Men who were spanked as children, how do you think it influenced your life?

45 comments

  1. It had a MAJOR impact on me as an adult. I was raised in a very much “spare the child – spoil the rod” type household. It was all the time. It wasn’t done in love. It was done in anger and frustration. I could go on and on about this but it’s a depressing story.

  2. Not sure it did much, but it isn’t like the spankings were a constant – every day, week or month thing.

  3. There’s no way to know for sure, but I think it made me more prone to violence and using violence to solve my problems. Took me until I was in my mid-20s to shed that mindset, and even today I occasionally struggle with it.

  4. Stopped me from fucking around and probably save me from getting hurt a lot. It didn’t happen a lot.

  5. I don’t see any issue with it. I was disciplined for acting in a wrong manner

  8. I don’t think it has to be honest. I mean sure it got me to stop behaving a certain way as a child but I think that could have been accomplished a different way too.

  10. Dunno how it influenced me, but it sure made me more kinky and fked up. Parents 0, me 2.

  11. Never got spanked, but my parents would hit me all the time. Usually just once, and always only if I wouldn’t stop doing something that was unacceptable. I don’t think it influenced me outside of correcting my behavior. I realize there’s a wealth of data that correlates physical punishment with many social ills, but I can honestly say that that was not the case for me.

  14. My parents spanked my sisters and I. Personally spankings weren’t a common thing, I’ve maybe had fifteen spanking at most. I’m thankful that my parents did so, it helped correct negative behavior I had displayed. I never feared my parents or felt like they didn’t love me. I think spankings are a good thing and I’ll have no problem doing it to my future kids if need be.

  15. We were abused growing up. Back in the 70’s and 80’s. You can read about it [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskMen/comments/ole06t/how_were_you_disciplined_growing_up_and_will_you/h5e2jmx/?context=3), [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskMen/comments/g3lc9l/be_it_good_or_bad_how_has_your_childhood_shaped/fns2wxo/?context=3), and here.

    When he and my mom divorced in ’92, I was in the Navy over in Japan. She eventually reconnected w/ a neighbor of ours she was god friends with growing up. We had moved away when this happened. This guy as a steel mill worker and never married living w/ his parents. But it wasn’t because he couldn’t get a date. Actually the opposite. When mom moved in with, many local women were pissed at her. One in the local grocery store refused to serve my mom at the deli and told her she was driving her truck. He just bought a new truck at the time. She knew him because she was always visiting with his mom when we lived there.

    Mom spend the next 2 decades with him, married in all but name. They couldn’t marry because she had a kidney transplant and would’ve lost her insurance if they did. She couldn’t afford the meds otherwise.

    One time while visiting after mom passed, he and I was talking about my dad. Dad was a scientist and a respected guy around town. It wasn’t until after mom moved in w/ him that he learned what dad was really like. Outta no where while talking about dad, he starts to tell me the time he stopped his dad from calling the police on mine and how he regretted it these days.

    Seems like in the 70’s, my dad was whipping the ever loving shit outta my brother or me in the front yard for who the fuck knows why. Mom’s BF was sitting on the porch w/ his parents when his dad finally proclaimed: *God DAMN IT! I don’t even beat a DOG THAT BAD!* *I’m calling the police!* As he stood up to do so, mom’s BF got up and started arguing with him. He informed his dad that it was none of their business and to stay outta it. That he had no right to call the police. He finally talked his dad outta it and they sat back down.

    After mom filled him as they lived together, he was shocked and horrified at some of the things she told him according to what he said to me. So I’m sitting across from this retired steel mill working with tears welling up, imploring me to understand why he stopped his dad those decades ago and how he’d give anything in the world to go back in time and make the call himself that day. And I don’t blame him because he’s RIGHT! That’s just the way it was back then. You didn’t get involved in domestic abuse.

    I remember the commercials urging people to do so in the 80’s. One that sticks with me is a couple laying in bed while listening to the neighbors in the next apartment fighting. You hear a loud “CRACK!” and her scream out in pain and then cry while you hear him yelling about what she “made him” do now. The couple just kinda looked at each other and then shut off the light. The commercial urged people not to ignore it.

    I really hate those idiots who post that shit about how they were whipped and claim they’re better for it. Fuck them. Oh, what my dad did was “clearly” abuse? Says who? He didn’t think so. Hell, the god damn STATE POLICE DIDN’T THINK SO!!! I ran away when I was 12 and when they picked me up I told them I was scared to go home. he was beating me w/ his god damn fists!! They knew this! My dad thanked and shaked their hands when they dropped me off.

  16. The only way I was ever “spoken to” as a child was by being spanked or harshly punished, and it made me resent my parents for a while. It’s made me a very very very non-violent person and encouraged me to work on communication skills

  19. It positively affected me honestly. I was a good kid and am now a well adjusted adult

  20. I am very disciplined and had a great career ending with retiring in my 50s as a CEO of a pretty big company and happily married with a great family. That being said, Istill feel resentment and low self esteem not from the spankings, but from the “you are not a good child” lectures that led me to have low self esteem even today. Words matter.

  21. I was spanked. Not beaten. People too often confuse the two. Spanking ≠ abuse.

    It was a quick way to learn right from wrong I can tell you that lol and as an adult (25M), I’m glad I was. Because you can sure as shit tell who wasn’t these days.

