re: OT: Did you get whipped/spankings as a child?

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I have spanked one of my kids and realized it did nothing but made me feel better....and taught the kid that if your bigger and stronger you can force your will on those who are smaller and weaker.

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That is something I never got from being spanked. If a parent disciplines with love and explains to the child why they are being disciplined, the "lesson" shouldn't be that you are free to inflict physical violence based on whether or not you can get away with it, or if you are bigger or stronger than your victim. Sorry, but I think that's a screwed up way of looking at discipline.

Perhaps you were beaten without mercy and your caregiver(s) didn't really care about your well-being or whether or not you would learn the right lesson. If so, then that is truly sad, but that is not how discipline should be enforced.

Different forms of discipline work better on different kids, so spanking may not be needed for every child to get them to learn their lesson. The reason why spanking is a universal (or used to be) punishment is because pain is a deterrent everyone understands, even children. The point of it (or any form of discipline) is to teach children that bad/unacceptable behavior has negative consequences and it is supposed to train them not to act that way. The point of teaching children this early on is supposed to be to prevent greater or more serious consequences in the future as they get older and the impact of their behavior is greater and they are held more accountable or responsible for their actions by more people (bosses, spouses, friends, government, etc.)

I believe that if spanking is to be used, it should be done in a controlled way. I don't believe in spanking out of anger or frustration, since you're probably not as much in control of your own actions (how hard your spank them or where) if you are emotionally compromised. I also believe that spanking should be accompanied with an explanation of why the punishment was being implemented as well as affirmation that you still love the child and are doing it to correct their behavior.

For those that say that spanking just reinforces the notion that hitting others is OK, I would say that it shouldn't. Most things we do in life are contextual. Killing someone in cold blood is immoral and illegal, but killing someone in self-defense or in defense of someone else is moral and legal. Therefore "killing" is not necessarily wrong in itself. The same thing applies to other forms of violence, such as corrective discipline through spanking.