eye-opener, food for thought (definitions of 'abuse')

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Just to clarify, (to my understanding) legally anyone here could smack their infant to discipline them and it's not abuse--smack their hand when they reach for tv buttons or smack their leg when they bite mom or dad. 2 months or 2 years, it doesn't matter. (Shaking could be abuse--but not smacking). I can't tell you how many people told me to smack dd when she was an infant. My mom told me, "If she bites when you nurse her, smack her leg until she stops." My mom also told me to smack her/scare her if she fell asleep nursing as a newborn--smack her to wake her up (so she would get full and not nurse every 10 minutes). She said she did it to me and it worked. It's not abuse around here unless you leave a mark. That would cause CPS to intervene. (Not saying I agree--just saying how it is).

Your last question. That's the one that I don't understand. It's hard to understand how if I hit my child OVER age 18, I could go to jail for assault/battery, etc. If I hit my child under age 18, it's okay. Why don't children have rights and/or protection under the law?

My mom has scars from her childhood abuse. I got the belt quite often--but nothing like she had. Why did nobody help when they heard our screams (I used to scream so bad when that belt came after me)? A domestic dispute would have the cops all over the place--but not if it's a kid getting the belt or popped in the face or worse, in my mom's case.

i totally get your original point. it's sad that people don't see spanking as the same thing as hitting... like it's somehow better because the person you're hitting is 1/4 your size

i think shaking a baby is different that hitting, though, because you can kill a baby by shaking them for 3 seconds.

I guess I thought of shaking simply because I was thinking about parents "losing their cool" and looking at my infant DS at the time, who is at the age where most often you hear of people "losing it" with the baby and shaking the baby.

Even when I was writing this, I was thinking that yes, there is a difference in the fact that babies are often killed by shaking. Spanking many times does not even leave a physical mark.

I guess the point I was getting at was this--if someone were to get reported to CPS for "shaking a baby" even if somehow the baby was fine...it would be taken as a far more serious issue than the same parent losing their cool with a toddler and spanking them. Even severely.

WHY isn't it seen as a serious issue? Like others have said, if I were to hit anyone in my household over the age of 18, that's assault. If I hit my own children under the age of 18, that's discipline?

AND...having worked with daycare in the past........hit another person's child in my care---wrong. I can be charged with some form of assault, child abuse.

Hit my own child--spanking. Discipline.
Why is me hitting my own 4 year old child any "less wrong" than if I hit your 4 year old child who happens to be in my preschool class?

Simple, in all reality, it's not.

I'm not saying children should be taken away from parents who in a bad moment, or because they don't know what else to do or whatever, have spanked.

I'm objecting to the fact that people don't even see that it is wrong.

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(bolding mine)

*so* true.

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This really depends on where you live. Where I live, it is only legal to spank a child between the ages of 2 and 12 with an open hand on the bum. In some places, hitting children is not legal at all.

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I'm not pro-spanking, but there is a difference between an attention grabbing 'swat' and losing your temper and hitting.

i thought it was odd that OP thinks calculated spanking is worse then temper spanking. Calculated spanking is the punishment that the parent has decided they are going to use. Temper spanking is a parent unable to control their temper and smacking things. : not my style either way, but I see a difference.

I know that most of Canada has the "2-12, open hand-butt" rule, where are you not allowed to hit children at all?
I'm pretty sure that most of the states you can about beat your kids to death as long as you don't leave marks

My reasoning behind "temper spanking' being easier for me to understand is this:
I can see losing your temper and swatting your kid (I'm talking hand on butt spank) in a moment where you're at a loss for what else to do.

I'm not justifying it, I am saying it is easier for me to understand why that happens than what i'm about to say

I do not understand PLANNING to use spanking as discipline---the whole calmly walking out and picking out the switch off the tree scenario. If I'm calm enough to plan an approach to discipline, I can I HOPE certainly come up with a better teaching tool than spanking!

And I would HOPE that on my walk to the tree I would see that what I was about to do was, well WRONG!

It's not that the "heat of the moment" is any less wrong or more justifiable or anything. And I absolutely agree that its scary to think of (or be!) the parent who doesn't/can't take the second to breathe before they hit.

but it's easier for me to see "losing it" for a moment and regretting that and learning from it than taking any sort of time to actually think about and consciously decide and plan out spanking your kid.

it's back to if you can take the time to decide that yes, spanking is for you, then you have time certainly to come up with something that would be far better than using physical violence and the fact that you are bigger....