Dr. Dobson, We'll Take it From Here

The Fatal Flaw of Faith-Based Tradition

I don’t know that I ever met Dr. James Dobson in person. Given the position my family enjoyed in the Church of the Nazarene, it wouldn’t have been unusual. By the time I received my last spanking my grandfather was a four-time college president in the denomination. Dobson was Nazarene educated at Pasadena Nazarene College. He was younger than my grandfather and while it would be a stretch to consider him a friend, as institutional or church community networks go it wouldn’t be inappropriate to have considered the two of them friendly professional colleagues.

At least for a time.

As the story goes, Dobson had written a book and sent my grandfather an early manuscript inquiring as to whether he’d consider writing the forward. He read the manuscript, sent it back to Dobson with a note declining the offer. While there were areas of the work where he could find agreement, there were also areas where he could not. And the areas where he could not were significant enough that he would not have his name attached to the work.

Not long after, grandpa heard Dobson on the radio disparaging what he described as the direction some of our Christian colleges were heading. Given the timing, he had the sense that Dobson’s words were, at least in part, a response to his decision.

I was angered by Dobson’s words, even third-party and decades later when the story was relayed to me.

I’d never been prouder of my grandfather.

Still, Dobson’s influence was steady in my life, at least as a young child. His books—including Dare to Discipline—were on our shelves at home. They were recommended at church, probably by my parents. They were shaping the way our family and church community understood discipline…or what Dobson called discipline. For us, it mostly meant punishment. That said, spankings weren’t out of the ordinary in our home.

One spanking in particular stands out in my mind. It’s the last one. It was the one that led to a shift in my parents. A moment when everything changed, and probably a level-up moment in my relationship with them.

It was a Sunday around 12:30 in the afternoon, mom called me into dad’s office at the church where he was pastoring. The church service had let out not long before. Usually it was not good when we kids were summoned into dad’s office. It was a place of business, so to speak. But they were there together, and spankings didn’t usually happen with both of them present.

“Come here, Jeff.” Dad said to me from behind his desk. I walked up to him, unsure of what was coming.

“I wanted to talk about the spanking I gave you last week, remember?”

I nodded. Of course I remembered. I had been wearing brand new white pants my mother bought for me. Mom had implored me not to get grass stains on them. Then, after church while running around outside with my friends, I had done just that.

As the three of us were gathered in Dad’s office a week later, my father placed his hands on my shoulders and pulled me square with him to be sure I was paying attention, which of course I was. He looked directly into my eyes.

“Did you know that when I spanked you it left you with a bruise?” He asked. I did not know this. I shook my head to indicate as much.

Dad looked at mom, and I followed his gaze. She seemed to exhale, and the countenance in my father’s face softened as well.

All these years later, the only detail I remember about that spanking was that dad had used the belt. On this occasion the buckle of the belt had left a bruise. I didn’t know it. It was a small bruise on the side of my lower left thigh, in a spot where just the right movement would have exposed it when I was wearing those short, 1980’s shorts. I didn’t even know it was there. But either my mother or father had seen it, and when they did it left a mark on them too.

“Well, I’m sorry.” He said. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

I only stood there, not knowing what to think. It was as if the tables were turning somehow. There’s not a kid alive who ever bought the “…spanking you hurts me more than you” line. A feeling of vindication peeked around the corner of my consciousness.

Dad explained that he and Mom had seen the bruise and were worried someone at school might notice and report them for abuse. That possibility made them stop and ask whether spanking was worth the risk. A small purplish-brown spot on the child they loved was what it took to see things from a different perspective.

“I want you to know I love you. Your mom loves you too.” Dad looked at mom who was standing nearby, then back at me. “We’re not going to spank you anymore.”

“OK.” Was all I could say. I didn’t know what to think. It was good news. No more spankings! The we love you part was old news.

I knew my parents loved me. There was no question about it. Dad pulled me in for a hug, which I was glad to give. Mom came over and joined in. Then they let me leave, free to run off and play with my friends, hopefully not staining the knees of my pants.

My parents grew, and I like to think I did a little bit that day.

But still, years later when I had my own children…I still spanked them!

I mean, I’d been spanked, and I turned out ok, right?

The shadow of Dobson was present, even in my home.

This was the thinking: that when you’ve tried other things to no avail, sometimes kids need to be spanked to understand the severity of what they did. At least, that’s how we approached it. You’ll be relieved to know this practice didn’t last long.

I don’t remember spanking my son, the older of my two children, though I know I did. I asked him the other day and he confirmed it. He remembers that I did but not why. And, after a moment of thought he rolled his eyes. “Don’t worry about it, dad; I’m fine. It’s not like it was a regular occurrence.”

My daughter was the recipient of the last spanking in our household. She was going through a phase when she was stealing things. As parents, my wife and I were at our wit’s end. The girl had everything she needed, and most of what she wanted. There wasn’t any reason for her to steal anything.

