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>"Today, many psychologists suggest using positive discipline" From Wikipedia: >"It is based on the idea that there are no bad children, just good and bad beh

>"Today, many psychologists suggest using positive discipline" From Wikipedia: >"It is based on the idea that there are no bad children, just good and bad behaviors." Given the fact that we've known for decades now that behaviour is roughly 50% nature (and 50% nurture), this foundational (implied) premise is unequivocally and demonstrably incorrect. Some children are "bad" and need to be taught not to hurt others. This parenting style is growing in popularity and I don't think it's a surprise that we now see an epidemic of kids with mental health problems. I recommend listening to this lecture from Jonathan Haidt: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5IGyHNvr7E&t=569s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5IGyHNvr7E&t=569s Children certainly need boundaries and rules. They need corrective measures when children rebel. I think it's clear that a lack of negative punishment is leading to all kinds of negative outcomes for children.

mxkopy 5y ago
>This parenting style is growing in popularity and I don't think it's a surprise that we now see an epidemic of kids with mental health problems. Mmm, let's ignore the profound changes in society, as well as the life-altering technologies... Yeah, being nicer to your kids is making them fucked up.
unityByFreedom 5y ago
> Some children are "bad" and need to be taught not to hurt others. The title of this post is relevant. OP "obliged" because he was told he was bad. The point is to not do that. > Children certainly need boundaries and rules Rules are paramount in "Positive Disipline". From the section "Creating Rules" [1]: > In her book entitled Positive Discipline, Jane Nelsen emphasizes the importance of not only creating clear rules, but of making them fair... Positive discipline is anything but permissive parenting. The point of the statement you quoted is simply that all kids can be guided towards good behavior, because as you said, nurture and nature both contribute. > I think it's clear that a lack of negative punishment is leading to all kinds of negative outcomes for children. To each their own, but I agree with Dreikurs that natural consequences are enough to teach kids the lessons they need to learn. Forgot your lunch money? Figure it out. Maybe it's hard to convince your kid to brush their teeth because the consequences are so far in the future, but if you take a moment to explain the importance of healthy teeth, they will hear you. The idea is to build a forthright, trusting relationship with kids so they feel comfortable coming to you with the harder problems later. I'd argue that using harsher measures pushes kids away so that when they do struggle with more advanced concepts later, they feel left adrift. On the other hand, if your parents were "tough" with you and you still have a good relationship then maybe that works for you. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_discipline#Creating_rules https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_discipline#Creating_r...
- DiggyJohnson 5y ago
  I appreciate your response and I apologize for the brevity of this one, but I worry that pretty much everything in the second half of your comments is based on a highly-idealized perspective of the situation. What if you try and be fair with a kid and they just never understand fairness? What do you do if you need the kid to follow rules so they don’t get in trouble? What are the “natural consequences” for a kid who keeps hitting his classmates on the playground? Law of the jungle?
  - orwin 5y ago
    > What are the “natural consequences” for a kid who keeps hitting his classmates on the playground? My little brother did that, he was like 6 or 7. My father pulled him from school for a week, brought him to work. At the time he was a social worker, finding jobs for excluded people and helping reinsertion through work, in a rural area (not as rural as some areas in the US, but very rural for western Europe). Gave him some books, pens and blanck sheet to draw, took him to lunch, probably had him "work" a little (he did basically the same to me when i was 14, only it was only work). He also send him to judo classes. Worked pretty well i'd say. It wasn't a punishment, it was more of a "timeout". Also, all kids understand fairness, they just don't always have the same understanding. You just have to explain it, before the act. You can't say "don't hit people" to a kid and expect him to understand, ESPECIALLY if he has been hit before. Also, this would have been a lie, as he can hit people. And to teach how, when, why and why not hit people, a martial art teacher is probably better equiped than a pacifist father.
  - unityByFreedom 5y ago
    > What if you try and be fair with a kid and they just never understand fairness? If that's your kid, speak to a therapist. There's definitely more to good parenting than a single concept, and more than anyone could relate on HN. By mentioning natural consequences and positive discipline, I'm only introducing topics which are described in more detail in books. I mentioned natural consequences specifically as an alternative to punishment which I don't think works. Adlerian psychology suggests misbehaving kids subconsciously want to be punished because that's how they learned to get attention. By the time they're adults, they act out all the time as a matter of habit.
moffkalast 5y ago
> I don't think it's a surprise that we now see an epidemic of kids with mental health problems To be fair, it's likely those mental health problems were there with most generations but went undiagnosed. We don't have a pandemic of cancer today, people just used to die from other shit before it got to them.
- mensetmanusman 5y ago
  “To be fair, it's likely those mental health problems were there with most generations but went undiagnosed.” Unless you don’t believe self surveys of the children themselves, it is unequivocally worse now.
  - moffkalast 5y ago
    > don’t believe self surveys of the children themselves Sounds like that would be very subjective and hard to compare?
blackbrokkoli 5y ago
The nature/nature discussion is definitely still on and riddled with over-confident takes made in the past that now seem silly. I would very much refrain from using the phrase "given the fact" here, and a video titled like a Buzzfeed article might not be the best evidence either

