Children are the only things you can beat, and not get in trouble for.

[Legodude77]

My parents would spank me when I was young, and I turned out fine.

It's called parenting.

A bad parent would had given the child anything he wanted if he stopped crying.

This

[Ad Bot]

[Jacky]

Beating a child with an object other than your hand is illegal in most states. If not, all.

I think if it's constant "spanking" on the ass, leg, hand, or face for one mistake a child did is abuse.

On a related note when I was like 4 my mom kept slapping me across the face with her slipper cause I was throwing a toy around and it hit my baby brother on the head. I was sorry but she kept screwing me over.

:(

[Tetris]

Fight back

[Lugnut]

bottom line is your going to raise a stuffty son or daughter, whilst someone using the parenting style that Thorax suggested will raise a good one

I've been beaten a total of 5 times in my life, 3 of which were smacks to the face when my mother was really pissed and I pushed it too far, the other 2 I can't even remember.
I'm growing up fine.

[Doomonkey]

Fight back

^^^ Person who needs to be beaten to learn respect.

The whole point of "the stick" is to make people fear and believe the word of the person in charge. People who are only given "carrots" tend to develop an anti-authority, adults-can't-control-me type of attitude. This attitude is later transformed into no-one-can-control-me, and leads to a society with no respect for anything and where everyone is demanding to get their "carrots."

[Count]

 Have you noticed how kids who were beaten fifty years back were a load better than today's kids?

[Fracture]

@OP: What do you suggest that the parent do instead?

When a kid is not acting appropriately in accordance to society's norms (ie Biting, hitting, screaming, etc.), parents are supposed to discipline their child so that they will function positively in society. At that age, kids don't really have a filter to control their words and actions with, so parents need to help them form that. Kids hardly listen to reason as most have a difficult time grasping the "big picture" of what their actions are doing to themselves and others around them. So while embarrassment isn't a big enough fear at this point to help form this social filter, pain is. There is a huge grey area as to what is acceptable with this and there is a large portion that is unacceptable. However, the line varies of acceptance from kid to kid and is very hard to gauge or monitor.

You have it wrong.
I was by no means saying that you shouldnt hit your kid. I was just wondering why they're the only thing you can really *spank*

[Funkadelic]

Beating children=Child abuse

You can get in a huge amount of trouble for this.

[fred da kiko]

beating a dog is ok as long as you don't over beat it, meaning you cause some actual harm to the dog. same with kids. cats and most other animals are different because they are more fragile.

[TeslaCoil]

My parents use to beat me with a belt across the rear end if I misbehaved. It set me straight and taught me respect.

[Ningyou]

My parents use to beat me with a belt across the rear end if I misbehaved. It set me straight and taught me respect.

So that's where your bondage special interest comes from!

[TeslaCoil]

So that's where your bondage special interest comes from!

You never know, that might be what happened.

[Mr. Jelly]

My parents use to beat me with a belt across the rear end if I misbehaved. It set me straight and taught me respect.

oh my god i love belts
<3
i was struck with a belt and..~~

[fred da kiko]

My parents use to beat me with a belt across the rear end if I misbehaved. It set me straight and taught me respect.

kinky.

[Fracture]

My parents use to beat me with a belt across the rear end if I misbehaved. It set me straight and taught me respect.

Me too, actually.