i want to start out by saying that i have spanked children and i was also spanked as a child...spanking is really strange to me, in that it's something that you do to your child that if anyone else did - they'd be arrested for battery. no where else in society is the hitting/spanking of someone deemed an acceptable way to teach someone a lesson. imagine you did something wrong at work and your boss used some physical means that involved striking you - even if it was in the privacy of their office - how would that work for you? would you learn from it? if so, what? would you work harder to make the boss proud after that?

to me, spanking is what people/parents (self included) resort to when they can't figure out what else to do. it HAS to be the last resort, doesn't it? if not it would be prett odd parenting to just skip right on over the other methods and go directly to the child-striking, wouldn't it? maybe you were in a hurry or you just couldn't figure out what to say to the kid...? kids can be frustrating and annoying and loud and they don't listen - but to strike them just seems wrong to me. again, i have spanked before and there are times in the store when a kid is throwing a fit and i'll think..."boy, the mom/dad oughta give that kid a good whack," but you've gotta stop and ask yourself is the spanking REALLY to teach THEM some kind of lesson (and if so, what?)or, could it possilby be because YOU are fed up with it and you don't want to hear it anymore and they've been bugging you all day and they won't stop crying no matter what you do and it would be quite satisfying to give that screaming little beast a little whomp on the butt?

in closing, i'd like to say that being spanked made me mad and it made me mean. that feeling of someone bigger and stronger than i was being able to do that and there was not a thing i could do - it's a terrible feeling and it didn't teach me anything....and i'm talking regular spankings - not beatings. secondly, the last time i spanked a child...afterwards i thought long and hard about the power play and dynamics and was it REALLY me wanting to 'teach' them or was it more like me being so frustrated that i just 'went there' and did the gut reaction thing. i have never learned a thing - not one single solitary thing from being hit, spanked or physically punished...other than that children are powerless against adults and that's not the way i ever want to make any child feel.