Corpun file 22976
Sunday Truth, Brisbane, 17 July 1966
Use the cane on teenage daughters
A TEENAGE Brisbane girl was caned hard on the bottom during the week for staying out too late one night.
Her mother dealt out the punishment.
The mother has written to Sunday Truth to tell of her method of rule in the home. She lives in Alderley, has included her name in the letter, but has signed it Mother of Teenagers.
Comment
Without comment we publish her letter in full, and invite your views on it:--
The behavior of teenagers has been the subject of some criticism lately.
I feel that it is self evident that lack of parental control is largely to blame.
Discipline of children is a parental responsibility, and it is too often shirked.
I have never subscribed to the theory that teenagers should never be chastised.
My own daughters, aged 15 and 17, know the limits of behavior I set in their own interest, and anything beyond these limits brings immediate punishment.
Only a few days ago my eldest daughter stayed out far too late at night, despite a direct instruction.
The first thing next morning she bent over the end of her bed with her pyjama pants pulled down, and received six strokes of the cane on her bare bottom for disobedience.
I do not advocate a return to the excessive zeal in punishment which characterised the home in Victorian times.
But there are times when teenagers, girls as well as boys, need to be chastised, if parents are mindful of their responsibilities to their children as well as to the community.
Note by C.F.:
Readers are reminded that:
(a) not everything that appears in the newspapers is necessarily true;
(b) some newspapers, perhaps especially downmarket tabloids like Truth, print readers' letters without verifying the identity of the sender or the assertions contained therein;
(c) some historical press items on this website are reproduced here not because they are always necessarily reliable but because they illustrate how the subject has been handled in the culture. We each have to use our own judgement in any particular case.