I hated spanking her. We didn’t do it much, and it always fell to me, the father. That was how it worked. Dad–me–the guy who lacked discipline in so many areas of his own life, would dole out punishment when his children failed to show they had any more self-control than he did. And, as I type these words, the projection in my own actions glares obvious.

But as I sat on the edge of my bed with my daughter that day, I was hit by a thought that would forever change how we developed discipline in our daughter.

This is lazy parenting. It’s just a punishment.

That’s what went through my mind as I hugged her post-punishment. I couldn’t let her go. She was crying. I knew her mother would be crying outside in the hallway. I wanted to cry too, but my role didn’t allow it.

I held the young girl, my flesh, for a few more moments before laying her down on her bed brushing her tear-soaked hair out of her face. I kissed her soft, warm, wet cheek, told her I loved her. This was important, Dobson would say–that we assured our children of our love after disciplining them.

You keep using that word…I do not think it means what you think it means.

Well, kiss or no kiss, I hated myself for what I’d just done.

Walking into the hallway, there was my wife with a look of concern on her face.

“We can’t do this anymore. It’s lazy parenting.” I said to her, my eyes were moist by that time too. She nodded in agreement.

“What are we going to do? She can’t keep stealing things.” She asked.

“I don’t know. But not this.”

“Good.” She said as she came in for a hug. “I hate it.”

We never spanked again.

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I’m glad to have been raised by men of nuance. That’s how I’d describe them. In Dobson’s patriarchal system, men had every incentive to go along. The promise of authority, influence, and prestige is an easy sell for our egos. My grandfather could have claimed some of that by lending his name to Dobson’s work. Instead, he refused. He chose integrity over advancement or recognition. That choice stands out to me, because the system would have rewarded him for doing the opposite.

When my parents decided not to spank us anymore, they weren’t turning down prestige. What they turned down was the easier path of discipline as a punishment. They chose instead to do the meaningful work of instilling discipline without violence.

I can’t overstate how grateful I am for that choice. The small bruise I carried (and it was small—I only saw it later in the mirror) was enough for them to reconsider their belief system, at least when it came to punishing their children for undesirable behavior.

When I became a parent, I reached the same point. The act of striking my own child was no longer something I could defend. I’m grateful I listened to my inner voice the day it spoke up, because heaven knows the damage I might have done had I relied on pain to teach lessons. Especially when there are other, better ways.

The challenge for people of my evangelical faith community is our inability to accept new, more complex ways of understanding the world we live in if these ways may undermine how we understand scripture.

It’s one thing to change our perspective on an issue, it’s another to accept our new understanding when it may challenge our previous biblical worldview, or more, require us to say the Bible is wrong about something. This isn’t just heresy, it’s an act that speaks to the existential reality of who we are. To admit the Bible might be wrong about something isn’t just a theological adjustment, it’s a threat to the authority upon which we’ve based our existence. We’ve built our identity and the structures of our world on such things, and it can seem like we risk everything when it changes.

As a simple example, Spare the rod, spoil the child is a line we evangelicals liked to quote in reference to spanking. We think it’s Biblical. It’s not. It’s from a 17th century satirical poem by Samuel Butler. But it’s easy to see where we get confused. We liken it to Proverbs 13:24, “Whoever spares the rod hates their children, but the one who loves their children is careful to discipline them” (New International Version).¹

It doesn’t take much of a leap to say, “See…spanking is biblical. We’re doing the right thing.”

The book of Proverbs is ancient wisdom. The great thing about ancient wisdom is that it can be timeless. It’s proven. That’s why we understand it as wisdom.

But sometimes–and I’d argue this is the case with the Proverbs 13:24–the wisdom statement unravels upon our discovery of new facts.

Not only that, but it isn’t fair to those of us who have come to appreciate less violent ways of helping our children live healthy lives. Sometimes this is teaching the benefits of discipline (not to be confused with punishment), and sometimes it’s just learning to understand that the functions of the brain of one child will differ from the function of the brain of another…or of the parent.

As Dobson was building his biblical platform and labelling children as…

• Defiant

• Rebellious of Spirit

• Hard to discipline or a discipline problem

• Tough-minded

• Little Napoleon

• Willful

…neuroscience was discovering:

• Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD); Trauma response; Anxiety disorder

• Executive function deficits (difficulty following multi-step directions); Depression (irritability or withdrawal mistaken for rebellion)

• Learning differences leading to frustration/avoidance (dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia); Auditory Processing Disorder (not hearing or processing instructions properly).

