Is Spanking A Child Abuse Or Discipline?

With the recent viral youtube video of a judge supposedly disciplining his daughter with a belt, the practice of spanking a child has been in the headlines.  Mainly, the discussion is does “spanking” or “whupping” a child cause more harm than good? Does corporal punishment still have a place in our society? Is it child abuse or old fashion disciplinary measures?

As you would imagine, there are individuals (child psychologists) on both ends of the spectrum. Some same a swat on the bottom of a child is in order, for it reaffirms the verbal message of punishment. While others would say under no circumstance should a parent hit a child, as it only causes the child to become aggressive. Not only that, some behavioral experts say spanking a child only has a short term message of discipline, and the long term message to the child is don’t get caught. Naturally, both sides have statistics to prove their point.

Look at today’s youths. Some are completely unruly. Is it a result of parents not “sparing the rod?” Every where you turn a youth is acting out in school or some other social setting. The language youths use today is worse than sailors (who are supposedly known for their foul mouths). As for manners, forget about it. They don’t exist. Can all this be blamed on generational differences of punishment, or does the problem lie with the youths not being spanked as a child or spanked as a child? (We could dump it all at the foot of pop culture which is a whole different story.)

I am not sure who’s right or who’s wrong.

While growing up, I got my fair share of “spankings” and “whuppings.” I would like to say they made me a better person. Though some might argue, I knew nothing else, so it is natural for me to come to that conclusion. My parents would say to those individuals that they “spared the rod” so that the law enforcement wouldn’t have to. Whatever that means?

I have friends who received the same form of discipline as I did growing up. As adults, however, they decided to take a different approach in punishing their children. The results were mixed. Some said avoiding a spanking worked. A few others said they had to introduce a spanking or two to accompany the timeout process to reaffirm their message of punishment.

Clearly, this is a debate that will go on for sometime. That being said, I do believe there is a difference between spanking a child and beating a child. Unfortunately, the problem is some parents can’t tell the difference and go too far with their spankings which lead to abuse.