Chastening Instrument

The printable version is no longer supported and may have rendering errors. Please update your browser bookmarks and please use the default browser print function instead.

Chastening Instrument is the name given for a type of spanking implement by devotees of the Christian parenting seminar Growing Kids God's Way. It is a tonguelike strip of flexible material; such as rubber shoe sole, leather, rubberized canvas, or polyurethane.

New Zealand insurance salesman Philip Holdway-Davis started a media firestorm when he tried to sell chastening instruments along with a three part explanatory video Safe Smack in 1997.

Chastening instruments appeared in Episode 7 of ABC's reality show Wife Swap "Bittner/Reimer: Like Getting Hit With a Whacker" in 2004.

A couple selling chastening instruments (flexible polyurethane, unbreakable and portable, 9 by 1+¹⁄₂ inches (23 cm × 3.8 cm), $6.50) out of their home were harassed by anti-spanking activists until they went out of business and left their home town in 2006. See also Stop the Rod.

Connect With Kids, Spanking

Links

Outcry over 'safe smacking' video on World Corporal Punishment Research
Wife Swap, Episode 7: Bittner/Reimer: Like Getting Hit With a Whacker
NewsChannel 19 Special Report: Divine Discipline
Archive of Child Training Resources Order page for Chastening Instrument (no longer for sale)
Article with a photo of a Chastening Instrument
News Report featuring another Chastening Instrument