  22. It caused me to fear my Dad more, but I don’t ever recall a situation where as a child I didn’t do something because I was afraid I’d get spanked. I knew if I did something bad I’d be punished, the type of punishment never entered my mind.

  23. Meh? I got spankings sometimes but my folks never hit me in anger. I’ve never had a particular issue with it and can’t point to any particular outcome. Mostly it’s just people telling stories of straight up being beaten and me being like “Oh….no, that is NOT what I got no wonder you’re fucked up.”

  25. Gained a lot of discipline. Stopped being a pussy If you could say so. Basically I see things as “bring it on man I’m not afraid” instead of being insecure or afraid of hardships/difficult situations

  26. My dad smacked me and my sister growing up. Both of our relationships with him have broken down to the most basic of father-son, father-daughter relationships. We have spoken that we both love him, as he is our dad, but we have both checked out of ever wanting anything more.

    We weren’t naughty kids either.

  27. I wasn’t spanked but I did experience physical punishments as a child and I can tell you it didn’t make me more obedient, it just made me better at hiding things from my parents. It also hindered my relationship with my parents in general, I didn’t feel like I could come to them with my problems.

    In my personal opinion, if you have to resort to violence to control your children, there is probably a much more fundamental issue with your parenting style. I’m not one of those touchy feely give every kid a trophy kind of person either. There may be acceptable situations where you can dole out physical punishments like if you just need them to immediately stop what they’re doing. But if that isn’t also accompanied by some kind of explanation to the children they won’t understand why what they did was bad.

  29. Taught me to behave. But not because it’s something I know I should do but because I didn’t want to get spanked. Once I was older and wasn’t getting spanked and I knew I wouldn’t I had to relearn a lot of lessons again because there were different consequences for my actions that I was never taught about. All I knew is “I don’t do some things because I’ll get spanked” rather than “I shouldn’t do this because these are the negative consequences of my actions”

  30. I learned never to say no or talk back to mother. Respect people . When got into fights with kids I learned none could hit as hard as my mother So wasn t afraid to fight when I had to..

  31. I had friends that were never spanked. I’ve never been to jail or addicted to drugs, they have. And their parents were mixed between the negligent type, and the perfect all American Beaver Cleaver type family.

    I ain’t saying I ain’t a fucking shithead because I got my ass whooped as a kid, but I got my ass whooped as a kid and I didn’t turn out to be a fucking shithead.

    Also, my kids have had their asses whooped too. They ain’t shitheads either.

  32. I think it taught me the proper respect for boundaries and that life’s choices have consequences. Like I know I can go get that chair and use it to go get cookies. But I also know that there is an ass whooping on the other side. But damnit, Grandma made some good ass sugar cookies y’all 🤣

    I think that too many people visualize “spanking” your children as a brutal back alley assault. And that just isn’t true for every case.

  34. We were spanked often and occasionally beaten. Our mother would try to redirect his anger from our heads to our bodies. When I told her I remembered her often saying “not in the head Roger” she had no memory of it. I was a neuroscientist before I was a physician. I wonder what I would have been if he continued to direct his anger at our heads. I think the verbal abuse had more effect than the physical abuse, he was just so mean. My earliest memory is lying in bed when I was a little guy, maybe 5, and thinking I could get a knife from the kitchen and stab him in the chest when he was sleeping.

    I dealt with it by learning to repress all my feelings. But repression is a child’s defense mechanism. It failed spectacularly as I entered adulthood. I think that was a good thing. I took responsibility for who I was as a young man and consciously built who I am. He victimized us when we were little, just as he was. But I became a protector. He valued material possessions more than his own children. So I help others in financial trouble.

    In the last years of his life I took care of him, along with my mother. I did not want to look back and think that I had not done my best to take care of him. When he died my conscious was clear.

    I don’t think a measured spanking on the butt is bad. But beyond that I do.

  35. It makes me think that spanking is ok i guess. Fear and pain are good teachers, especially when children are young and can’t be talked to or reasoned with

  36. I absolutely cannot tolerate being hit. If someone threw a punch at me I’d immediately see red.

  37. It did not help the situation, ever.

    I especially resent being hit with a belt for bad grades. Instead of inquiring and insisting I bring homework home, it was easier for old pop to whip me once a quarter

    Long term, it has weakened the relationship with my dad. He loves me so much, but I am kind of indifferent toward him. I am cordial and see him often, but the resentment is still here.

    He did it to himself.

  39. Got hit loads of times. Not affected me since I left home as I never think about it.

  40. I don’t remember ever getting “spanked” but I definitely got beat. My dad had a metal studded belt that he beat my sister and I with, one time beating me until I was crying and screaming so much that I pissed myself. I really don’t remember what we got beat for, and the only thing I ever learned from it was that my dad was a prick and not a man who we could speak with and expect to be reasonable.

  42. i was spanked and honestly not a lot…. my mother was very bad action = consequence. often the eye or the verbal warning was enough. i think it helped me measure people better. i used to be able to look from across the room and know when she was in the punishment mode and i use that now to measure responses from people.

  43. I think I turned out fine. I only got a spank if I did something really bad. I personally don’t see any problem with it if it’s used sparingly and even then no actual intent to harm is applied.

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