Bigred1995;629816 wrote:Out of curiosity, how much experience do you have dealing with families in these situations?
A few years (2-3) with about 15-30 kids at any given time. Most of my time is spent with the kids, but there is regular parental interaction as well. The kids who get whooped for "acting like they want to be in a gang" seem to be the ones whose names I end up hearing most often on the local police scanner.
Bigred1995;629816 wrote:It's been my experience that it does work, especially when you consider what most of these families have to work with. The problem isn't the parent that does this, it's the parent that does nothing!
Oh I would CERTAINLY agree that this does deter SOME of the kids ... which is more than doing nothing. I don't know what you've seen, but this kind of parental behavior seems to be polarizing. The kids seem to fall decisively one way or the other.
Bigred1995;629816 wrote:I'd be willing to bet that most of the thugs & gang members have parents that are either dead, in prison, no where to be found because they left before or soon after the child was born, or are trying to be a thug with their child.
I agree. These same ones often have mothers or other father figures (grandfathers are mostly what I see) who think they can "beat" the thug out of the child. Doesn't work that way.
Bigred1995;629816 wrote:When these kids think in terms of people being "soft" or "hard", how would you suggest these situations be handled?
I think that mentality is what needs to be worked on, and not simply accepted as a foregone conclusion.
It needs to be noted that I am no child psychologist or anything. Just a volunteer.
