Customer Reviews

Spare the Child: The Religious Roots of Punishment and the Psychological Impact of Physical Abuse

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This is a powerful book. It may be too strong for those who most need to hear its message, but for every parent who has wondered about corporal punishment it will be an eye-opener. In Greven's inspired hands the stories of battered Christians through the ages come to life in a never-ending tale of appalling woe. That all this pain was delivered to children in the name of God and with the apparent sanction of holy scripture makes it all the more poignant, almost unbearable in its awful human tragedy.

There are a mere handful of insightful, non-dogmatic, loving authors who understand the vulnerability of children (we, who were children, and those who now are children for awhile), and who can open up for us those feelings which arose in childhood and mold us the rest of our lives. Mr Greven and Alice Miller are the two I admire most. This book is honest, insightful, non-judgemental and enlightening. Do not be afraid to question the wisdom of your forefathers in regards to punishing your children - read this and learn.

This book is a compelling rebuttal to all those who claim that corporal punishment does not harm children. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in learning more about how experiences in childhood can and do affect our adult selves.

I found out about this book through the bibliography of a parenting book I enjoyed. I almost did not buy it, because I needed no further convincing that corporal punishment was a bad idea. But I decided to buy it anyway, to better help me understand how the way I raised might have influenced the way I think -- I'd identified some connections, but suspected I hadn't found them all. I was right.

Greven pursues the connections between violence against children and depression, dissociation and apocalyptic thinking (all of which resonated with me). And he describes many others as well. Learning the beginnings of these problems does not necessarily solve them entirely, but it helps a lot.

Everyone in our society could benefit from reading this book. It provides a powerful argument against an all too common parenting tactic. It sheds light onto how corporal punishment has far-reaching emotional and psychological effects. And perhaps most important of all, it shows a strong connection between the apocalyptic thinking characteristic of evangelical Christians and the corporal punishment so many of them believe crucial to raising children.

I used to have a job as two-year-old teacher at an evangelical church and day care center. The day care workers kept the children strictly controlled by terrorizing them with a fair amount of empty threats and plenty of corporal corporal punishment. It's hard to believe that this kind of emotional and physical abuse is happening in 2011 in day care centers here in the U.S.A. I reported the incidents to all the Powers-That-Be, but nothing has changed. This school and day care continues to keep their students controlled using these heavy-handed, emotionally abuse methods. It's horrible that there are people who think that emotional abuse is good for children. They do this in the name of God. I hope these abusers rot in H*ll for what they're doing to these innocent children.

This book, together with those by Alice Miller, showed me the truth about so-called "traditional family values." Or rather, they affirmed what I knew in my heart all along -- the simple, childlike understanding of truth that adulthood tries to force us to deny. The only way not to be swayed by Greven's argument, is to have made up your mind beforehand.

Every Christian should read this book. Watch out though, there is some scary truth in there.
Love, love, love your children with all your heart. They are a true blessing from the Lord.

Mr. Greven is very intelligent. He is also very brave. I think this is a must read for every parent. He tells us why it is wrong to hit our children. People hit their children all the time and then they wonder why they turned out so bad. Violence is never the answer. Kids need love, attention and to be guided. I thank Mr. Greven so much for writing this book.

Every parent must decide how they will deal with unwanted behavior in their children. Is the child always right? Then let them do as they please.
But if a parent has a duty to teach his child right from wrong, he must decide how to deal with a child's negative behavior.
Let's break down the possibilities into two broad categories: You can rely solely on reasoning with your child, or you can give consequences.
Now we are ready to ask the question: which can take the prize for greater cruelty: emotional coercion or level-headed spankings?
This book does not take a fair look at the thousands of adults thankful for properly administered spankings when they were children. Neither does it explore the emotionally crippled adults whose parents never spanked them, but scarred them far worse through the use of verbal reprisal and emotional extortion and manipulation.