Talk:Poisonous pedagogy

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Transferred from German-English_translation_requests:

de:Schwarze Pädagogik

Corresponding English-language article: Poisonous pedagogy
Worth doing because: the English version makes very little sense.
Originally Requested by: User:Jackiespeel 8 March 2006
Other notes:
Status: translated, ready for review/proofreading. Chonak 02:12, 23 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Supported:

One phrase in the German was unclear so I omitted it: der Tabuisierung der Berührung mit Hilfe eines abstrakten Erziehungsapparates: "the tabooization of touching with the help of an abstract child-raising device". Is that what Rutschky intended?

"Abstract child-raising device" sounds like a disparaging way of referring to morality or religion. If so, I think it's non-NPOV and should be clearly attributed to its author. Chonak 02:12, 23 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Children's books and fairy tales

Traditional children's fairy tales portrayed child abuse and manipulation by wicked adults. Alice Miller discussed them in her book "Thou Shalt Not be Aware." However, this section simply says how they "affect children is disputed, because of the variety of experiences." It is not clear to me how this section illustrates the concept of Poisonous Pedagogy. -- Bookish 13:45, 1 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The text as it currently appears is just a translation of the German counterpart. Is the writer of the article perhaps interpreting "cautionary" fairy tales as thinly veiled threats directed at children? Chonak 05:59, 2 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

My feeling is that the fairy tales section should either be removed completely or substantially re-worded. I am currently participating in a major re-write of another article, but I could come back to this one later. Do you agree that it should be removed or revised? -- Bookish 20:46, 2 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think this is the author's logic: he is presenting the named children's stories as examples of tales in which an evildoer is killed. If one were to take such stories as de facto threats addressed to children ("Behave or die"), that could be considered part of poisonous pedagogy.

It definitely needs work. As I'm not well versed on the concept of schwarze Pädagogik (have never read Rutschky's views and only one book by Miller), I'm not in a position to do the rewrite at present. I've posed your questions and mine over at the German talk page to see if the original writers can expand on the section.

The reference to the Hays Code does need explanation too, as noted below. Chonak 22:23, 3 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for posing the questions at the German talk page. I think the article is basically very good, but I'm not happy about leaving it up to visitors to try and guess the author's logic in the fairy tales section. Tales in which an evildoer is killed are a recurring theme in all kinds of literature. What is the specific relevance to Poisonous Pedagogy? The Children's books and fairy tales section is very short at the moment, and I feel the article would not be weakened if it was removed until a more carefully reasoned version could be introduced. I have read most of Alice Miller's books. Although she mentions childrens' fairy tales, it isn't one of her major themes. I wouldn't find it easy to compose a condensed summary. However, she discusses Rutschky's Schwarze Pädagogik at great length in For Your Own Good.

The Hays Code struck me as a confusing digression. Personally, I think it would be better not to make an attempt to massage it into having some relevance. -- Bookish 11:27, 4 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You might be interested to know that the complete text of Alice Miller's For Your Own Good is available online. I worry that relying too much on translations of a German Wikipedia article is not the best way to improve the English version. -- Bookish 12:36, 4 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I have to agree with you about the 'fairy tales' section, so I'll cut the text from there and save it somewhere (maybe a subpage of this talk page) to preserve it in case we find some way to make it relevant. (As a newbie, I'm averse to tossing material.) I'll add a link to the Miller book on the article's book list too. Chonak 07:40, 5 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think you've done the right thing. The fairy tales chosen as examples were not well known classics to English speaking audiences. Removing the section also takes care of the Hays Code problem. I suspect the person who added it misunderstood the article. -- Bookish 09:46, 5 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hays Code

Thanks, 81.173.134.142, for adding the Kellogg link: a good observation. About the Hays Code, could you expand that "see also" with a few words to show what part of the Production Code relates to this section? Because of the length of the Production Code article, I think the connection isn't clear enough yet. Again, thanks. Chonak 04:33, 1 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. Without a few more words to show how the Production Code relates to this section I think it might confuse readers. -- Bookish 13:45, 1 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Article format

