Willie and Korie Robertson of Duck Dynasty fame are not afraid to admit that they spank their children when need to be.
The couple, who are parents to three daughters and two sons, Rebecca Lo, John Luke, Sadie, Bella, and Willie, have written a book entitled Strong & Kind in which they detail the way they discipline their kids. The method includes spanking of course.
"There was a handful of spankings. I mean, we certainly use that as an option." Willie admits in an interview with ET Online. Willie and Korie's children are currently ranging in age from 20 to 13, so the book looks back on what transpired in the years gone by.
"Some of our kids are one way, some of them were hard-headed, some of them were not. Some of them were super sensitive, so you have to take all of that into effect," Willie told ET Online. "I could look at Sadie one way, and she would start cryin'-like that!-it wasn't a spanking or anything like that, she was so sensitive. And John Luke was very hard-headed, and his brother, Will, was very hard-headed."
Speaking of his son John Luke as an example, Willie says, "Sometimes you gotta do a little swat, you know. I said, 'Do not touch' whatever I told him not to touch. So he was fake touching, and I popped them fingers. He looked at me, and he was thinking, 'I didn't touch it!' I was like, 'You don't even act like you're gonna touch it! We're not playin' games.'"
Willie and Korie are not the only parents in the Robertson family who believe in spanking. It will be recalled that Jep Robertson once said in an interview that dad Phil Robertson was "famous for spanking." In other words, whacking the bottom seems to be common in the Robertson family.
But the Duck Dynasty duo reiterate that corporal punishment develops the child's confidence in parents as authority figures.
"We've lost confidence as parents. We get confused, and we think, 'Oh no, is this going to hurt her self-esteem? ... We've lost that confidence to say, 'I'm the mom. I'm in charge here. You're gonna be fine.' ... [Kids] need to see a strong role model," Korie says. "They need to see somebody who's confident and knows what's up."
However, the husband and wife team admit that spanking is not the method of choice, nor is it the only one in their parenting arsenal. Though corporal punishment was an option, it was not used very much. Communication was still key in the disciplining method, Entertainment Today reports.
The book was written by Korie with mother Chrys Howard, along with anecdotes contributed by Willie. The book cites heavily from lessons from the Bible. When asked to sum up the parenting style that the book speaks of, Korie says: "The values that we talk about in this book are strength, kindness, humility, self-control, patience and honesty," as well as personalizing parenting methods for each child.
