1. Objectifs

Intentions :
Défendre rationnellement l’argument selon lequel toutes les formes de punitions corporelles sont immorales.

2. Méthode

Type de traitement des données :
Réflexion critique

3. Résumé

« In what follows I present a two-part argument designed to rationally persuade readers that, first, all forms of corporal punishment are immoral, and second, that the Canadian law which grants parents and teachers a legal privilege to corporally punish the children in their care ought to be removed from our Criminal Code. I argue for the immorality of all forms of corporal punishment based on its harms to children and the adults they become — harms and risks for harms that have been repeatedly demonstrated in empirical research — and on the absence of evidence that it is effective at improving children’s behaviour or character. The most, it seems, that can be said for corporal punishment, based on this evidence, is that it is usually successful at temporarily interrupting specific aversive conduct. But since this can also be said of other disciplinary methods that do not involve the infliction of pain, the interruption of aversive conduct cannot morally justify the use of pain as a disciplinary measure. Contrary to what a long tradition in law of granting parents and teachers the legal privilege of corporal punishment assumes, there is no moral justification for it and indeed, definite reason to morally condemn it. » (p. xiii)