News Jaya

Human Rights Commission says you are allowed to smack your kids

Hurrah for the Human Rights Commission. The Human Rights Commission says parents are allowed to smack their kids after all.They can even use correction provided that such correction is not "for the purposes" of correction, as long as the purpose is for specified purposes as defined in Section 59 of the Crimes Act.

Such correction could be for non-corrective purposes, like prevention, or for the purposes of being a normal day-to day parent, provided correction itself is not your main purpose of correction.

But if you prevent a child from doing something and correct them using reasonable fore for the purposes of stopping them, that's allowed in the same way as reasonable force was allowed in the old law. If you prevent a child from doing something - like stopping their tantrum - and you prevent them from undertaking in such disruption with a smack for the purposes for correction, that's against the law and not allowed.

This whole hoo-har is a little bit like a teenager inhaling, not for the purposes of utilising his cigarette, but because he wants to look cool with his peers. Should inhalation as part of a good smoke be a criminal offence because others abuse their lungs? After all if this teen smokes twice a month he may go overboard and get lung cancer in six weeks and be investigated by people who investigate suspected cases of lung cancer. He may get his lungs taken away from him for a while so he can't inhale - or give him a plug for his mouth and let him breathe through his nose and put him on a drip. But he must not inhale. Therefore,we should announce a bill banning inhalation, then amend it to a ban on smoking, while saying you can only smoke cigarettes if you don't inhale. We could call it the stupid Clinton law and have a referendum on it.