mxkopy 5y ago

>This parenting style is growing in popularity and I don't think it's a surprise that we now see an epidemic of kids with mental health problems. Mmm, let's ignore the profound changes in society, as well as the life-altering technologies... Yeah, being nicer to your kids is making them fucked up.

unityByFreedom 5y ago

> Some children are "bad" and need to be taught not to hurt others. The title of this post is relevant. OP "obliged" because he was told he was bad. The point is to not do that. > Children certainly need boundaries and rules Rules are paramount in "Positive Disipline". From the section "Creating Rules" [1]: > In her book entitled Positive Discipline, Jane Nelsen emphasizes the importance of not only creating clear rules, but of making them fair... Positive discipline is anything but permissive parenting. The point of the statement you quoted is simply that all kids can be guided towards good behavior, because as you said, nurture and nature both contribute. > I think it's clear that a lack of negative punishment is leading to all kinds of negative outcomes for children. To each their own, but I agree with Dreikurs that natural consequences are enough to teach kids the lessons they need to learn. Forgot your lunch money? Figure it out. Maybe it's hard to convince your kid to brush their teeth because the consequences are so far in the future, but if you take a moment to explain the importance of healthy teeth, they will hear you. The idea is to build a forthright, trusting relationship with kids so they feel comfortable coming to you with the harder problems later. I'd argue that using harsher measures pushes kids away so that when they do struggle with more advanced concepts later, they feel left adrift. On the other hand, if your parents were "tough" with you and you still have a good relationship then maybe that works for you. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_discipline#Creating_rules https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_discipline#Creating_r...

DiggyJohnson 5y ago
I appreciate your response and I apologize for the brevity of this one, but I worry that pretty much everything in the second half of your comments is based on a highly-idealized perspective of the situation. What if you try and be fair with a kid and they just never understand fairness? What do you do if you need the kid to follow rules so they don’t get in trouble? What are the “natural consequences” for a kid who keeps hitting his classmates on the playground? Law of the jungle?
- orwin 5y ago
  > What are the “natural consequences” for a kid who keeps hitting his classmates on the playground? My little brother did that, he was like 6 or 7. My father pulled him from school for a week, brought him to work. At the time he was a social worker, finding jobs for excluded people and helping reinsertion through work, in a rural area (not as rural as some areas in the US, but very rural for western Europe). Gave him some books, pens and blanck sheet to draw, took him to lunch, probably had him "work" a little (he did basically the same to me when i was 14, only it was only work). He also send him to judo classes. Worked pretty well i'd say. It wasn't a punishment, it was more of a "timeout". Also, all kids understand fairness, they just don't always have the same understanding. You just have to explain it, before the act. You can't say "don't hit people" to a kid and expect him to understand, ESPECIALLY if he has been hit before. Also, this would have been a lie, as he can hit people. And to teach how, when, why and why not hit people, a martial art teacher is probably better equiped than a pacifist father.
- unityByFreedom 5y ago
  > What if you try and be fair with a kid and they just never understand fairness? If that's your kid, speak to a therapist. There's definitely more to good parenting than a single concept, and more than anyone could relate on HN. By mentioning natural consequences and positive discipline, I'm only introducing topics which are described in more detail in books. I mentioned natural consequences specifically as an alternative to punishment which I don't think works. Adlerian psychology suggests misbehaving kids subconsciously want to be punished because that's how they learned to get attention. By the time they're adults, they act out all the time as a matter of habit.

moffkalast 5y ago

> I don't think it's a surprise that we now see an epidemic of kids with mental health problems To be fair, it's likely those mental health problems were there with most generations but went undiagnosed. We don't have a pandemic of cancer today, people just used to die from other shit before it got to them.

mensetmanusman 5y ago
“To be fair, it's likely those mental health problems were there with most generations but went undiagnosed.” Unless you don’t believe self surveys of the children themselves, it is unequivocally worse now.
- moffkalast 5y ago
  > don’t believe self surveys of the children themselves Sounds like that would be very subjective and hard to compare?

blackbrokkoli 5y ago

The nature/nature discussion is definitely still on and riddled with over-confident takes made in the past that now seem silly. I would very much refrain from using the phrase "given the fact" here, and a video titled like a Buzzfeed article might not be the best evidence either