Posted on 08/26/2007 9:04:26 AM PDT by FreeAtlanta
Woman accused of child cruelty maintains innocence
The attorney for a McDonough woman who, along with her husband, is charged with committing acts of cruelty on their two adopted children said his client is “shocked” by the allegations against her.
Deborah Williamson Dinkler, 41, was released from the Henry County Jail Friday on $100,000 bond — one day after her husband, 42-year-old Earl Thomas Dinkler, was released.
McDonough Police say the couple caused “excessive” and “malicious” pain to the children, ages 13 and 11, over a four-year period by forcing them to run laps in the back yard of their home and do other exercises that would result in the deprivation of food, or beatings, if left undone. .... By Jason A. Smith, jsmith@henryherald.com
(Excerpt) Read more at henryherald.com ...
And the mom had to stay in jail a day longer than the dad did...I'm still trying to figure that one out. Was what the mom did worse, or did they only have enough money to get one out the first day, or what?
I keep wondering what kind of man would get himself out of jail but leave his wife there. Wouldn't most respectable men want her to be out, even if they had to stay longer?
Panther, the way I’m reading the “not running fast enough” is the type of running slowly on purpose just to anger a parent. I could be wrong, but I know that kids do that type of thing sometimes just to make their parents angry. I could see a highly frustrated parent threaten a spanking for, “not running fast enough.” There are better options, though. Maybe these parents had run out of ideas for disciplining these children.
Most people, whether spanked or not, turn out “okay” in that they think alright of themselves and aren’t criminals. Particularly in this country, there’s an abundance of wealth, so it’s not like being spanked as a kid means you’re going to turn into a junk addict and die in a gutter at age thirty. But people love to claim that a decrease in the use of corporal punishment is turning society into a cesspool. It ignores that
a) Crime of all kinds has been decresing in the US for decades.
b) Most of the people committing the remaining crimes (in fact, almost all of them) were physically punished as children. To paraphrase, not everyone who’s spanked as a kid turns into a horse thief, but every horse-thief was spanked as a kid.
Severity and frequency of corporal punishment matters a lot, and certainly children need firm discipline. But firm discipline isn’t synonymous with spanking; no study has ever suggested a particular benefit to spanking or corporal punishment over other methods. Spanking a kid gets immediate results but has less positive effects in the long term because you’re only controlling your kids through brute force. Used reasonably, laps and food “deprivation” (including bread and water while the well-behaved siblings of the miscreant get dessert, for instance) are much better forms of discipline. But just because a child with no discipline growing up will have problems, doesn’t mean that people should justify an excess of discipline. The child with little discipline growing up doesn’t, at least, have a vastly increased probability of being a drug-dealer or murderer. Now, these cases are created by a culture that condones any form of discipline taken by parents, people that will jump to defend parents that basically beat their kids almost daily for any offense. This problem is particularly bad in the black community. Do I think that a much milder, rarer form of corporal punishment, only for serious offenses and administered caringly rather than screaming at the kid, will create a murderer? No. But then, I still haven’t seen an argument that it’s more effective than non-physical forms of punishment. A restraining grip or a brief swat on the rear to get their attention might be necessary, but a ritualized form of beating isn’t.
I’m reminded of when Aaron McGruder reminded black people that, “Not every famous (black person) that gets arrested is Nelson Mandela”. Likewise, not everyone standing trial for abusing children is Virginia McMartin. People have a tendency to try and cast everyone on “their side” as an innocent victim. These people, if the accounts are true, went well over the line into abusing their kids. It’s one thing to avoid jumping to condemning them. It’s another to accuse the prosecutors of being lying scumbags that are fabricating stories just to hurt home-schoolers, and the children of being manipulative, evil, ungrateful brats, just to defend a pre-conceived notion that this nice, home-schooling couple must be completely innocent and impeccable. Give the prosecution and the kids the benefit of the doubt too.
It could be he had to go to work. Typical homeschool families have the mom teaching and the father working. I don’t know, yet, but if I get more information, I will update you.
But, why waste the time when they have families to raise?
Those were red flags for me, as well.
Just about 90 minutes ago, we drove by the neighborhood park. It was filled with Pop Warner football players, probably ages 10-13 or so. They were in helmets and jerseys. It was 111 degrees outside. Apparently, Pop Warner in Phoenix didn’t get the “heat memo”. OTOH if we all waited until the weather was cool enough for these outdoor sports, we’d be waiting until early November.
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Perhaps, homescholing moms use ¨food deprivation¨ ´by not allowing their children to snack between meals.
Unlike too many babysitters, homeschooling moms don´t use food as a pacifier.
Maybe their kids are not being offered food that encourage cravings on a regular basis from their so-called friends at schools.
