Whilst I fully agree that a child needs to recognise boundaries, I don't believe that this is best done by shouting at them. One might 'discipline' a dog, in order to subdue it's wildness, i.e. to prevent it from becoming uncontrollable and attacking people, one does not need to 'discipline' a child, because violent and maladaptive behaviour is not innate to any human being. The nature vs nurture 'debate' has misled all of us on that count. Furthermore, adults do not usually tend to go around shouting at other adults when they do something that shows a lack of boundaries. Therefore, why is okay to do it to a child? They are more sensitive than adults, not less, therefore this logic doesn't work.
Again, not shouting at a child isn't 'spoiling' them, it is treating them with the same respect that most adults show to other adults. There is this mistaken belief that children must be 'toughened up' and desensitised in order to function properly as adults, but this belief is mistake. Desensitisation is exactly that - and it results in decreased empathy, compassion and kindness. Everything is learned behaviour. Teach a child that their feelings are unimportant and they will grow up to regard the feelings of others as unimportant. It is telling that most of the people I have heard defending the 'spanking' of children, or shouting at them, were treated that way as children themselves. Therefore they mistakenly believe that it is 'normal' in the healthy sense. It isn't. It teaches them that feelings are insignificant, and they aren't
They are crying because they are sensitive, and their feelings have been hurt, all of which is perfectly normal, until they have it conditioned out of them by well-meaning but ultimately misguided adults. Invalidation of children's feelings DOES cause lasting damage. I did not originate this idea myself, nor is it unique. As I suggested, the writer Alice Miller talks about this issue in many of her books, as does J.Konrad Stettbacher, and others. Trauma is relative. What a desensitised adult might consider insignificant may very well feel like the end of the world to a child. Invalidating their feelings teaches them that their feelings are insignificant, and therefore, that other people's feelings are insignificant. Why must they 'integrate'? For many autistic people this concept is little more than a pipe dream, therefore a person must be comfortable with the possibility of spending time alone, because that is the position many autistic people find themselves in. To me and many others, integration simply means adopting group values, but when the group values of our society are callousness and 'survival of the fittest', those are not values which are really worth adopting. Furthermore, caring about, and validating, people's feelings, is not 'special treatment'. It is simple, basic humanity. Likewise, telling a child that their feelings are valid isn't 'pandering'. As long as the child isn't doing something maladaptive or violent, there simply isn't a need for 'discipline'. There are people who shout at their children because they won't eat their dinner! Are children not even allowed to have preferences?
This is simply a more extreme version of the 'discipline' of children within the family home, i.e. 'shaming' a child because they do not adhere to the set of values which the parent thinks are the best values. Unfortunately, if a person has been emotionally invalidated and/or 'disciplined' in childhood themselves, they will then go on to invalidate their own child, either by shouting at their child, hitting them, or telling them that their feelings are invalid by saying things like "stop crying" or "don't be silly". This will then lead the child to grow up to be a person who suppresses their own emotions, which causes massive damage (see 'Letting Go: The Pathway To Surrender' by David Hawkins). As an unpleasant side effect, a person who has had their emotions invalidated as a child may often grow up to be a person who invalidates the emotions of other human beings. I was told recently by someone that I was "too sensitive". This is emotional abuse, and rings massive alarm bells for me that I am most likely dealing with a disordered individual. My advice to all Autistic people everywhere is this: never let anyone tell you that you are being "too sensitive". The people who say this are telling a blatant lie designed to obfuscate the fact they themselves are desensitised and insensitive.
