<p>Boy, have times changed that much? Next yelling will be considered felony mental abuse.</p>
<p>Sense when? LOL</p>
<p>I was spanked when i was younger, but my mom stopped after i turned around and told her to just get it over with.</p>
<p>I swear thats whats wrong with kids these days. They have no respect.</p>
<p>That is assault as far as I’m concerned, barrons. What could possibly be served by beating a kid with a belt?!</p>
<p>No one should beat a child with a belt - or anything else.</p>
<p>I never got the belt, but we had a “spanking stick” and I also got it from whatever cooking utensil my mom had in her hand. (the large plastic spoons were the worst)</p>
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<p>That’s probably because there are lots of misdemeanor-proof idiots out there.</p>
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<p>So, would spanking yourself be a felony?</p>
<p>barrons, if your boss came into the workplace and hit you with a leather strap it would absolutely be considered assault. So, in a country that believes in equal rights for all, hitting a child with a leather strap should be considered assault. You should not lose your rights simply be dint of age or relationship to your attacker.</p>
<p>It occurs to me that even parents who believe in corporal punishment (and I don’t) should be able to get their point (whatever that may be) across without the use of a belt. Or a stick, spoon, paddle, whatever. I absolutely consider the use of such weapons against a child to be worthy of a felony charge.
Great insight, cartera - and too sadly true.</p>
<p>Here’s one way that times have changed for the better. Nobody has a right to beat a child.</p>
<p>My daughter was a handful when she was 4-5 years old. Too smart for her own good, and one who needed to test her boundaries with us in just about every area.
I don’t believe in corporal punishment, and we had been able to use rewards and reason to get the behavior we wanted from her, for the most part. One day, though, I was really stressed about something, my 4yr old Dd did something that really made me mad ( & I think it’s important to note that I have no recollection of what that terrible deed was) and I pulled her toward me and gave her a rather hard slap on her bottom with my hand. Instead of a cry, she gave me a look of shock that I’ll never forget, and said, " You HIT me!"</p>
<p>THEN she went crying down the hall- not because I hurt her bottom, but because I broke her heart.
I don’t think some people have any idea how damaging physical punishment is for a child.</p>
<p>I suppose it depends on the belt and the vigor of the beating. Spanking? You gotta be kidding.</p>
<p>I know people who were hit with belts as kids. I’m not saying that everybody who was hit with a belt is screwed up, but every time someone tells me they were hit with a belt, I am not surprised.</p>
<p>“I don’t think some people have any idea how damaging physical punishment is for a child.”</p>
<p>I don’t think some people have any idea how damaging it is to let children think that their feelings are more important than their behavior. JMHO of course.</p>
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<p>There is no reason for there to be a choice. There are forms of discipline that work much better than spanking or hitting so to choose spanking is less efficient and has the added downside of possibly producing a really messed up kid. Usually spanking has more to do with what’s going on with the parent than the child and is about anger, not discipline.</p>
<p>Um, may I suggest that those who think spanking and beating are the same … have never been beaten.</p>
<p>When I tell people that I was spanked with a belt as a child, they usually give me a strange look, as if saying “Oh my God, I’m so sorry.” I actually thought it was pretty normal, so I was initially surprised when I started getting those reactions.</p>
<p>I’m not someone who thinks it did me any good though. If anything, it inflicted psychological harm at a young age and was something that I was never quite able to get over. I would never do it to my children, if I ever decided to have any.</p>
<p>(However, as bad as the belt was, I think that soap in the mouth was still much, much worse. The taste would stay around for days.)</p>
<p>^ Oh God, I’m so sorry …</p>
<p>I don’t think spanking and beating are the same thing but when you spank a kid, do you think they are thinking, “thank God, at least he didn’t beat me.”? It is all hitting and the risks outweigh the benefits. It’s easy and it often does result in stopping a behavior but it is admitting failure when you tap out - where do you go from there?</p>
<p>Of course there’s a difference - in degree - between spanking and beating. (It’s still a big person using physical means against a small person, however.) But it’s certainly possible to raise well-behaved children, who grow into self-disciplined adults, without beating or spanking them. Why spank if it’s not absolutely necessary? Do parents spank because they can’t think of a better way to discipline their kids, or because they think there is no better way to discipline their kids? Either way, I’m not impressed.</p>