Since I discovered unconditional parenting, absolutely. I was always anti-spanking, but now even time-outs turn a nerve bad.
(In relation to this thread):
I was at a friends house the other night and we ended up talking about parenting. I sat there quietly while they all discussed their problem children, and when someone asked me something (I forget what the question was) I replied with "Well we do unconditional parenting, so that doesn't really apply to me". Which of course followed "What's that?" My next response was laughter followed by "Oh, I should not be involved in this conversation" (more laughter). Then I (with as few words as I could think of) said "It's basically parenting without punishment, rewards, or praise."
The reaction I got was a cross between an eyeroll, a blank stare, and internal laughter.
Anyway, they wanted to hear more, so I told them more, and after I left my friend said that a couple people who were there sat kind of quietly and commented on a few of the things I said (like how I believe young children should not be punished or put in time-out for "bad behavior" when the problem should be addressed rather than the behavior itself).
When my friend told me that those people were very hard on "discipline", it seemed as though they felt guilty about the way they parented! Here I am using compassion to teach, and they're ignoring the need to punish the behavior (I'm paraphrasing, of course - I just assumed that's how they felt, because that's how I would have felt).
I immediately said "I hope I didn't insult anyone!", then stopped to think about it and was like "Actually, I hope I did!"
Maybe I stopped a child from getting spanked that night? Who knows... But it was kind of a neat feeling that the way I raise my child had an impact on 2 other people, who probably didn't think there was any other way.