The References section is sub-divided into "Books" and "Web pages." As it is a Wikipedia custom to include an "External links" section for links to external web pages, is there any reason why that change should not be made to this article? -- Bookish 14:58, 30 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds good. Chonak 05:05, 31 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Introduction

Since I translated the article, the German version has (IMHO) improved the first paragraph as follows (my translation):

Poisonous pedagogy is a designation for repressive child-raising methods from past centuries. It is a basically negatively loaded umbrella concept, comprising behaviors and communication of a strongly manipulative or violence-prone character.

It may be good to rewrite the English first paragraph too, though I worry that the above text verges on POV. (Hard to avoid it with this topic.) Chonak 23:00, 3 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I have incorporated something approximating to the above in a new rewording of the introduction. Alarics (talk) 11:38, 13 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Crackpot quote

The quote in the second paragraph of after the subtitle "Historical background in Germany" made my heart sunk. I consider it impossible to parent away a child's own will. Having a will of your own is an inevitable consequence of being human. At best, a person may be unsure about what he or she wants due to unaccostumedness to listening to his or her own emotions. Also, some persons habitually refrain from telling what they want because they think that nobody will listen to them. I think the wording was originally made by a psychologically highly ignorant person who mistook blind obedience for lack of will. This leads to the question: is blind obedience really something good? I don't think so since it can so easily be abused. What I mean is that a blindly obedient person can easily be made to do things which are harmful to him or her. The interests of different persons inevitably differ from each other. What is good for one person might not be good for an other and the reverse. Furthermore, parents don't always know what the best is for their child. There are the obvious examples of mentally impaired, addicted or mentally ill parents failing to provide for their children's physical needs. But even if the parents are able to provide for their child physically they may not be able to meet the child's physiological needs. Also, there are plenty of examples of parents forcing their children to do things which they don't realise are good for the parents but not for their children. Such examples include forced leisure activities, study programs and professions chosen by parents without asking about the wills of the "children" - which are often teenagers or even young adults - and arranged marriage. Most of these appear to be done in ignorance of the very existence of differences of interests between family members. However, some of them are probably done by parent unconsciously projecting their own unfulfilled childhood dreams on their children. All in all these parents unintentionally make their children unhappy by making decisions for them which the children do better themselves. Consequentially, it is necessary for all children to learn to make their own decisions. In practise it means taking responsibility for more and more according to their growing mental capabilities. Something authoritarian parenting tends to take far too little into account.

2009-12-08 Lena Synnerholm, Märsta, Sweden.

The myth of all children being born evil

I don't think humans are born evil. I think we are born with the potential of both good and evil but with the proportions varying between different persons. However, this idea is not taken out of thin air. Steven Pinker has pointed out that some people needs more nice people around them in order to be nice themselves. From this I draw the conclusion that you can't make children nicer by punishing them but by being nice to them.

2009-12-08 Lena Synnerholm, Märsta, Sweden.

Misunderstanding by critics

Frank Furedi seems to think that Alice Miller is against parents rebuking their children at all. I am quite sure that they are wrong. Such people are only against physical punishments and probably other dregrading tratment of children as well. Appearantly, some people still thinks that these are the only ways of rebuking children. As Alfie Kohn has ponted out it would be enough to just tell them that they have done somthing wrong. Personally, I think it would be good to also tell why it is wrong providing the child has mental capacity to understand the atrguments. I also think that explaining why something is wrong is good for the parent as well. If you can't explain why somthing is wrong the rule in question is propably superflous.

2009-12-05 Lena Synnerholm, Märsta, Sweden.

All the above is beside the point. This page is not intended for our personal views on the substantive issue, only for discussing how the article might be improved. -- Alarics (talk) 23:38, 5 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]