. They were flying off theirs. So let's

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Speaker 2: talk about the main reasons that people defend smacking. I

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Speaker 2: think that that's probably the best way for us to

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Speaker 2: move forward here.

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Speaker 1: I think the number one is you get immediate compliance.

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Speaker 1: You smack your child, they stopped doing what they're doing immediately,

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Speaker 1: whether it be out of fear, whether it be out

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Speaker 1: of shock factor, because all of a sudden they're now

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Speaker 1: you know they've been hit, and there's pain, but there's

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Speaker 1: instant compliance.

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Speaker 2: So when we look at research on that. Believe it

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Speaker 2: or not. A study was published maybe six or seven

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Speaker 2: years ago by a guy called George Holden. He's one

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Speaker 2: of the world's foremost discipline researchers, and he is a

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Speaker 2: pure academic. I love the way he does his research.

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Speaker 2: He went into people's homes with cameras and recording devices

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Speaker 2: and literally recorded what happened when kids were smacked. And

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Speaker 2: here's what he found. In seventy three percent of cases,

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Speaker 2: when children were smacked, they were back at the same

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Speaker 2: or other challenging behavior in less than ten minutes. So

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Speaker 2: even that idea that you get that instant compliance, it's

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Speaker 2: a furfy. It's not completely true. The kids will start

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Speaker 2: to rebel, start to play up, start to do something

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Speaker 2: else challenging within ten minutes in seventy three percent of cases. Therefore,

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Speaker 2: that argument, while it makes sense intuitively, while it feels

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Speaker 2: right the evident, suggests that it's not right.

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Speaker 1: The argument to that, which I've heard numerous times, do

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Speaker 1: you clearly and smack them hard enough?

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Speaker 2: Yeah? Yeah, I mean that's awful, isn't it? What an

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Speaker 2: awful thing to do? Oh, it didn't work, so you

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Speaker 2: should do more of it And do it harder. We

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Speaker 2: can be better than that. I think you can tell

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Speaker 2: a lot about a society by the way they treat

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Speaker 2: their children, and right now there's an area that we're failing.

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Speaker 2: What's another argument for smacking.

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Speaker 1: Well, you can't reason with children.

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Speaker 2: This is one of my favorites. I'm cutting you off

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Speaker 2: straight away because I love it when somebody says this,

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Speaker 2: because it's so easy to debunk. The way that I

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Speaker 2: debunk this argument you can't reason with children, so therefore

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Speaker 2: you need to hit them is you can't reason with

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Speaker 2: somebody with Alzheimer's or dementia. So does that mean that

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Speaker 2: we should start hitting people in retirement homes? The thought

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Speaker 2: is just repulsive. It's so earth shatteringly wrong. Nobody would

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Speaker 2: even consider that we would be hitting elderly people because

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Speaker 2: of their inability to reason, because they've lost their thinking capacity.

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Speaker 2: And yet we make the same argument and think that

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Speaker 2: it's acceptable. We let it flow for our one, two, three,

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Speaker 2: four five year olds. It's just not an argument. What's

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Speaker 2: the third reason that we've come up with for why

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Speaker 2: people justify smacking their kids.

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Speaker 1: Well, it's the only thing that works.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, except it doesn't work, and we've kind of

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Speaker 2: talked about that already. The other thing is, when we

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Speaker 2: look at the research evidence, there are so many positive

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Speaker 2: parenting techniques, so many gentle techniques, so many understanding. Yeh.

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Speaker 1: But I talk and I talk and I talk at

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Speaker 1: my kids and they just don't listen.

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Speaker 2: Maybe it's not about you talking to them. I love

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Speaker 2: that story from Stephen Covey where he says a man

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Speaker 2: approached him after a seminar and said, I can't understand

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Speaker 2: my son. He won't listen to me. And Covey responded,

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Speaker 2: let me say that back to you. You can't understand

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Speaker 2: your son because he won't listen to you, and the said, yeah,

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Speaker 2: that's right. He said, no, no, no, let me say it again.

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Speaker 2: You can't understand your son because your son won't listen

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Speaker 2: to you. And the man agreed again, to which Stephen

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Speaker 2: Covey said, I thought, for you to understand someone, you

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Speaker 2: need to listen to them. What's the next reason that

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Speaker 2: people say smacking is useful?

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Speaker 1: It never did me any hum.

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Speaker 2: So I'm going to link in the show notes. We

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Speaker 2: don't have time for the whole debunking here, but I'm

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Speaker 2: going to link in the show notes to an article

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Speaker 2: that I wrote that was published in The New York

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Speaker 2: Times a couple of years ago. It was about the

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Speaker 2: eye turned out fine fallacy, This idea that because I

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Speaker 2: was hit as a child, I turned out fine. The

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Speaker 2: reality is you can't know if you turned out fine

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Speaker 2: or how you might have turned out differently had you

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Speaker 2: not been smacked. And when we look at the research

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Speaker 2: that's been cited from the Australian Catholic University and Darryl Higgins,

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Speaker 2: what we're seeing is that the data shows quite clearly

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Speaker 2: that there is a correlation between being hit as a

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Speaker 2: child and mental health outcomes throughout childhood and adulthood. I

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Speaker 2: don't think that we can mount a credible argument that

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Speaker 2: we turned out fine, and even if we did turn

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Speaker 2: out fine, it's fine. The baseline is that the benchmark.

