I am totally against hitting a child. I was hit as a kid and it just made me secretive plus a smack on the butt was preferable to any kind of restrictive punishment.

I've done it three times. Its more effective as a sharp shock for immediate danger for a smaller child. You can't 'explain" to a three year old in a way that's meaningful that attempting to climb over the 4th floor balcony is a bad thing. You want them scared of the idea of going near that balcony, running out into the street, or playing "hanging". (There you go -- those are my three times).

Now that they're older I find myself really wanting to slap the bejeezus out of them fore being horrible, but that I don't do.

Southern black woman here so you know I was spanked. European DH made me promise not to spank kids before we married, and I am so glad he did. Some children are not harmed by spanking. Other sensitive souls experience it as humiliating. Either way, you force brave kids to fight you physically and jeopardize the self-respect of shyer ones who don't stand up to you. The biggest problem with spanking is that it can't last forever. Authority based on physical supremacy evaporates as soon as your kids become as strong or large as you are. What do you do then? My aunt tried to forbid her son to buy a Playboy. How shocked she was when he slapped and punched her into submission.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Works well on some of my more impulsive kids. Particularly an anxious one that does not handle separation well. Can't send that child to a corner where he feels abandoned. This was a child who was obsessed with poking at electrical outlets, which was the cause of introducing spanking. Nothing else had worked; spanking fixed it in a couple days.

Wouldn’t your child stop playing with the outlet after they were shocked once or twice? Seems like natural consequences is a perfect approach in this situation.

Not a spanner here but seriously let your child get shocked by an outlet? Are you kidding? Maybe let them run in the street and hope the sound of screeching brakes and a loud horn reaches them not to? It 's called parenting.

My mom "spanked" us and it was not harmful at all. My dad "spanked" us and it was straight-up child abuse.

I don't agree with spanking because many people who believe they're just spanking are often taking out their anger and frustration (and sometimes rage) on children, physically. They will swear up and down that it's a calm, thought-out punishment and it's just a spanking but every abuser thinks they're just disciplining their kds.

Not all spankers are abusers. But all abusers would call themselves spankers.

Anonymous wrote:Works well on some of my more impulsive kids. Particularly an anxious one that does not handle separation well. Can't send that child to a corner where he feels abandoned. This was a child who was obsessed with poking at electrical outlets, which was the cause of introducing spanking. Nothing else had worked; spanking fixed it in a couple days.

Wouldn’t your child stop playing with the outlet after they were shocked once or twice? Seems like natural consequences is a perfect approach in this situation.

Works well on some of my more impulsive kids. Particularly an anxious one that does not handle separation well. Can't send that child to a corner where he feels abandoned. This was a child who was obsessed with poking at electrical outlets, which was the cause of introducing spanking. Nothing else had worked; spanking fixed it in a couple days.

Anonymous wrote:It shows you aren't strong enough for the mental and emotional grit of parenting. And that your child is getting the best of your emotions.

I have WANTED to hit to my kids out of sheer frustration. I never have. But I can understand the impulse. It's almost always when I was feeling emotionally out matched by my 3 or 4 year old's sheer ability to be stubborn without reason. As you keep marching through parenting you get better at it.

I can't imagine spanking my kids in their hardest moments would have helped anything.

I am in the same boat - I have definitely wanted to spank or slap my kids at certain points, but I can't imagine what that would do to them if I did that. They're little kids - sometimes they're not acting based on logic, they're just struggling with their emotions. Imagine someone hitting you when you're at your low.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It shows kids that someone who loves them and cares for them can hit them. That's not something I want to teach my kids.

This is my most important concern with it. It's not a healthy relationship, even between a parent and child. What would be your reaction to stranger coming up and slapping your child? You'd want to beat the hell out of them. So why would you do it to your own child? This is not what people who love each other do to each other.

Or not even a stranger - what do you do when your daughter, who was spanked by her father, is hit by her abusive boyfriend, who then explains that he really loves her, but he had to hit her because of the way she was acting? How on earth do you reconcile that?

My husband and I don't spank our kids. We were never spanked but it seems like a physical reaction towards a child (unless danger is involved) seems unproductive. I do remember seeing a friend get belted by her dad when I was a kid and it horrified me. I don't know what I'd think of my dad if he had physically hurt me.

I was spanked and by no means did it result in this. There's a very big difference between spanking and abuse.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It shows kids that someone who loves them and cares for them can hit them. That's not something I want to teach my kids.

This is my most important concern with it. It's not a healthy relationship, even between a parent and child. What would be your reaction to stranger coming up and slapping your child? You'd want to beat the hell out of them. So why would you do it to your own child? This is not what people who love each other do to each other.

I was spanked, actually beaten with a belt. It still is with me, many decades later. I guess the worst of it was that I wasn't being helped with what was really happening - being afraid to leave my very neurotic mother and go to school.

Anonymous wrote:When I go out, some times I see little kids hitting their parents or screaming in their face. Parents get down and the kids level and talk to them just to get a slap across the face. I feel so bad and I want to go up and ask if I can slap the shit out of their kid for them.

Cool story. The best way to teach a kid not to be violent is to hit them?

It shows you aren't strong enough for the mental and emotional grit of parenting. And that your child is getting the best of your emotions.

I have WANTED to hit to my kids out of sheer frustration. I never have. But I can understand the impulse. It's almost always when I was feeling emotionally out matched by my 3 or 4 year old's sheer ability to be stubborn without reason. As you keep marching through parenting you get better at it.

I can't imagine spanking my kids in their hardest moments would have helped anything.

Anonymous wrote:It shows kids that someone who loves them and cares for them can hit them. That's not something I want to teach my kids.

This is my most important concern with it. It's not a healthy relationship, even between a parent and child. What would be your reaction to stranger coming up and slapping your child? You'd want to beat the hell out of them. So why would you do it to your own child? This is not what people who love each other do to each other.