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Blair, the Martha Stewart of Creative Correction

This afternoon, I took an unexpected turn towards the Eastland School For Young Women when I read that Lisa Welchel (the actress turned home schooling mother who played Blair on the stunningly awful but mysteriously popular 80s sitcom Facts of Life) advocates a method of “creative correction” called “hot saucing.” “Hot saucing” is, apparently, the controversial practice of placing a small dab of hot sauce on a child’s tongue as a punishment for swearing, talking back, or otherwise making indecorous remarks.

Whelchel says,


she would have never used hot sauce to discipline her three children if it caused lasting damage. The actress-turned-home-schooling mom suggests using just a dab of hot sauce, placing it on your finger, then touching your finger to the child's tongue.

and

"It's totally against popular opinion in culture these days," Whelchel said. "I prefer my child receive a small amount of pain from my hand of love than to encounter a lot more pain in life," she said.

Comments

  1. Amy on 2004-09-02 12:07:52 wrote: As a Mom of a difficult but wonderful almost 6 yr old. I am searching, praying and desperate for ways to teach my child boundries. For some parents putting your child in a Time-out or being passive gets you nowhere and the chiild just doesn’t change their behavior. Personally after watching her on ABC I am going to buy the book. I am at a loss w/ my daughter, nothing works and I fear the poor kid will have a difficult life ahead if I can’t get her attention. So I agree w/ Blair, I’m going to hot sauce.

  2. George Spence on 2005-11-15 00:30:04 wrote: Children need to be taught that there is no profit in rebellion and that willful, negative behavior begets negative responses. “Time Outs” do not work, but a good spanking (with forgiveness to follow) adminstered out of love DOES work. Ask Dr. James Dobson. Ask my 30 year old, former Marine son.

  3. Melissa on 2006-05-31 16:04:17 wrote: While I do agree that hot saucing may work, it may also work against you as the child may see you as an enemy. I recently had this problem with children I babysit I used two methods to fix the problem. 1) Make them come up with a list of the bad words they use, then a list of good words that they can use (the sillier the better). 2) When they use one of the bad words they are sent to the washroom because of their “Potty Mouth” and they can swear all they want. Part of the reason children swear is to get your attention and look cool. Being sent to the washroom is not cool and no one pays attention to them while they are there. Make sure you praise them when they use the good words and understand that they may slip every once in a while.