The Dead Roo

Comment from Iain Hall
Time: April 7, 2007, 8:38 am

Kieran
Just one question; do you have any children? If you don’t then I’ll politely suggest that you have no idea what you are talking about.
To suggest that smacking is universally a bad idea is as silly as suggesting that children should be beaten daily as punishment for the sins that they committed that the parent has missed.
Corporal punishment, has a very small place in a parents child rearing and it is futile to try to ban it through legislation. Laws that cannot be enforced are essentially very bad laws and in the absence of surveillance in every house these sort of laws just can not be enforced.
.

Comment from Ronald Raygun
Time: April 7, 2007, 9:40 am

This strikes me as potential morality legislation even though it won’t be discussed as such by major parties. I am yet to have children (although they are on the cards) and feel that what is tantamount to assault is completely unwarranted. When children are too young to understand logical arguments that explain why they shouldn’t do something “naughty” a tap on the hand and an angry face is fine. I do not condone taking to a kid’s behind with a belt, paddle, wooden spoon or even hand. Using violence as a deterrent is not an effective means, just look at the death sentence.

Comment from Alex
Time: April 7, 2007, 10:17 am

Good post -

Smacking is always the wrong thing to do, and yes I do have children.

Teaching children that violence is an appropriate problem solving technique is counterproductive and dangerous. I deal with this damage every day

The “I was smacked as a child and I’m OK defense” is one of the funniest I’ve heard. Though the person may not feel they have been psychologically damaged, they are clearly wrong as demonstrated by their need to turn to violence against their own children. Having said that, I know that most parents who were smacked as children don’t assault their children.

Comment from Rebecca
Time: April 7, 2007, 11:34 am

Smacking is a perfectly reasonable thing to do. There is a clear line between a gentle tap as a rebuke and physical abuse (a distinction which Ronald Raygun explains well above) that actually harms children, something which the fanatics seem to have no comprehension of.

If I did something stupid as a child, I got a smack, and I generally didn’t do it again. It was hardly “violence”; rather, the best way of getting across to a child not yet capable of being reasoned with that something is wrong.

A gentle smack is not done out of a loss of control. I think it is rather sad that people suddenly wonder why there was an according rise in feral and uncontrollable children at around the same time (mid-1990s era) that smacking them for misbehaving became “uncool”. This backlash is political correctness gone completely insane, and an entire generation of children and parents has suffered for it.

Comment from joe2
Time: April 7, 2007, 12:55 pm

“But then, their website also declares that “Expert Research Finds Homosexuality More Dangerous Than Smoking”.

Just typical kiwi, fundy, bulldust. Their link to research does not work and no consideration is made of both in combination. Suspect it is just another case of hetro-jealousy. Te he….

Comment from Kieran
Time: April 7, 2007, 2:12 pm

Just one question; do you have any children? If you don’t then I’ll politely suggest that you have no idea what you are talking about.

No, I do not have children. I disagree with your claim that this means I “have no idea”. No, I cannot bring the perspective of a parent to this discussion, but that is not the only valid perspective to be heard.

To suggest that smacking is universally a bad idea is as silly as suggesting that children should be beaten daily as punishment for the sins that they committed that the parent has missed.

Why?

Corporal punishment, has a very small place in a parents child rearing and it is futile to try to ban it through legislation.

I agree that this legislation will be nigh on unenforcable. A bit like speed limits, the state lacks the coercive power to control all our actions, all the time.

I diagree with Iain and Bec on this one (obviously). I smack my dog, it’s certainly an effective form of behavior modification. The dog bites, the dog gets smacked, the dog cowers away.

But children are not dogs.

Smacking the dog does several things we would not want to do to a child. We do not want the child to see adults and authority as unquestionable masters, to be feared in the case of infringement.

A dog is a prisoner. We do not want it to be an equal. We deliberately stunt its emotional development. We want it to fear crossing us. We want it to know we will always be in charge, we will always dominate every aspect of it’s life. We want it to know that infringement will result in pain.

Do we want any of these things in the next generation of citizens?

In responce to Bec.

Children did not suddenly become “feral” in the ’90s. There was not some mythical golden age in which all children were magically well behaved like in Enid Blyton stories.

I doubt there would be a negative correlation between smacking and crime.

Moving on.

There is no line between this “gentle tap” you talk of and assault. The goal of the “gentle tap” is to inflict pain in order to dissaude repeat behavior.

Try and enter the mind you had back then. The “gentle tap” wasn’t something that made you think “oh I’d better not do that again”. It was pain, distress, anger and resentment.

I had one parent who gave me such a “gentle tap” from time to time, and another who went to town with various implements. One may not have left me with bruises, both left me hating them.

I may get along well with both my parents now, but I’m not in the mood to do what I’m supposed to do (ie. look back upon it all and laugh).

Comment from Rebecca
Time: April 7, 2007, 2:35 pm

All of this is hyperbole. No one has produced the slightest bit of evidence that smacking makes children see adults and authority as unquestioned masters, makes their emotional development stunted, or makes them prone to being dominated.

