Last weekend my attention was drawn to a video making rounds on Social Media. In the video a young boy, of not more than 10 years was having a heated argument with his mother in a bus. The young child proceeded to call his mother some unprintable names, all because he wanted to sit by himself. Perhaps the mother knew the nature of her Son and wanted to keep him close by.
At a point the boy even threatened to punch the mother in the face, if she didn’t yield to his request. The mother warned the boy of the consequences of his words and actions when they get home, but the boy retorted that he was going to call Social Services on his mother, should she lay her hands on him.
I watched this video in utter disgust, because even as a young adult, I could never talk to my parents in that manner. Right from childhood, our parents made sure to discipline us very well anytime we did something wrong. It could be something as simple as forgetting to brush your teeth or something as grave as stealing.
No matter what it was, you were assured of some sort of punishment for your wrongdoings. The punishment came in different forms, from getting beaten with a cane soaked in kerosene overnight, to being injected ginger with an anal syringe.
Looking back, I believe that those punishments helped to shape who I am now. As a kid, whenever I did anything wrong, I was always fearful of my parents finding out because I knew what they would do to me. In a way these punishments helped keep our behaviors in check, because we just knew we could not get away with doing some things.
Recently, being the educated, open minded and liberal person I consider myself to be, I was beginning to question this crude way of disciplining our children. In my view, it was more of child abuse and I was beginning to advocate other forms of punishments as used by parents in western countries. However, any disregard I had for the Ghanaian way of disciplining children went through the roof after watching that video. If for anything at all, I know no Ghanaian child would ever disrespect their parents in that manner, especially in public.
We must however, draw the line between disciplining out of love, to being plain wicked and ruthless towards children.
What are some of your memories of being punished? Do you think Ghanaian parents should stop using this method? Let’s discuss…
I believe the way out parents punish us is good I don’t know about now but I remember the day I did something bad and I got punish by mum, I had to stand on one leg and hold my ears and not move at all . Cause she was just sitting right next to me and to spicy it up more she put hot pepper on my manhood that’s when the torture began
@Oheneba Miyagi, pepper paaa..gosh…hellfire dat..
@ThyckMama, loooool but it made it sweet papa
@Oheneba Miyagi, hahahahahaha yeah ryt
@ThyckMama, hahahaha
all i can say is the “chaleywote never lie”….either that or u kneel with bare knees in the sun or belt for worse deeds done..i laff wen i look back..
@ThyckMama, looool
@Oheneba Miyagi, hehee ..
When I was a kid I rem one fine sat mornin my dad took me to town to buy me a white shorts 4 my sch’s PE(physical Education). Just when I came home,my neighbour n frnd patience came to convince me dat we shld go n swim in sm muddy fish pond close to our house. I went inside,wore my new white shorts n sneaked outside wit my frnd without telling any1 anything. We had so much fun and on my return dat evening,ma Dad with a cane in his hand was waiting patiently 4 me @ the entrance. Infact the man beat the living hell out of me n 4 abt 1 week I feared to even go close to the gate n frm that day onwards I never left the house without seekin permission n to make matters worse he bot a new white shorts to replace the one I used 4 the swimming but made sure I went to sch wit an empty pocket for 2 gud days(tho my mum secretly gave me pocket moni 4 those 2 days.lol).Today,I think he did a gud job cuz come to think of it I cld ve drowned @ the pond cuz dat was my first tyme of swimmin.Today I’m a better behaved person cuz I knew I cld get punished wen I misbaved. Big ups to our ghanaian parents on dis.lolzz
@jay, loooool you got me laughing out loud
@jay, lool gud one der..lmao