tape on kid's mouth

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Would you consider putting tape over a kid's mouth discipline or abuse? I saw someone post a picture on Facebook recently of their kids with tape over their mouths and I'm not sure.

I would say it's abuse unless it was some sort of posed picture as a joke.

I hear it is and I used to put scotch tape over my own mouth because I got tired of getting accused of talking in class or making sounds when I was just minding my own business and not making a peep. I just wouldn't believe then I had no awareness of my behavior so I thought everyone was lying when they would claim I did something like make noise or talk or push someone aside. It was very frustrating then. Imagine life where you had no awareness of your actions and everywhere you went, people would get mad at you and say you did something you didn't even do. Imagine people hearing your thoughts and getting in trouble for even thinking it because you didn't know you said it out loud.

They were also wearing a shirt like this.

http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/get-along-shirt

I don't know if it was meant to be a joke or not.

Depends on the tape.

Scotch tape?? Masking tape?? Not my style (although I've thought about it from time to time), but it's not going to hurt when you peel it off. Discipline.

Duct tape?? Packing tape?? That's going to take some lip off with it. That's abuse.

I think that was just meant to be a joke. They better watch out though. Some overzealous CPS worker could see it and be all over them and there's no telling when that mess would end.

A man once posted a photo on Facebook of his toddler being tied into a pretzel and one of his "friends" reported it and CPS came and the man faced charges. I think he did it as a joke so I doubt he left her like that after he took the picture. You really have to be careful with humor and kids. One mom in Florida got her kids taken for staging child abuse with her photos because she thought it would make her ex get back together with her but instead he showed the photos to the police she text him. The newborn wasn't hurt and neither was her three year old but they didn't care because they had the photos and they looked brutal and the baby happened to be crying in them. She didn't even do it as a joke but it still showed you really have to be careful with what photos you put online and even if they are cute, you still have to be careful. I even saw a baby photo in a high school yearbook of a high school senior being in the dryer from when he was a baby and I thought it was cute. Post it online, someone might freak out and call social services and your kids are taken. I also wouldn't put a photo online of your kid having their mouth taped shut as a joke because it can really backfire. I am really this paranoid because of the media stories. It just taught me be careful with jokes and your children. Someone might not find it cute and might report it.

Here is another story about someone typing their kid up when I tried to find the other story about that man.

http://www.scnow.com/news/local/article ... 0f31a.html

Be careful parents with your humor.

Kids + abuse = not funny. Ever.

as accused of child abuse for quoting Klingon ... "today is a good day to die" ... in front of my children.


Remember anything that someone "thinks" harms your kids is child abuse. It is very very subjective in court.

In The Simpsons, it's humorous when Homer chokes his son whenever he gets mad. In South Park it's humorous when Butters always gets ground and they beat him up sometimes. But in real life it's not funny when it happens. Some parents joke about tying their kids up or beating them up or kicking their asses but not everyone finds it funny and they take it seriously. When parents say these things, they don't mean it. They are just exaggerating. Even some will joke they got their asses kicked when they mean they got in trouble, they don't mean their mom beat them up. If they did actually mean it, that is scary then because they were abused and they think that is totally acceptable and they don't even know they were abused.

How things have changed in the short time since I was a kid.
I used to spend time with my next door neighbours, they would talk to me and liked my company as they where childless.
One day the wife, a nurse, asked me what the angry purple welts around my neck were from, I told her my Stepfather had strangled me.
Back then folk didn't interfere with other peoples family life.

How I wished they had had adverts like this back then, though I hasten to add I never had a cigarette put out on my face.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFtRuBdtMmw[/youtube]

If you wouldn't do it if other people are watching, then I classify it as abuse.

Sometimes there is a place for theater as a parent. However, the metaphor of tape over the mouth would usually be too abstract for a child to be effectively learned as a lesson. It would seem to be more of an opportunity for the parent to express his distress and this would be a mis-use (ab-use) of the child.

Time spent in a chair facing a wall would seem to be more likely to remind a child that they are supposed to be quiet. The objective is to teach the child to control himself.

That is, indeed, my preferred method.

It takes TIME.

We seem to live in a world that has lost all semblance of common sense.

1) We're missing the idea that raising kids takes time, and seem to think instead that effective parenting equates to instantaneous results.

2) We're missing the idea that raising kids is frustrating, and seem to think that anything other than happy smiles and sweet words equates to abuse.

3) This sets up a really nasty perpetual motion machine, whereby every time something's not perfect, people end up upset and turn a small issue into a medium-sized issue...

...and every time people end up upset, that brings on them suspicions of abuse and heaps criticism upon them, and turns a moderate issue into a massive issue.

The only currently efficacious way of stopping this is to keep a lid on the small issues, and try to appear perfect, so the perpetual motion machine doesn't get started in the first place.

That's... Well, that's not really a good thing, is it?? It leads to people being more isolated, and getting scareder over smaller problems...

Holy cow. YIKES!!

If they did it and left it there, it could be dangerous. I've heard of someone with allergies getting kidnapped and dying of suffocation because her sinuses acted up.

Of course this is perfectly acceptable now. Because people in charge only pay attention to abused kids if someone is watching that can give them a raise or help them get re-elected. Nothing has changed since I was 15 and the county attorney (my best friend's dad) had pictures of me with handprint bruises and still couldn't get anything done. People in positions of power could care less about anyone too young to vote or give them contributions.