Statement by MODS
The Network of Organisations for the Children of Serbia (MODS) must respond to increasingly frequent appearances of Zoran Milivojević, who is known to the public for advocating corporal punishment of children and hate speech, which is especially illustrated by one of his recent statements given to the Novi Sad-based daily Dnevnik.
The Novi Sad-based daily Dnevnik published Mr. Milivojević’s statement that Roma children were doubly protected – for being children and for being Roma, and that therefore no one could do anything to them. Thus, he has criminalised an entire people, by vocalizing an opinion, which is discriminatory, to say the least, and basically labelled all members of the Roma minority. In doing so, he compares children with predators and gives himself the right to determine and speculate about the age limit for corporal punishment of children.
Using the media space, provided to him by the Politika daily, he continues to openly promote corporal punishment of children in Serbia presenting theses that are unsustainable and problematic, twisting the facts as he pleases without clear and logical consistency. So he first claims that there is no evidence that violence causes violence, and then makes the point that NON-VIOLENCE CAUSES VIOLENCE.
According to Milivojević, it seems that corporal punishment is the ONLY thing available to a parent in raising children and the only way for achieving parental authority! Only this totally disqualified Milivojević as a competent interlocutor on the issue of parenting. Milivojević consistently and erroneously equates the absence of corporal punishment with the so-called permissive parenting where “everything is permitted” to a child and parents are "powerless".
Milivojević persistently avoids talking about the abundance of ways to overcome difficulties in raising the child without beating. Such parenting may require more effort and a lot of patience, and sometimes may be harder.
In order to avoid judging what "permitted corporal punishment" and "abuse" are, violence should be prohibited by law and parents should be provided with great support in child raising, and genuine and real experts should be invited to help parents to provide better guidance to their children.
And we invite Mr. Zoran Milivojević to publicly apologise to the Roma community, parents and children for presenting discriminatory attitudes, hate speech, promoting violence and amateurish attitude towards the profession, parents and children.
We also invite professional associations, particularly the Union of Associations of Psychotherapists of Serbia, to distance from and condemn the statements and appearances of Zoran Milivojević, who violates the Code of Ethics of the Union by his actions and public appearance. Practicing psychotherapists know very well that they have a significant social responsibility because their recommendations and professional actions may alter the lives of others. Therefore, it is extremely unethical to recommend violence to parents as a way of solving problems that inevitably arise in child-raising, as Milivojević does. It is extremely unethical that professional associations remain silent to such statements and practice. We remind you that you as psychotherapists have committed to respect the integrity and protect the welfare of the persons with whom you work, to care about yourselves and others (physically, mentally), bearing in mind the uniqueness and worth of everyone. Are children less valuable and should we not respect their physical integrity?