• Sensory Processing Disorder (meltdowns due to sensory overload); Sleep disorders (fatigue leading to irritability and poor self-regulation

• ADHD (impulsivity, difficulty sustaining attention, trouble with transitions); Autism (rigidity in routine, sensory overwhelm)

• Anxiety-driven need for control in unpredictable environments; Autism spectrum traits where predictability feels like survival, not power-seeking

Dobson, a psychologist, never allowed for scientific advancement to amend his worldview. (I wonder if he even kept up to date on developments in the field.) Instead, everything he recommended was rooted in his reading of biblical values, even when those values were detrimental to the way God’s creation was actually playing out in real time.

In recent days I’ve been doing a deep dive into ADHD. I was struck by how many of the challenges I had as a child (God bless my poor mother) now appear to be text-book issues related to ADD. You’ll note in my case, I’ve left out the “H.” This is because hyperactivity wasn’t a thing for me. I’d sooner fall asleep staring into space than have trouble sitting still. I wasn’t strong-willed, I just couldn’t get things done.²

No amount of spanking, grounding, taking away television or Nintendo did anything to instill discipline within me. What’s more, I don’t recall ever–not one occasion–choosing not to behave in a certain way because I risked being spanked.

Dobson’s use of the word discipline is problematic in and of itself. From where my butt was sitting it felt like he was teaching parents how to punish–you know, with love–rather than learning how best to help a child function in their world.

It was always, ‘Do this or else,’ rather than, ‘Here’s why this way will serve you better.’ The first requires little effort from the parent. The second takes more work, but it’s the kind of work that actually helps a child grow, and it’s far more likely to produce a lasting result.

We as Christians (and indeed, other faith traditions as well) must take seriously the complexities of humanity. Sometimes this will mean we leave some biblical principles behind in the spirit of healthy growth, which I’d suggest is a biblical practice itself. This was a challenge for the early church.

I don’t know what particular element of Dobson’s writing my grandfather was uncomfortable with, but I think it likely took some courage, or perhaps even discipline of his own to reject what would have been comfortable in an effort to maintain intellectual integrity.

I don’t know how much my parents struggled with spanking before a little bruise prompted them to reconsider their parenting techniques. But I know they chose love when they realized it was conflicting with pain.

And me and my family? Well, my daughter did steal again. One more time.

So we packed up all her favorite things and put them in the attic for a week. We “stole” them so she didn’t have them anymore. I don’t know if it was the right way or not, but we wanted her to understand how her behavior was affecting others, so we modelled her behavior for her. It seemed to have the desired effect.

What we did with our daughter wasn’t punishment, it was teaching. That’s what Dobson never seemed to grasp. Discipline isn’t about pain—it’s the patient work of helping a child grow. My grandfather knew it when he refused Dobson’s platform, my parents knew it when they laid aside the belt, and I knew it when I finally did the same. Each of us, in our own way, chose to risk a new understanding. That’s the work my evangelical community still struggles with—accepting that real love sometimes requires leaving behind what once felt biblical.

1. I didn’t know this poem existed until doing the research for this piece. Here’s the stanza from the poem, followed by ChatGPT explanation as to its meaning. It strikes me that a 17th century poet was forward-thinking enough to recognize corporal punishment as folly.

"Love is a boy by poets styl’d;
Then spare the rod, and spoil the child.
A Persian emperor whipt his grannam
The sea, his mother Venus came on."

1. “Love is a boy by poets styl’d;”

Classical poets (Greek and Roman) often personified Love as a mischievous boy — i.e. Cupid/Eros. He’s young, reckless, hard to control.

2. “Then spare the rod, and spoil the child.”

If Love is a boy, then he (like a child) needs discipline. If you don’t “use the rod,” the child (here, Love itself) will be spoiled — unruly, destructive, indulgent. Butler is twisting Proverbs into a metaphor: unchecked passion or lust becomes dangerous if it isn’t restrained.

3. “A Persian emperor whipt his grannam / The sea, his mother Venus came on.”

This is Butler getting playful with classical/mythical references:

The “Persian emperor” is likely Xerxes, who, according to Herodotus, ordered the sea itself to be whipped after a storm destroyed his bridge across the Hellespont. It’s an image of absurd punishment.

Venus (Aphrodite), the goddess of love, was said to be “born from the sea” (emerging from the foam). Butler merges this with the idea of “mother” — so the sea becomes Love’s “grandmother.”

So what’s the joke?

Butler is ridiculing the idea of taking “discipline” to ridiculous extremes. He’s saying:

Poets call Love a boy → so, discipline him or he’ll run wild.

But look at history: Xerxes literally whipped the sea. Absurd. And if Love’s “mother” (Venus) came from the sea, then he was effectively whipping his own grandmother.

It’s mockery — taking the Proverbs image of discipline and pushing it into parody, showing how ridiculous blind zeal or over-literalism can look.

2. It seems worth mentioning, I began my deep-dive into ADHD in hopes I could begin to understand why I have more than two dozen blog articles started, but significant problems bringing them to conclusion.