psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

My dh and I help clean a church for some extra $. When dusting the books in the library I find myself tempted by the books talked about here (that I've previously not had the desire to read). This week's 5 minute waste of my time was the bible study version of "Creative Correction" (by Lisa Whelchel, published by FOTF).

I only read a few of her 'creative' ideas, but I was immediately struck by how similar her suggestions are to psychological torture. :yes2

I went through prisoner of war training when I was in the military. It was in the early 90s (pre-Gulf War I), and much of the tactics used were those of Vietman era P.O.W.s. Some of the instructors had been P.O.W.s. During our training, they did not/were not able to physically torture us (there where things they did that caused minor pain to indicate, had it been a 'real' situation, when they would be dislocating our shoulders or hanging us up by our toes or the like). They did, however do a large amount of 'psychological' torture - all of which are mentioned in one form or another in the book:

deny food
deny use of electricity
hand cuff you to another person
blindfold
have stand in a corner with nose high on the wall - if nose drops below a certain line, add to the time, but don't explain why
control use of toilet facilities (even if just to 'make a point who's in charge')
mock you while they do these things to you

It's all 'crazing-making' stuff. :sick It's supposed to be crazy-making stuff. As a prisoner of war, they are trying to completely break your will so you will do exactly what they want, when they want you to do it. We were adults, and knew what we were getting into. Prior to the exercise, we went through classroom training to learn how to resist the crazy-making. How to maintain your self-will when someone has complete control over you. How to fight so you don't actually go crazy. We knew the exercise would last no longer than 96 hours, and it was a miserable 4 days. But after it I was much better equipped had I ever become a P.O.W. :yes

Admittedly, I was looking for the 'worst' examples in my 5 minutes (I had a job to do, afterall). But how can these things be justified as 'biblical'? :hunh Why would we want to treat our children like they are an 'enemy combatant'? :scratch Is striving for 'absolute control' of our children the least bit rational?

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

ITU - I felt similar after reading exerts in her book. They're not creative - they're just plain mean & adversarial. It's sad, b/c her book is widely promoted as it's endorsed by FOTF. :no2

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

thank you for that unique perspective. It confirms what I've always felt about the book :shiver

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This makes me want to go talk to our assistant pastor (and pastor), who recommends this book in his "families under construction" class. :think

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Wow. :hunh Very, very sad. :yes2

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That is so very insightful! I read the book but never thought of any of that. Of course I've never had POW training, but still. It really is all about control, as is so much punitive parenting. What I find unsettling about that book is that in between these chapters about various control techniques are lovely lists of Bible verses to discuss with your children as they struggle with character issues. That's confusing for the parent reading it and trying to sort it all out. And one other thing sticks in my mind. She has her son make her bed every morning. In my sons that would breed resentment. What do you think about that, Atarah?

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

Thank you for confirming that this book is every bit as barbaric as I thought it was the first time I read it. I had a visceral reaction to this book. I thought it was my PTSD acting up because of that horrible story about her daughter Haven asking to be spanked...that story made my blood run cold, talk about setting a child up to become the perfect victim of domestic violence...I'm glad it wasn't "just me"

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Oh, my. I don't remember that. :hunh I'm not Atarah, but, what is the reason she gives for that? That doesn't even make sense.

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She's training him to help around the house, do chores. :shrug I think I'd come across as lazy if I had my boys make my bed. I feel like I'm setting a good example when I do things I expect them to do for themselves.

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I met her in person, and I got cold chills when she snickered about how her children's birthdays were "bittersweet", because they when they got spanked as punishment, they got a "spank" for every year of age.

I also still can't get over her putting Tabasco sauce on her son's toungue for lying. Or her daugher asking to be spanked when she was 2 or 3 or so. Or how she says that she homeschools when they haven't homeschooled since she started writing these crazy books all the time! arghh......I need to go to another post! :jawdrop

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

Seriously, those things are in the book? :hunh Or were those things part of the POW training that were similiar to suggestions in the book?

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

I encourage you to write to her, the publisher, and a review at amazon. What you've noticed is powerful and very important.

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Um, I think that doing his *own* chores would be plenty "training". Unless of course, she's making *his* bed for him, if the point is "serving" other people.

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

yes, those things are suggestiong in the book for dealing with various sorts of 'discipline' problems. yes, it is crazy.

