We Went Viral for "Child Abuse"

In this candid discussion, Malcolm and Simone Collins share their unconventional parenting approach, which includes a form of physical correction they call "bopping." Despite the controversy surrounding their methods, the couple argues that their approach is rooted in cultural practices and evolutionary psychology. They discuss the differences between abuse and discipline, the importance of setting boundaries, and why they believe their methods are ultimately in the best interest of their children.

Malcolm and Simone also delve into the challenges of parenting in the modern world, the limitations of existing research on corporal punishment, and the potential consequences of relying solely on emotional punishment. While they acknowledge that their approach may not be suitable for every child or family, they stand firm in their belief that parents should have the right to raise their children in accordance with their cultural values.'

[00:00:00] We can't do it, man! That's discipline!

We don't believe in rules like we gave them up when we started living like freaky beatniks. . Yeah, you've got to help us, Doc. We've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas.

Most, perhaps all, the blame rests with the parents. Have you ever tried simply turning off the TV, sitting down with your children, and hitting them?

lost your god damn mind! I guess I just hate to see a child go unbeaten.

Malcolm Collins: now I need to talk for a few minutes about why I find the research so distrustworthy in this space.

One, you're proceeding into the research from a prior that this is a human rights abuse. Whenever anyone says every expert in a field agrees on something, I pretty much immediately dismiss it.

Because I'm like, that just doesn't happen in science when science is

Simone Collins: happening correctly. There is always nuance in finding what's happening

Malcolm Collins: correctly If you look [00:01:00] at what the research is saying, it's this has a massive IQ effect. This has a massive effect on aggression.

These people become antisocial and aren't able to They hate their parents, et cetera. If these things were true at the levels that they're saying these things are true. Every single long lived culture on Earth would not have convergently evolved this method of interacting with children during this developmental stage.

What is really negative and what we are against is. Is any form of punishment where the pain is the point of the punishment? what happens during a bop? It is a light slap on the child's nose or face that is meant to shock and redirect and refocus attention. The reason we do the face is because It requires much less pain to get the same reaction than doing something like slapping the wrist.

Don't really do this for four year olds and up with our kids two to four range, because with my [00:02:00] four year old, I can say this could kill you and he can begin to cognitively understand that.

Two to four, you don't really get that. And so when you need to denote, no, this is an extra level of don't do this when compared to other things I have told you not to do the only way to denote that other than physicality. Is by emotionally elevating the conversation. And I think that causes more emotional damage

if you read the article, it says exactly what happened in the context. He was about to push over a table I did the bop to reorient him because he knew he wasn't supposed to be doing that, but then I immediately tell him I love him. Now, this isn't something I can do if I'm punishing him through the emotional means. Exactly. If I had elevated the conversation emotionally, now I need to say daddy's mad at you, instead of saying, bop, you crossed a line, but daddy loves you,

and this is the problem, right? So the urban monoculture would say to us, what you're doing is culturally non normative, stop it.

And I'm like, I have seen the [00:03:00] results of your normative parenting style. These kids are Miserable, anxiety, depression, illiterate messes .

when you look at the ban the rate of corporal punishment in the United States. It pretty much directly correlates with the rise in depression among youth and the rise of anxiety among youth.

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Malcolm Collins: We no longer spank our children's butts because now we can spank their brains.

Would you like to know more?

Simone Collins: So how do we feel being the new public face of child abuse?

Malcolm Collins: Yes, we have gone viral yet again for punishing our child in front of a reporter in a way that she interpreted as a form of corporal [00:04:00] punishment and would technically be a form of corporal punishment. Now this gets really interesting because the internet went completely apoplectic when they heard that this happened.

They Could not believe that in the modern age, anyone would touch their child. They're like anyone who practices any form of corporal replenishment is basically an animal and inhuman. And I'm like, that is a little concerning of a thing to say, because, according to a 2011 study by Gorshoff 89 percent of black parents practice corporal punishment, and 80 percent of Hispanic parents practice corporal punishment and then they're like oh obviously I need to add some caveats to what I said there.

No, actually what happened, this is one of my favorite instances of media baiting. We're being attacked by all these progressives online. And one of them immediately shoots back this just proves my point. Blacks have more violent communities than whites. There's a lot of

Simone Collins: back, backpedaling in that.

Malcolm Collins: [00:05:00] One of the sharks got wounded during a freeding fencing, and then all the other sharks turned on it, because now there's shark blood in the water. Then it was whoa. Yeah. Whoa. But this is true. And it's something that. It's downstream of why we actually do this, because a lot of people are going to be like, haven't you seen the research on corporal punishment?

Why did you engage in corporal punishment knowing that so much of the research shows it's so negative?

Simone Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: The answer here is a few things. First, I do not believe the research is relevant to the type of corporal punishment that we are enacting with our kids. If you look at the research, it is predominantly looking at delayed, ritualized punishment where the purpose is to inducing pain in the child as a punishment for something negative that the [00:06:00] child had done.

Simone Collins: Yeah. I think when most at least when I think of corporal punishment, I think wait until your father comes home and you spanked or something. Or we

Malcolm Collins: know from animal. So anyone who's just any familiar with dog training, for example, or any form of mammal training delayed negative reinforcement doesn't work.

Like it just causes behavioral problems. This is something we see in any mammal that it's used in. So I shouldn't expect anything different in humans. Yeah, it would be inane. Inane. But then it has led to this problem in the field where there's these two starting assumptions. One is this has been studied for a long time and everyone agrees on it.

Now, this is a problem. Whenever you get a field and somebody said everyone agrees on it, no edge