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Speaker 2: I want my kids to turn out wonderfully. I don't

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Speaker 2: want them to be fine. I want them to be fabulous.

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Speaker 2: So it just doesn't wash for me that these arguments

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Speaker 2: are still used to defend and are practice that does

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Speaker 2: not do anything redeeming anything positive for our kids at all.

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Speaker 1: Well for the time, poor parent, it's just quick and easy.

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Speaker 2: Yeah it is. It is quick and easy, but it

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Speaker 2: undermines everything else. And there's something that I've been teaching

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Speaker 2: for years and years and years, and that is that

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Speaker 2: fast is slow, and slow as fast, you go for

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Speaker 2: the quick fix, but you pay for it down the road.

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Speaker 2: If you spend the time now, it works out. So

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Speaker 2: let's talk about five reasons really quickly that we don't

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Speaker 2: want to smack our kids, given that they're the arguments

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Speaker 2: that people use for smacking, and I hope that I've

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Speaker 2: debunked them reasonably well. My first idea for why we

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Speaker 2: shouldn't smack kids is that corporal punishment is violence, and

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Speaker 2: teaching our kid violence begins a cycle where children learn

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Speaker 2: to express their anger through violence towards themselves or others.

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Speaker 2: I think that's a strong argument. My second argument is

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Speaker 2: that when we hit our children, we treat their bodies

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Speaker 2: as not their own. We teach them that other people

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Speaker 2: are allowed to enter their body space with ill intent,

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Speaker 2: and if that person is bigger, they can use their

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Speaker 2: size to exert power over them. And I want my

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Speaker 2: kids to know that their body is theirs and that

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Speaker 2: they're in control. My job as a parent is to

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Speaker 2: elevate and amplify that control, not take it away, and

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Speaker 2: My third instinct is to point towards smacking as something

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Speaker 2: that weakens kids psychologically. If they feel unsafe with their parents,

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Speaker 2: the psychological overflow is that they may end up feeling

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Speaker 2: that they're unworthy. It may lead some of our kids

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Speaker 2: to feel so much shame that they feel like they're

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Speaker 2: bad or dangerous or untrustworthy, and it sows the seeds

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Speaker 2: of insecurity that could last a lifetime. Our job as

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Speaker 2: parents is to help our kids feel safer and stronger,

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Speaker 2: not weaker and more insecure. My fourth reason for not

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Speaker 2: smacking kids is that there's fifty five years of smacking

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Speaker 2: research that shows no positive effects. Fifty five years of research.

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Speaker 2: We're not talking about abuse research, we're talking about what

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Speaker 2: Americans of course, spanking. And my fifth one is really simple,

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Speaker 2: because we feel crappy. We feel like we're lousy parents

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Speaker 2: when we whack our kids. No parent has ever given

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Speaker 2: their kids a good whack and too well, job done.

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Speaker 2: Now back to it, I nailed that. Got that's so right,

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Speaker 2: it's not what we say. We walk away and we

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Speaker 2: feel so awful for having done it because we know

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Speaker 2: that that's not what our relationship is supposed to be

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Speaker 2: built on. Any final comments.

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Speaker 1: When I think about the relationship that I have with

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Speaker 1: my children, I want them to see me as a

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Speaker 1: safe place, not a place to be feared, not someone

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Speaker 1: that they want to, you know, kind of hide from.

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Speaker 1: And I can't be that place if smacking is in

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Speaker 1: my toolkit, because I become for all intents and purposes,

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Speaker 1: I become the perpetrator. I become a violator of everything

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Speaker 1: that I actually hold safe and sacred.

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Speaker 2: I'm so glad you said that this didn't end up

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Speaker 2: being the podcast I thought it would be. I thought

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Speaker 2: we'd have a light conversation about something that needs to change.

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Speaker 2: But it's really affected me, and I can tell that

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Speaker 2: it's really affected you. So we're going to wrap it

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Speaker 2: up there. For everyone who's participated and listened to this podcast,

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Speaker 2: thank you for being here today. If you have any

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Speaker 2: stories about this topic that you would like to share

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Speaker 2: with us, we would love for you to send us

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Speaker 2: a voice memo, keep it short, and send it to

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Speaker 2: podcasts at Happy Families dot com dot you. Just open

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Speaker 2: up your phone, record yourself talking into your voice memo app,

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Speaker 2: and then send that voice memo to podcasts at Happy

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Speaker 2: Families dot com dot you. This is a conversation that

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Speaker 2: needs to continue until we see some real change. The

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Speaker 2: Happy Families podcast is produced by Justin Ruland from Bridge Media.

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Speaker 2: Craig Bruce is our executive producer, and if you'd like

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Speaker 2: more info about making your family happier, please visit us

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Speaker 2: at happy families dot com dot you, where you will

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Speaker 2: find endless solutions for how to stop smacking your kids

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Speaker 2: and start loving them all