For the "Get the Belt" Sketch

Now- it’s important to remember neither approach is inherently perfect. Working out emotional issues caused by childhood trauma can take years or even a lifetime- but so can acquiring and implementing the tools to reach financial goals. A person with enough money cane easily pay for therapy. A person with enough happiness can’t buy a house with joy. So it depends on your personal priorities. If all you care about is being happy, and you can be happy with anything- you’re good no matter what. If you want to drive a Porsche to work though... that’s gonna take some money.

Having grown up in an era of physical discipline, most people I know around my age experienced physical discipline up to levels that even at the time would be considered torture and excessive. And most of them are happy, well adjusted adults as much as anyone else. They have their kinks and hang ups and issues- but most aren’t related to being whooped but to social or economic circumstances and how that relates to their experiences in society.

The idea that physical discipline somehow automatically “messes you up for life” is insulting. It’s also probably false as we know that not every well adjusted adult (including the same adults who started the idea of not using violence for discipline) was never hit as a child and not everyone in prison was beat as a kid either. Most anyone who is on this site is old enough there’s a good chance their parents probably got a whoopin or two- and not everyone here has parents who are super messed up humans (more than any other human.)

The fact is- physical discipline can and often does work. It’s rarely the most efficient or optimal method. It’s also a crap shoot. The more sensitive or “delicate” a child is- the more likely they are to crack. Carbon turns to diamonds under pressure, but put that same pressure on something else and all you get is a smashed up useless lump. So while SOME kids learn from physical violence- others do not- or learn the wrong lessons. You don’t know until they grow up and you see in what ways they are messed up.

So there is a huge risk with using violence to punish or discipline kids. I was a TERRIBLE child. I was hit- abused. Not “abused” the way people think a smack on the bottom is. Abused like a guy who knows what Jack Bauer needs to and there are 3 episode left in the season. Go to the hospital kind. And guess what? It sucked. Guess what else? I know in what ways it influenced my development and even my behavior to this day.

And... not the more extreme abuse but the ass beatings? I pretty much deserved every one of them. I’m glad for them. Grateful. I was a little shit and would be dead or in prison. I was a tiny terror. An actual monster. I would laugh and mock or manipulate and play with whatever attempts you’d make at non violent discipline. Take my stuff? I’ll take it back. Learn to pick locks, be sneaky, steal etc.

And what will you do about it? That was me. What would you do? You have to go to work eventually. You WILL leave me alone and when you do- I will do what I want. Get a baby sitter? Yeah. I’ll fight them. Bite, knives, sticks, fists- whatever. Broke the front teeth out of ones jaw by running jump slamming their face into a door. Learned women didn’t have penises when I tried to kick my other in here when I threw down and fought her in the middle of a street at a busy intersection in 3rd grade or so.

But I understood violence. If I couldn’t take you in a fight and you would use force- I couldn’t say “what are you gonna do?” I knew. You’d whip my fucking ass. That didn’t always stop me of course. I was an optimistic shit and figured you got lucky the last time. So a combination of prudent violence and gentle coaxing and support taught me to be better with time.