Corporal Punishment In African Americans

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Pages: 7

A belt or any instrument a parent uses to discipline a child varies, but what matters is how often they are used. Corporal punishment had been widely accepted but studies show, in African American communities, it is higher. Ta-Nehisi Coates mentions in his book, “Between the world and me” he had suffered many harsh beatings from his father. Some, like Ta-Nehisi claim it's rooted in fear, if parents don’t use force to receive obedience, someone else will, like the police. Studies show that corporate punishment can become abuse, especially amongst African American families. Coates mentions how corporal punishment had a significant effect over girls. Parents would hit them in an attempt to punish them and instead would drive them away. …show more content…
Corporal punishment is a way of discipline, used in a high percentage of African American communities. They use corporal punishment as a way of instilling respect and fear into their children towards them as parents when they are disrespected. This is also used as a form of discipline, to teach them that if they can do that to them then people in the streets, where no one cares for them, can do much worse. Statistically a study shows “…pro-spanking bloc has slipped from about 84 percent in 1986 to about 70 percent in 2010 and 2012. That’s still a majority, but spanking has become less socially acceptable over the past three decades” (Enten). The divide between corporal punishment vary from religion, race, political standing and more. Every grouping has a different opinion as far as corporal punishment, the effects and if any part of what is considered corporal punishment is OK. “Whites (including Hispanics) have been, on average, 11 percentage points less likely than African-Americans to favor corporal punishment” (Enten). Race and religion are the leading groups with the strongest opinions. Althogh in Race there is a slightly larger gap in opinion, “Over the past 10 years, 80 percent of born-again Christians have said spanking is OK. Support among the rest of the population has been about 65 percent” (Enten). In a religious stand point the gap is said to widen more as …show more content…
Every family has different ways of instilling discipline into their kids. Some may have learned it from their parents; however, others change their disciplinary actions because of their experience with their parents, and as a result, did not learn from corporal punishment and do not want to instill that on their children. Studies show that African American parents use corporal punishment more than any other race or ethnicity. Corporal punishment is used as a disciplinary action to create well behaved children, so as they age society does not feel fear towards them. Ta-Nehisi Coates mentions in “Between the world and me” that sometimes his parents over reacted using corporal punishment. If the punishment would be fair to what was done wrong then perhaps there would be fewer children making erratic decisions made out of anger for being hit. While some children are still going to be upset for being punished, whatever the punishment may be, the outcome of a smaller, more communicative punishment with the child, compared to being hit, may have a better