Crafting An Instrument To Beat Your Child With Is Premeditated And Sadistic

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In more news the NFL wishes weren’t happening, Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson has been indicted on charges of reckless or negligent injury to a child and a warrant has been issued for his arrest. The charges stem from an incident of Peterson using a “switch” to punish his four year old son. He made the switch himself and claims it was the kind of discipline he received as a child and refers to it as a “whooping”. To me, crafting an instrument to beat your child with is premeditated and sadistic. I don’t see how this could be acceptable to any sane person.

 

More details from ESPN.com:

Hardin issued a statement Friday saying his client’s conduct “involves using a switch to spank his son.” According to a report by Sports Radio 610 in Houston, Peterson removed the leaves of a tree branch, which he referred to in a police report as “a switch,” to strike the 4-year-old child.

“This indictment follows Adrian’s full cooperation with authorities who have been looking into this matter. Adrian is a loving father who used his judgment as a parent to discipline his son,” Hardin said in his statement. “He used the same kind of discipline with his child that he experienced as a child growing up in east Texas. Adrian has never hidden from what happened.”

 

I’m sorry, am I on glue? What kind of loving father methodically removes leaves from a tree branch taking the time to plan out physical abuse on a 4-year old child? I hope this big, bad NFL player feels super manly now that he’s inflicted “cuts and bruises to areas including his back, buttocks, ankles and legs” on his little boy. This was done as punishment for the child pushing one of his siblings. Logically, it makes sense, amirite? Well, maybe to a total moron. Your kid pushes someone and you punish them by making your own special weapon and inflicting physical abuse that goes far beyond a little push. The puzzle pieces are clicking into place for me now, I get it Adrian Peterson! I mean, this sounds precisely like what a loving father would do and is also a totally logical punishment by the standards of an abusive piece of crap. But wait, there’s more:

 

“Adrian will address the charges with the same respect and responsiveness he has brought to this inquiry from its beginning,” Hardin said. “It is important to remember that Adrian never intended to harm his son and deeply regrets the unintentional injury.”

 

Oh, duh! In removing leaves from a branch with the intent to use that bare branch to whip his pre-schooler I’m sure he NEVER intended to injure him- it was just for a tickle, right? And no doubt, that regret crept in only when he realized this incident may jeopardize his precious football career. This makes me physically ill on it’s own but coupled with the knowledge that Peterson’s 2-year old son was killed last year at the hand’s of his mother’s boyfriend in a physical assault really gets me scratching my head. To know that you’ve lost one child to horrible violence inflicted by a grown man really makes me wonder why anything resembling that would make it into your discipline repertoire as a parent going forward.

As far as my opinion and feelings on physically harming a child as punishment? I think you can tell by my tone that it is not something I agree with in general but I obviously realize that there is a huge difference in using a weapon to harm your child and a quick spank out of anger. From what I have read about spanking as punishment and conclusions I can draw on my own, I honestly don’t see the value in it but there is clearly a distinction between that and whipping a small child with a “switch”. When you employ a weapon to punish your child you will probably create a violent human being who continues that kind of behavior throughout their life. I don’t know what other conclusion a child could draw from it. I hope that anyone seeing this story in the news who uses this kind of discipline puts away the switch and realizes it is not right. At all.

(Image: Suzanne Tucker/Shutterstock)

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