Republicans have been on a real a hot streak lately when it comes to admitting things that no normal human being should do or, if they do, admit out loud. You know, things like “shooting a puppy in the face.”
As such, several Oklahoma Republicans spent some time this week pleading with their fellow legislators to not pass a bill that would ban teachers and other school officials from hitting children with disabilities.
Yes, the same state that banned teaching students about racism because it might cause white students “discomfort,” that has over 50 bills targeting LGBTQ+ people, most of which imply they are trying to sexually “groom” children, still has corporal punishment at its public schools. Like, instead of getting detention, your teacher or principal can spank you. On your butt.
So they can’t say that LGBTQ+ people exist or racism exists, but non-consensual S&M is just fine! Even if the kid is already in a wheelchair.
The bill is actually sponsored by two Republicans, state Reps. John Talley and Anthony Moore, both of whom were rather taken aback when it initially failed last year, having been under the impression that “not beating children with disabilities” was something everyone could get behind. What fools!
Via Tulsa World:
“I told (Talley) I would co-author this bill with him, that this would be an easy bill to carry because there’s going to be nobody who’s for corporal punishment on students with disabilities,” said Rep. Anthony Moore, R-Clinton. “Apparently I was wrong.
“I could talk at great length about what ‘the rod’ means in the Bible,” said Moore, a former prosecutor. “I could talk at great length about the data that could fill this room about the fact that corporal punishment on children with disabilities is a poor decision.”
As it turns out, many Oklahoma Republicans definitely love the idea of schools beating children, including those with disabilities. Why? Because the Bible tells them so and they don’t need any reason other than that.
The bill’s primary opponent is Rep. Jim Olsen, whom we last heard from in December, back when he was trying to plaster the Ten Commandments all over public schools. In fact, we brought up his opposition to this bill when it came up last year as evidence of his extremism. Who would have known he’d have so many on his side?
Olsen appears to be entirely clueless as it pertains to the concept of “public,” and has very enthusiastically claimed that the Bible should be more trusted than experts and widely available studies regarding the ineffectiveness of corporal punishment.
But he’s not the only one. Rep. Shane Jett (no relation to Joan, we hope!) gave an impassioned speech in opposition to the bill, with some rather interesting arguments. Jett, we will note here, was also the author of a bill banning schools from discussing several concepts regarding race and gender, on the grounds that it violates the Establishment clause. How? Well, according to him, Critical Race Theory is a religious belief and a doctrine of the “religion” of secular humanism (which he has some pretty hilarious definitions for).
In his speech, Jett framed teachers hitting children with disabilities as a parental rights issue. As in, parents should have the right to give schools permission to hit their kids if they want.
“Effectively, we’re taking a tool that has been in the hands of parents and in the hands of schools to maintain discipline,” he said, “And we’re removing it from the parents’ prerogative and saying, we, Big Brother, the state of Oklahoma, knows what’s best for your child, and we’re removing an entire motivational tool from discipline in the classroom.”
You know, call me crazy but I think 1984 would have hit a little different if it were all about how The Party wanted to ban teachers from hitting children with disabilities.
It’s also a rather interesting take from someone who voted for Oklahoma’s bill banning gender-affirming care for children under the age of 18. Apparently, in some cases, he does believe that Oklahoma knows better than parents do.
Jett also explained that, according to the Bible, if you don’t hit children with disabilities, it means you hate them.
Transcript via Friendly Atheist:
I already cited Proverbs 13:24: “Whoever spares the rod hates their child, but he who loves them disciplines them.” And we’re saying the state of Oklahoma has unilaterally decided if you have vision impairment, you cannot be disciplined, even if your parents want that. We’re going to unilaterally take that away from our schools and our parents, more importantly. If you are hearing impaired, suddenly you’re in a different class, you cannot be disciplined. And we’ve already made it abundantly clear that children can misbehave regardless of their abilities or inabilities, capabilities or incapabilities. … Are we sending a message that we don’t love our children?
No one ever said that children cannot be disciplined, just that there are nonviolent means of accomplishing that — means that are far more effective and less likely to cause lasting trauma than hitting, at least according to approximately 80,000 studies on the subject.
Via the Journal of Adolescent Health:
The Society for Adolescent Medicine believes that the vast majority of the evidence leads to the conclusion that corporal punishment is an ineffective method of discipline and has major deleterious effects on the physical and mental health of those inflicted [1, 4, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61]. No clear evidence exists that such punishment leads to better control in the classroom [12, 13, 42, 43]. Physically punishing children has never been shown to enhance moral character development, increase the students’ respect for teachers or other authority figures in general, intensify the teacher’s control in class, or even protect the teacher [2, 6, 8, 29, 62]. Such children, in our view, are being physically and mentally abused and no data exist demonstrating that such victims develop enhanced social skills or self-control skills [2, 7, 18].
But Shane Jett has no interest in studies and experts. Especially “experts” like Dr. Benjamin Spock, whose parenting advice should not be listened to on the grounds that he was a “Communist.” (Dr. Spock was not a communist, but also who cares if he was?)
And this is an erosive and a corrosive element in the United States whenever Dr. Benjamin Spock published a book that said, “Don’t discipline your children. Don’t spank your children.” And a lot of people don’t know that his voice was elevated because it fit a particular agenda. Dr. Benjamin Spock was a Socialist who ran for the People’s Party. That means he’s a Communist. […]
Jewish culture, Christian culture, and any common sense culture understands that if you don’t discipline children, or you create a class of children that cannot be disciplined, those discipline problems are gonna cascade through the rest of society. And we are seeing that now, from Dr. Spock telling Christian parents, “Don’t spank your children,” and they follow Dr. Spock instead of the Bible.
Dr. Spock was a communist who ran for president with a Communist Party. This is Communist ideology.
Yeah, who needs to show any actual data when you have the Bible, your gut instinct and a large collection of pamphlets from the John Birch Society?
Weirdly, I was just writing about Jean-Jacques Rousseau the other day, who you may know developed a fierce spanking fetish later on in life due to having been spanked by a woman whose dad kind of adopted him — one which somehow caused him to develop a habit of hanging around dark alleyways and flashing his butt at women he saw. I’m not saying that’s what happens to all children who are spanked, but the studies do actually show that those who are spanked as children are more likely to have sexual problems later in life, to be violent towards their future partners, and to have mental health problems like anxiety and drug abuse.
All of that aside, no child, whether they have disabilities or not, should have to fear violence, particularly from their parents or teachers. They should be taught that they gets to say who touches them and how. There are myriad more effective ways to “discipline” children than hitting them, and frankly anyone who is too daft to figure that out shouldn’t be around them at all.
PREVIOUSLY:
