Hitting a child of ANY age, for ANY reason, with ANY amount of force, is NEVER okay. Hitting a child's hand away from a stove is not okay, and it is not necessary. It is a pathetic rationalization for parents acting out their frustration on their children, and children too young to understand that hot stoves are dangerous are not going to understand that the hitting is correlated to the stove, or that the stove is capable of hurting just like Mommy is hurting. If a child is near a stove, the responsible thing to do is BLOCK their hand or move it away as gently as possible, but hitting is simply inexcusable. And, amazingly, parents who are dedicated not to hit don't seem to be suffering from any higher levels of burned children than those who insist it is necessary to hit children to keep them safe.
And, no, there isn't a "when all other means of discipline have failed." Why is it that only parents who are a priori accepting of spanking get to that place, whereas those who make a commitment never to spank don't seem to have those situations? Giving yourself an "out" to spank just means you are going to be less thoughtful and well-rounded in terms of how you approach your child's needs, and it becomes all too easy to rationalize lazy parenting to oneself and resort to spanking.
You know, I dislike spanking, especially when it's used as the go-to means of punishment for anything. I agree that it
is lazy parenting in that regard. However, that being said, I don't begrudge parents who use it as a last resort if all else fails. The thing is, children aren't mini adults. Sometimes children
can't be "reasoned" with. Sometimes they won't listen to you, no matter how many times you "gently" explain it to them. There will be times where they'll need to be disciplined, unless you're so wishy washy that you don't care, or resort to bribery, which rewards bad behavior and can also backfire. Going by this reasoning, just about any form of discipline could be argued as abusive. Standing in the corner? Mild form of torture. Sending them to their room? A form of child imprisonment. Grounding? Depriving children of needed stimulation, which is cruel.
But perhaps the most important thing is that
every child is different. Some children aren't affected by spanking (I think some on this forum said as much), and some do much better without it, and turn out fine despite never seeing a raised hand in their life. And some children become uncontrollable, borderline unloveable hellions when raised with the "let's be calm and gentle in everything we do and 'reason' with children instead of punishing them because discipline is barbaric" method. You, as the parent, need to find the most effective methods for your child when it comes to enforcing boundaries (which
does not include "beating the shit out of them" and "hit them over every minor thing").
And as for the bolded, it's probably because many people who follow "no spanking"
and also have problem children absolutely refuse to believe they have problem children, refuse to admit they've lost control, or worst of all, just stopped caring. You're not automatically good at parenting just because you don't practice spanking. You can still be a shitty parent and still have shitty children, and never raise a finger against them. Never reaching the point of spanking doesn't necessarily mean the children are well-behaved and that the parenting is successful; it just means the parents have a strong conviction to never use spanking, no matter what.
