Too sad that you hear of abuse cases that are with relatives that a parent is most likely to trust.

Anyways, this was just a heads up about the volunteering thing. At my daughter’s Islamic school, the teachers don’t even go into the kids’ bathroom, for better or for worse.

agreed. She put it quite poignantly.

But overall, i think the worst thing about the post is that it encourages people to mistrust their own families, and all based on the perverted actions of a few. What an awful, awful thing to do.

Now, this is what I don’t agree with (YES even me who believes in physical discipline).
I have never called my children ’stupid or dumb’, walhamudllilah, at the most I have told my children that what they did was silly.
My children immediately tell me, ‘that was not nice what you said.’
And even in my anger I have to emphasize, ‘I am not calling you silly rather your action silly!’
That makes me feel better that walhamdulilah I am not a dictator figure in their minds because they can object, even if I am angry

Anonymouse: You can well see the difference between the eastern youth and western youth’s respect level of elders and esp. teachers.

Besides, as i kept saying, a hitting which is merely a reaction of a child’s misbehaving vs. a hitting that is a ‘consequence’ of several warnings has a different effect.

As for hitting while teaching Qur’an, I don’t think anyone would have the heart to hit a child merely because they make a mistake or can’t pronounce something correctly.
It is usually because either they start playing around, or they waste time or they disrespect etc.

And I do believe in the necessity of explaining the child that hitting is not because they made a mistake but because of their playing around, misbehaving etc.

Honestly, hitting doesn’t mean bleeding your child rahter it is merely to embarrass and instill fear in the child, so that he doesn’t repeat his mistake/action to save himself from the embarrassment and/or out of fear.

Umm Layth: (long time no post!) I agree that every child is different and not every child need to be hit.

OH and as for Imam Malik’s story of hitting Hisham ibn Ammar, it is a beautiful story. If I get a chance, inshaAllah, I will post it later.

But just to summarize, when Hisham started crying, Imam Malik immediately stopped and asked him if he had hurt him (because the intent was to discipline and not hurt) and when Hisham said that he had, Imam Malik asked Hisham how he could compensate…I mean this shows that hitting can be done in a way different then ‘abuse’ or ‘humiliation’.

Plus, hitting has to stop after a certain age and can only work during a certain age. What can be used as a deterrence for a child, who does not even perceive ‘long term’ punishments.

BTW, good suggestion! Actually, I have a draft of a post that’ll touch on this subject, but from a slightly different angle…

On a slight tangent, FOB vs ABCD, I think it could be a good post for blog by someone like Amad who was FOB, and apparently upgraded(in his view, could be considered downgraded) to American who can discuss the wide bridge between two. I would have much more to comment on that post.

Jazaakillaahi khairan Umm Layth for the measured response… I do think your comment was the best during this whole discussion!

Firstly, regarding the article of abuse: We shouldn’t live in suspicion about every single person that is out there and assume they will harm our children.

Secondly, let us take it easy on AnonyMouse and the other sisters.

My person thoughts are that there is a fine line that we can’t cross and that is bashing those who do use the hand sometimes for disciplining. It was something that was used in the past by everyone, including the Salaf and those that came after, and is still being used today. Even amongst Americans it is something normal sometimes and not looked down upon. The only ones who may say something are CPS really but you know the ones with the bad kids probably hit their kids too.

I’m personally not for hitting a child when he is memorizing Qur’aan because I also hated learning the Bible when my grandmother would smack me. However, she smacked me for not paying full attention which is considered disrespect of the book and I think that is something we need to pay close attention to. We live in a time where disrespect is shown to everyone. We speak about children disrespecting us and if tactic A doesn’t work we move on to tactic B, but what about disrespect for Allaah’s Words? Seriously, if they are of sound age, don’t listen the first time when they get the warning and they know that their actions are wrong, they do deserve a small disciplinary action that is beyond a warning. Obviously, if a warning doesn’t work, it probably won’t work the 2nd time or the 3rd time or the 4th time. And believe me, I have seen parents who constantly give warnings and the children just make a mock of them because they realize that is as far as their parents can go.

Every child is different. Age matters. If they know their action is wrong matters. What steps were taken prior to show them their mistake matters. In reality it is called wisdom. Some girls are harder than other boys and vice versa. There is no reason to call war on each other over this. But I do want to say to those who are against using the hand at all that you get married and have children first. If you get lucky because of your OWN wisdom, your children won’t need more than a talk but with all honesty, that depends on you. If you end up with a kid who just won’t listen, throws stuff at you, hits you – try your tactic and see how long you go without breaking. Also a reminder: don’t ever hit your kid because of your anger. If it has to be done, do it to make him learn. Remembering the example of Ali (radhiyallaahu `anhu) is something well worth our time in such instances.