Children *did* became worse in the 90s. Parents from my and my siblings’ generation have a hell of a lot more trouble with their children than our parents generation did. This isn’t much of a surprise. If you ditch well-established methods of discipline for “effective, non-violent and positive behavior modification”, you just end up with a feral child. It rather reminds me of the means by which schools have been taught to deal with bullies in this day and age; it may be non-violent, it may be “positive behaviour modification”, but it’s about as effective as the proverbial tits on a bull in actually getting the child to behave.

When I was smacked as a child, I felt pain for a couple of minutes, recognised that I’d done something wrong, and got over it. I’m very thankful that that sort of thing happened; as a generally well-behaved child and adolescent I got myself into far less trouble than the products of “positive behaviour modification” do today. It’s not a matter of laughing; it’s a matter of recognising that it was a (useful) part of growing up.

“Going to town with various implements” is, plain and simple, physical abuse. Extending that to the gentle tap - which worked well for generations and generations - is a perfect example of the left’s tendency to throw the proverbial baby, bathroom and house out with the bathwater.

Comment from Alex
Time: April 7, 2007, 3:04 pm

If I did something stupid as a child, I got a smack, and I generally didn’t do it again. It was hardly “violence”; rather, the best way of getting across to a child not yet tof being reasoned with that something is wrong.

I’m very disappointed in your commentary, Rebecca, especially in light of your excellent post about recent shocking judiciary decisions.

A “gentle tap” may be that way to the adult, but has the effect of modifying the child’s through fear. You can make anyone comply with anything by using fear.

I hear your exact same argument coming from abusive men every day, Rebecca. Somehow they think that abuse is perfectly reasonable if it is somehow restrained. “I only hit her softly, it didn’t even leave a bruise” Is one of my favourites. Disturbingly, that is precisely your argument.

I think it is rather sad that people suddenly wonder why there was an according rise in feral and uncontrollable children at around the same time (mid-1990s era) that smacking them for misbehaving became “uncool”. This backlash is political correctness gone completely insane, and an entire generation of children and parents has suffered for it.

Rebecca, that’s the same argument that’s been used for eons, with each generation lamenting the decline of morals and behaviour of the next. Smacking has been ‘uncool’ since the 1960’s when researchers first began to notice a correlation between smacking (or spanking as Americans say) and maladaptive behaviors in children continuing through adolescence and adulthood.

Smacking advocates show an extremely unsophisticated understanding about child development. Numerous positive parenting programs show that a respectful and consistent approach to child rearing leads to children with a highly developed sense of problem solving and self-control. They also learn that problems can be solved without resorting to violence, which is probably the most important lesson of all.

There’s plenty of literature out there.

Comment from Rebecca
Time: April 7, 2007, 4:12 pm

I’m sorry, but that is ludicrous. You cannot apply the logic of dealing with a misbehaving child who has not yet developed the capacity to reason and evaluate consequences to a man abusing his adult partner. The former is concerned with teaching a child who has not yet learned how to behave how to do the right thing; the latter is concerned with a pure exercise of control. Treating the situations as being one and the same is bizarre.

As nice as it sounds, this sort of theory doesn’t work in practice. It sounds lovely, warm and fuzzy, but fails dismally when you actually have to try and apply it in reality. This attitude is quite analogous to what I saw with school bullying years ago. It was quite the “in” thing to try positive reinforcement, encouraging self-control, etc, to correct the behaviour of kids engaged in bullying, rather than taking actual punitive action. The problem is that it didn’t work - and didn’t work so badly that the Department of Education kept ending up in court when the victims of that policy ended up very traumatised and launched a spate of lawsuits. This perhaps hit home best when the poor daughter of the academic who was one of its biggest proponents become one of the worst victims of bullying I ever saw; he was simply so obsessed with his ideology that he couldn’t even see the reality of his own daughter’s experience.

Yet, most of all, this insane ideology is failing the children who grow up under it. A child who grows up without learning any discipline might be spared a light tap on the bum or three, and find the school system tolerant, but without that discipline, when they get out into the real world, they’re likely to find themselves getting fired an awful lot.

Comment from Iain Hall
Time: April 7, 2007, 4:35 pm

I disagree with Iain and Bec on this one (obviously). I smack my dog, it’s certainly an effective form of behavior modification. The dog bites, the dog get smacked, the dog cowers away.

But children are not dogs.

I have previously bred pedigree dogs and I have a lot of experience in dog training and you are quite wrong about smacking a dog you will not make a dog fear you with the occasional smack But the dog will learn that you are higher up in the pack pecking order. Actually Kieran I think you are quite mistaken in your claim here; until the children are amenable to reason the way to modify unwanted behavior is exactly the same in principle as you would use for your dog. Of course as a child grows older, between three and four in my experience, and become more amenable to reason then the occasional smack becomes both less necessary and less effective. But given the choice between a fairly gentle tap on the back of the hand when he reaches for some thing dangerous and “time out” or verbal admonishment which does not change the undesired behavior I know that I will do, because I have seen children who have been burned and maimed.

