Reddit reviews For Your Own Good

Holy crap, neither did mine!

I've been reading through a book recently: For Your Own Good and it's been like reading my parents parenting playbook. Guess narcissism was more systematized.

Parents are responsible for their childrens behavior. This could be a blind spot preventing you from holding your own parents accountable. If you can't emotionally understand this you wont logically understand this following argument.

If a parent needs to get their children to do something or not to do something out of fear of punishment then it's not a relationship. It's dictatorship and you'll never get respect or compliance from your children when you act like you know what's best for them - and this is the reason why abuse escalates.

It's the parents responsibility to teach their children right and wrong by talking and listening to them, helping them understand, and ultimately modelling that behaviour themselves.

Before you have children, it's important to work on yourself because everything you experienced as a child from abusive parents thats lingering in your unconscious will come to the surface when you have your own children.

It seems you area already projecting some of this by thinking experimentation like smoking in the room or lying about homework is bad. Wouldn't it be better to foster a relationship where your children can you tell they tried a cigarette or don't want to do their homework? That way you can actually be involved in their lives.

If you raise your children correctly I wouldn't worry about most bad activities because you'll give them the skills to know better. The science shows that addictions, victim of bullying and peer pressure are all caused by child abuse and an unstable home. If you want to know more about this look up Gabor Mate (I have more resources).

Actually as children get older they become easier to parent when you raise them peacefully and being involved because you have built up a relationship.

Here are books I'd recommend:
Why Love Matters: How Affection Shapes a Baby's Brain
http://www.amazon.com/Why-Love-Matters-Affection-Shapes/dp/1583918175

The Drama of the Gifted Child: The Search for the True Self http://www.amazon.com/Drama-Gifted-Child-Search-Revised/dp/0465016901

The Truth Will Set You Free: Overcoming Emotional Blindness and Finding Your True Adult Self http://www.amazon.com/Truth-Will-Set-You-Free/dp/0465045855[2]

For Your Own Good: Hidden Cruelty in Child-Rearing and the Roots of Violence http://www.amazon.com/Your-Own-Good-Child-Rearing-Violence/dp/0374522693[3]

Stefan Molyneux: Real-Time Relationships: The Logic of Love http://www.freedomainradio.com/free/books/FDR_3_PDF_Real_Time_Relationships.pdf

On Truth: The Tyranny of Illusion http://board.freedomainradio.com/blogs/freedomain/archive/2008/09/11/book-on-truth-the-tyranny-of-illusion.aspx

Between Parent and Child: The Bestselling Classic That Revolutionized Parent-Child Communication http://www.amazon.com/Between-Parent-Child-Revolutionized-Communication/dp/0609809881

Playful Parenting http://www.amazon.com/Playful-Parenting-Lawrence-J-Cohen/dp/0345442865

Unconditional Parenting http://www.amazon.com/Unconditional-Parenting-Moving-Rewards-Punishments/dp/0743487486

Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves http://www.naomialdort.com/book.html

Parent Effectiveness Training http://www.amazon.com/Parent-Effectiveness-Training-Responsible-Children/dp/0609806939

The Philosophical Baby: What Children's Minds Tell Us About Truth, Love, and the Meaning of Life http://www.amazon.com/Philosophical-Baby-Childrens-Minds-Meaning/dp/0374231966

What's Going on in There? : How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life http://www.amazon.com/Whats-Going-There-Brain-Develop/dp/0553378252

Becoming the Kind Father: A Son's Journey http://www.amazon.com/Becoming-Kind-Father-Sons-Journey/dp/0865715823

Connection Parenting http://connectionparenting.com/connection-parenting-book.html

I'm sorry, I don't want to impose, but how can you even interact with this person in any capacity anymore? I'm wondering if she's still being abusive (just not physically anymore) and that you're not recognizing it?

This story goes beyond the typical (but still horrible) N-abuse that gets posted here. I know we're not here to decide who had it worse, but I think in your case, it's important that you know this is far worse treatment than most if not all that I've read on this sub in the last 6 months. She could easily have killed you. I'm not exaggerating.

