Social Engineering

Social engineering is the art and science of getting people to comply with your wishes. An example of how this can be better understood would be visualizing a group that is against smoking in public areas. This group will do whatever it can in order to get bills and laws passed to have smoking banned. The wishes of this group would be to ban smoking and in order for an anti smoking law to pass, enough people in the community would need to believe in what the group is fighting for. The group would need to convince the community in a way that the group's wishes to ban smoking would occur. Laws can be used as tools for social engineering because if certain laws pass, it can be proved that social engineering really does work.

If I were in position to create and pass laws, the type of social engineering I might enact is the authorization of parents to spank their children when and where the parent deems it necessary. During my childhood, a parent publicly disciplining a child was considered to be a social norm and universally acceptable. Today, it is taboo and considered abuse! There is too much emphasis on what is considered child abuse. Admittedly, child abuse is wrong and our children should be protected from such abuse. However, a parent should have a right to rear his child without the interference of the law (to some extent). I believe that if a child misbehaves in public then a parent should be granted the right to discipline (a couple of attention gaining pops on the buttock or hand, not an all-out assault) that child on the spot without worrying if an eyewitness is going to summons the police. Some parents chose not to discipline or not to spank their children for whatever reason and that choice are without a doubt their right as a parent. I just personally believe that children benefit from a little social engineering administered by the parents. It teaches conformity and how to properly behave in public places. The discipline I received...