This powerful documentary by director Joshua Overbay features three survivors of childhood corporal punishment, including Stanford-educated preacher Darrell Armstrong. (Note: there’s a $5 fee to download). For each, religious institutions sanctified the violence. Despite this, two of the individuals used their churches as a lifeline to adulthood.
Compelling moments include a victim’s description of spanking as psychological warfare, with his father forcing him and his brother to wait for a long time in fearful anticipation before theatrically removing his belt to hit their bare bottoms, saying “I’m doing this because I love you”. The director illustrates the negative results of spanking with stories of an angry girl who hit most children in her classroom, and a boy who became a pathological liar.
Why is it that society doesn’t allow us to legally hit anyone but children, despite the downstream consequences?`