Maybe it is because homeschooling is so efficient that homeschoolers have ··plenty··of time for large muscle play that fosters creativity as well as lean muscle and strong bones.
Maybe it is due to having a mom with enough time to plan and cook wholesome meals from scratch, and their mothers are not as tempted to take the family out for fast food.
If this is deprivation, American children could use a lot more of it.
Personally, I have never met a fat homeschooler who has been homeschooled from the beginning.
“And the mom had to stay in jail a day longer than the dad did...I’m still trying to figure that one out. Was what the mom did worse, or did they only have enough money to get one out the first day, or what?
I keep wondering what kind of man would get himself out of jail but leave his wife there. Wouldn’t most respectable men want her to be out, even if they had to stay longer?”
Good point.
Maybe the kids would be better off with just mom.
“When I read the occasional incident of “homeschoolers” who are truly abusing their kids, it occurs to me that the abuse came first and that the parents pulled their kids from school to avoid any questions or investigation.”
Yes...they don’t like the questions or scrutiny from the teachers or school nurses, so they pull the kids out.
“Panther, the way I’m reading the “not running fast enough” is the type of running slowly on purpose just to anger a parent. I could be wrong, but I know that kids do that type of thing sometimes just to make their parents angry. I could see a highly frustrated parent threaten a spanking for, “not running fast enough.””
Or...the kids learned a long time ago that Dad isn’t going to be pleased no matter what they do.
Or - Dad’s expectations are too high, and they just aren’t able to run as fast as he would like them to run.
There are all sorts of possible scenarios here.
I have three young sons. They get bruises everywhere, and we don't use corporal punishment. Between knocking into each other, wrestling around, roughhousing, etc. they're constantly scratched or marked on their bodies, including their backs and arms and other places.
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Sounds like you and I have similar views when it comes to home discipline. I remember pulling dinner away from a child who was being obviously obstinent and bratty. They ate a real good breakfast the next morning, I can tell you that.
Mine sometimes refuse to eat certain foods on their plates, so I withhold dessert. Although I've never withheld a meal, I have said, "After you're finished this assignment/chore, you can eat lunch."
But, imagine if we had children who knew how to "work the system" by twisting the story around and accusing us of withholding food. When you're homeschooling, the accusations are taken even more seriously because you're already under suspicion in the eyes of the general public.
So, imo, the jury is still out on this case. I'm not jumping to conclusions yet. I jumped to a conclusion once before that a homeschool family had been horribly abusing their children. It was one of the worst cases ever. But, as more and more information was revealed, eventually I came to see that the case was not as cut-and-dry as I'd thought. Now I think that family was railroaded. So, I'll withhold judgement on this one, too.
LOL. You brought back memories of my mother threatening me with the wooden spoon when I was little. I don't remember it hurting much, though.
I'm not jumping to any conclusions about this case. Maybe the accusations are true. Maybe the kids are twisting the story. I don't know. But my husband carries one of those miniature wooden baseball bats in the car for protection. It sounds crazy, but he would know what to do with it, so I believe it could cause some damage.
That doesn't mean these parents hit their kids hard with it. Or even hit them at all.
The yardstick! I remember it well... The nuns would use it on us. LOL. I remember having to hold out my hands so a nun could swat them with a yardstick. I think most of the nuns at my grade school way back in the late 60's and 70's would be doing jail time if they were teaching today. Times have changed!
I called once. I'm a homeschool mom. I called on my parents' neighbors whose kids went to public school. Those kids, ages 12, 10, and 5, at the time, were out all hours of the night, vandalizing property, threatening the neighbors, including my folks, and at least one was dealing drugs. Reasoning with the parents didn't work - they were even worse. So, I finally called, first the police, then child welfare, and guess what? I was told by child welfare that they only investigate (1) if someone has witnessed the kids being beaten, (2) if the kids aren't being fed, and (3) if the kids aren't in school during school hours.
So, if that woman had called child welfare on ME, on days when my children were visiting during school hours, child welfare would've investigated. But dealing drugs and terrorizing the neighborhood up to 1:00 in the morning? Oh well...
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You're darn skippy the reactions to this article would be different if these kids went to public school.
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To the contrary, I've noticed many Freepers, including homeschoolers, supporting corporal punishment at schools when stories about it are posted. Not all of us, of course. I myself don't support it, and I know some others don't, either. But not all homeschoolers share the same opinions, just as public schoolers don't always agree.
P.S. (My rule has always been to only use physical aggression when my child must be stopped from hurting himself or someone else. So, as a parent of three boys, I have had to use it in those ways, though never as punishment after the fact... But I know that doesn't work for all families.)
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