Granted, some of the things they did during the POW training were "worse" than those examples, the but the goal is the same - crazy-making, 'control' of another person.

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

As far as making the mom's bed for her. :scratch Like Chris said, maybe if it's about learning to 'serve' other people. But in a dynamic like the writer is setting up, I do think it would breed resentment. I think there's lots of other ways to encourage 'serving' in things that benefit the entire family - like helping with laundry or dishes or whatever.

The POW training did envolve 'slave labor' - we were trained to try to figure out who ultimately benefited from the labor and act accordingly. If it would only benefit the captors - excavating land to install anti-aircraft gun, for example - we were trained to sabatoge it at any cost. If it might benefit us, the captives - shelter or food or a way to escape - we were trained to take care of ourselves. In the training exercise, we didn't have the theat of physical harm.

In Ms. Whelchel's dynamic and in real POW dynamic there is the ever present threat of physical pain. Her book is (as far as I can tell) presented as options so you don't have to spank as much. :shrug But the physical assault is there as a threat and a backup if the children don't want to comply to the other punishments.

more later.... son calling.....

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

This is one of the few books that I wanted years ago but didn't have money for. I'm glad I didn't now. Thankfully the only bad idea I got from her was the Tabasco thing and that didn't work. My daughter LOVES spicy hot foods! She puts hot sauce on everything. :P~ All that other stuff seems like total human rights violations.

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The book is awful. Just sickening. :sick And it's made worse that *so* many people see it as a better alternative to spanking. :(

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:yes2 :yes2

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that's a really interesting correlation :think

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

GIRLS I AM SO EXCITED!!! I was at the park with the lady in charge of our mother's library at church, and I was explaining that I might not be participating in the mother's group next year, partially because of the issues I have had with some of the books in the library (Sheparding, and Creative Correction). I had already spoken with her about CC, but reiterated my original points, and added Atarah's reasoning from this post, and she agreed to remove it from the library!!! Thank you Atarah for presenting your thought here so that I could share it and have this great result. :highfive

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:tu for speaking up about it to the 'lady in charge'. That is exciting to have it removed.

I knew that training would come in handy for something......

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:rockon

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:bump

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

I believe the op, so don't misunderstand me when I ask for any sort of documentation to back up what you have said. I ask because I have thought that some these things are forbidden by the Geneva Convention, but have no idea where to even start to look for that kind of information. I am already catching some grief for the way I parent and do not expect that to change any time soon. I would like to be able to say look at such and such and tell if you see any parallels or that is not allowed for enemy combatants, why on earth is it okay for kids?

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

Not all countries abide by the Geneva Convention. Atarah's training wasn't so that they knew what to do with their POW's, it was to prepare for what might be done to them if they were captured. Especially in the ME, when you may be captured by any number of different factions, not necessarily gov't run. Make sense? I mean, I could ask my little brother if official documentation exists to prove that this is how they train troops, but I get the feeling it wouldn't be appropriate for him to link me to official gov't docs.

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

I'm sure some of it is prohibited by Geneva convention. But like Clara mentioned, it's not about what the U.S. does to it's prisoners. It's about training our military to be prepared for what might happen to them if they are captured by others. :shrug

The training, BTW, is all 'classified', but I tried to be vague enough so as to not 'share' stuff I shouldn't. :shrug And things may have changed in the interim. This was 20 years ago.

But yes, that someone would encourage parents to treat a child in a manner that could be considered an 'international war crime' in certain contexts; that is appalling.

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I know not all countries abide by the Geneva Convention, (intrestingly, the ones that do abide by it for the most part rarely go to war). I did not think about it being classified :doh, so maybe my great idea is not as good as I hoped. But all the same, there has to be something that I could find. Maybe there are some human rights groups that would have something I could use.:think I know I am one person and I cannot combat all the evil that passes for Christian parenting, but I want to make as many cracks in it as possible and that seems like a great place to start. (Not discounting raising my own kids, just thinking that the shock value would be good for those that would disagree).

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

Thank you for sharing that perspective.

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I remember Dave Roever wrote about some of the training they did in Welcome Home, Davey.

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So... um... Atarah. :poke Have you read the whole book yet? I'm dying to hear your full, revised thoughts. :) :popcorn

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Thanks for the :poke

It's not an easy book for me to read for lots of reasons..... :no

Re: psychological torture as 'creative correction'
 

:hug