Please consider reading For Your Own Good by Alice Miller. It may give you some more perspective.

Book free Preview

Book purchase link

read a book by Alice Miller

+1 on "The Gift of Fear"

Toxic Parents by Susan Forward

For Your Own Good by Dr. Alice Miller, especially the Afterword

People of the Lie by M. Scott Peck. (This one not as much as the first ones, but still helpful)

For an intriguing (though psychoanalytic) look at how coercive parenting can aid the creation of an oppressive society, you may be interested in For Your Own Good by Alice Miller.

Perhaps we have differing ideas on what "horrible person" means.

Or maybe we don't, considering that you went straight for a Hitler analogy (although, even in the case of Hitler, I would refer you to this book).

In any case, feel free to replace my last sentence with, "Well, next time you make a choice that you know is going to hurt somebody, I'll be sure to write you off as a horrible person."

And yes, I am bored.

I would suggest reading the following books:

http://www.amazon.com/Drama-Gifted-Child-Search-True/dp/0465012612/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323483898&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.com/Your-Own-Good-Child-Rearing-Violence/dp/0374522693/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323483921&sr=8-1

wildcard_, Thanks for your comment; it gives me another chance to try condensing the large and varied data on the subject into a short response -- not an easy task, but one I keep working on. For starters, two links: the first two columns of a 5-part series, both of which include discussion of this topic: Part 1: Civil Society Requires Non-Aggression - and one thing more and Part 2: How the Idea of Civil Society was Destroyed

Now a short list of reasons why emotional health is, indeed, crucial to the functioning and protection of a free society:

1. Emotional health (love, the sense of connection with others, compassion, or however you prefer to say it) supports honest behavior, crucial to the market. A society of sociopaths will not remain free for long, assuming it ever is.
   
   
2. Charity and other help for the disabled and poor (of course, in a free market you'd have many fewer poor), especially at sufficient levels, requires emotional health. You apparently believe this function is strictly based on a free market, but to the extent we see voluntary charity NOW or in any situation, it is because most people feel at least some sense of connection to their fellow man. High-tech birth processes in the US -- 20% - 25% of all births here are now C-section, for instance -- harm the mother-newborn bond and to some extent shut down the newborn's sense of connection to others; such a start to life affects outlook, philosophy, physical health, and other predispositions life-long. A recent study found that today's college students score 40% lower on measures of empathy than students did in the 1970s; I believe this corporatist-fueled plague of artificial birth practices is at least partly responsible. The Business of Being Born is a good resource here and especially worth watching by anyone planning to have children.
   
   
3. Widespread emotional health prevents (or reduces, depending on how widespread) the incidence of mass murder that has characterized human societies for centuries. Government itself is a major tool for this, as you know, but a functioning government is not necessary for a democide or for lesser mass-murders, from the small-time Charles Manson type to larger examples such as the Rwandan genocide which was initiated, planned, and largely executed by various groups outside the government and strongly fueled by tribal animosities. Government WAS involved to some extent, but it seems clear that unlike, say, the democides committed by Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and so many others, the Rwandan horror was mostly outside of any government's official policy.
   
   
4. Even for the far more common situation of a government murdering its own, widespread emotional damage plays a major role in bringing the perps to power and thenb recruiting willing torturers and executioners. Alice Miller has written extensively on this, especially in regards Nazi Germany; **For Your Own Good: Hidden Cruelty in Child-Rearing and the Roots of Violence provides a very detailed look at the issue. See also Ghosts from the Nursery: Tracing the Roots of Violence by Robin Karr-Morse and Meredith S. Wiley for basics about how early experience affects later behavior and Miller's short article Adolf Hitler: How Could a Monster Succeed in Blinding a Nation? -- note that the site graphics at that link are appropriate to the nature of the site, aimed at parents with small children.
   
   The links and references above only scratch the surface.
   

I'm not aware of any studies that support corporal punishment in any regard. If you're interested in this topic, read Alice Miller. I haven't found a better book than For Your Own Good on the subject.