We currently have 2 Bills moving through Parliament. Bill S251 is being championed by Dr. Stan Kutcher in the Canadian Senate. Bill C273 is being championed in the House of Commons by MP Peter Julian. Both Bills call Canada to honour the Truth and Reconciliation Call to Action #6 to End Corporal Punishment in Canada. Many organizations and individuals have been working to have this fundamental change in our Criminal Code - to repeal section 43 which allows for the use of physical force against children as discipline by caregiving adults including parents and teachers. Some protections are in place in various jurisdictions, but many provinces still give parents and teachers a pass for using force against children to gain compliance. Physical assault is one of the most common ACEs. If we can stop this, we can make major inroads into stemming the volume of ACEs continuing to be perpetrated on children in our society. Ending corporal punishment is a gateway to inspiring us to increase positive childhood experiences, including positive discipline. Here's the letter I just submitted to the committee.
Please join us in finally moving this legislation over the finish line, so Canada's kids can be safe from tolerated physical assault by adults in our society.
Dear Members of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights,
I'm writing to you at this time to implore you to pass Bill C-273 to Repeal section 43 of the Criminal Code of Canada.
Numerous studies, experts, advocates have identified the damage physical assault has on developing children.
The fact that corporal punishment and spanking are delivered by adults whom children are supposed to trust not only causes physical harm, but also severe psychological, emotional and spiritual harm.
I work with adults everyday who continue to attempt to heal from the damage caused by parents who thought they were doing the right thing to discipline their children, but who were wholly misinformed, as we all have been over the decades.
I started #ACEs Canada in 2020 after 6 years of working on my own to get the message out about the effects of Adverse Childhood Experiences. I commit my own time and resources to advancing our collective awareness of the developmental trauma created when we don't respect the autonomy of our children.
Specifically, overriding a child's physical autonomy with violence expressed as discipline teaches children many lessons we see playing out in adult society. For example, in the area of domestic violence that love is violent; it's ok to override someone else's autonomy to get what you want; children have no say in their own lives - they must always submit to adults or they'll "suffer the consequences." Each of these simple messages internalized by children, play out in youth and adult lives, as perpetrators of abuse, as victims of abuse and human trafficking, of exploitation in the workplace, as disempowerment in life and relationships - not being able to advocate for self to have needs met in multiple areas of life, not the least of which is in healthcare where life and death can be on the line. Addiction, obesity, inactivity, can all be attributed to the overriding of a child's authority over their own bodies. When our bodies aren't ours to respect and care for, we psychologically disconnect from them and allow them to be subject to a myriad of unhealthy experiences - not consciously, but because the authority over our own bodies has been stolen from us and to survive, we disconnect and shut down our emotional connection to our physical aspect.
I know a lot of people want to follow the Bible as it is often quoted "spare the rod and spoil the child." But Jesus also said "suffer the children to come unto me." He wasn't assaulting them and forcing them to come to him. They were attracted to him because of his kindness, respect, gentleness, and genuine humility.
John Bowlby in his extensive research on attachment clearly identified the adverse effects of having the very people we need to rely on for our care be our perpetrators. Trauma research has identified that the people with the most severe mental health challenges are those with disorganized attachment - as a result of growing up with inconsistent volatile psychological state shifting adults. As children we don't know who's going to come home from work and how they're going to react to us. This instability creates unstable traction in identity and relational and world view.
It's no wonder we have so many adults struggling in our society. We have repeatedly at least for the last 30 years rejected the responsibility of protecting our children from physical assault at the hands of those who are supposed to nurture them. Love is not enough. Especially when it's accompanied by violence.
We must enshrine in our laws, protections for children against all versions of physical assault. Then we will be inspired to learn how to redirect our children when they are behaving in ways that are not desired as they learn to navigate this challenging journey of living on Planet Earth. Of course, additionally as a society we must provide resources to help us all learn alternatives to hitting children as discipline. There are myriad resources available for all of us to use, if we would just stop being allowed to use the simplest - power over.
Children are whole beings unto themselves - not here to become - rather messengers of innocence, curiosity, emotional authenticity, love.
I often wonder what kind of world we could have created if we adults who now consider protecting today's children had been seen as whole, respected, nurtured and emotionally validated rather than overridden by adult superiority. You reading this have made successes out of your lives. You are the lucky ones. Many have not had privileges necessary to overcome the limitations imposed on their development by the harmful adversities they were subjected to as children, including corporal punishment and spanking.
I still hear daily accounts of assaults by parents on my clients as children. Many of us pretend we haven't been affected. But I see the effects every day. And I watch for the effects to manifest in the lives of those in denial in the form of cancer, heart attacks, dementia and suicide.
Overriding the bodily autonomy of children has extensive impacts that reverberate throughout the life of the affected children, as adults, through society, intergenerationally and historically.
Coerced compliance is not respect. It's assault. Adults have been perpetrating it on children forever.
Will you have the courage to finally stand up for the child you were and say No More! ?
I sincerely hope so.
Elizabeth Perry, MEd RPC
#ACEsCanada
@ACEsCanada2020
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