I hear your exact same argument coming from abusive men every day, Rebecca. Somehow they think that abuse is perfectly reasonable if it is somehow restrained. “I only hit her softly, it didn’t even leave a bruise” Is one of my favourites. Disturbingly, that is precisely your argument.

Alex
I think that you are working from a rather false assumption; namely that when an abusive man describes what he does in a manner that is meant to diminish the severity of his abuse you should not extrapolate that description to mean the same thing when someone else uses the term. Some times a gentle tap is exactly that and in the real world it is not abuse.

Comment from Alex
Time: April 7, 2007, 6:14 pm

You cannot apply the logic of dealing with a misbehaving child who has not yet developed the capacity to reason and evaluate consequences to a man abusing his adult partner. The former is concerned with teaching a child who has not yet learned how to behave how to do the right thing; the latter is concerned with a pure exercise of control. Treating the situations as being one and the same is bizarre.

You’re joking right?? Both are acts of complete control. One by a dysfunctional violent man, who 9 times out of 10 was also abused as a child, and one by a parent unable to respectfully deal with their own child - probably because they were also smacked as a child. To suggest that smacking is somehow a panacea to child control is dangerous and grossly ill informed.

Where do you think children learn self-control? They just don’t wake up one day with the skill. It’s a complex process largely learned from parental input. What sort of lessons do you want your child to learn?

By the way, thanks for referring to my years of work and research in the area of violence prevention, ‘ludicrous’, Rebecca. Most appreciated.

I think that you are working from a rather false assumption; namely that when an abusive man describes what he does in a manner that is meant to diminish the severity of his abuse you should not extrapolate that description to mean the same thing when someone else uses the term. Some times a gentle tap is exactly that and in the real world it is not abuse.

Children would not comply if just a ‘gentle tap’ was used. It’s a completely false term to hide the nature of the abuse. That’s the point I was making.

Comment from Rebecca
Time: April 7, 2007, 6:29 pm

Nonsense. I realise that you’ve done years of work in the field of violence prevention, but you’re trying to apply a set of lessons learned in one particular area to another, significantly different area, without much appreciation for the huge distinctions.

It is perfectly reasonable for a parent that both loves and respects their child to smack them - to give them a slight tap when necessary and teach them discipline so they don’t have a life of angst when they discover that, shock horror, boss/university lecturer/partner won’t take the sort of nonsense that they could get away with at their otherwise pacificist, but discipline-free home.

Where do you think people learn self-control? Smacking children was the norm for decades and decades before this latest fad came along, and yet generations of people had no problems with self-control. I think this is an imagined problem.

However, it is your last comment which reveals just how out of touch with reality you are on this issue. A gentle tap is indeed enough to get many children to comply. It was the case with me, it was the case with most of my parents and my generation; from the posts above, it was even the case with one of Kieran’s parents.

This is part of the problem from coming at this issue assuming that the dynamics are the same as domestic violence. You come into this assuming that smacking must necessarily be an act of great violence, with any other description being a facade. Sometimes - as much as I hate to say this, as Iain said - a tap really is just a tap.

Comment from Alex
Time: April 7, 2007, 7:05 pm

Where do you think people learn self-control? Smacking children was the norm for decades and decades before this latest fad came along

LOL!! So was wife beating!

If you’re not aware of the causal relationship between childhood experience and adult behaviour, then I suggest you start reading. At the moment you’re sounding like an ignorant RWDB.

I’ve finished here.

Comment from Iain Hall
Time: April 7, 2007, 7:21 pm

Alex
When infant son kept wanting to play with power points I tried just saying “no” in a severe tone and moving him away but strangely he kept coming back to repeat the undesirable behavior. I felt that I had no choice but to make my disapproval of his potentially lethal behavior known so the next time he reached for a PowerPoint I slapped his had away to the accompaniment of a loud and stern “NO !” and rather like training a puppy he got the message and on future occasions I have only had to use verbal admonishment. This is an example of the rare occasion when a parent is entirely justified in using a Very Minimal amount of smacking. The child does not see the smack as a message the he should fear the parent but that the behavior is wrong, but like a puppy the admonishment MUST be clearly and directly associated with the wrong behavior so as with toilet training a puppy; if you catch them in the act apply negative reinforcement but if you just find a puddle, forget it until next time.
I tend to think that you are very much a black or white kind of guy and for you it is easier to say that All smacking is assault than to have to concede that there is a place for VERY LIMITED smacking in child rearing.
As my daughter is now approaching eight I have no need or desire to smack her; she is now largely amenable to reason and denying her computer or internet time is a viable sanction should her behavior warrant it. If I remember correctly your children are now grown so some how I think that you have well and truly forgotten what it is like to deal with a recalcitrant child who will not listen to reason. I actively look forward to it no longer being necessary to ever use the occasional smack with my son as well. But until that day comes around I will not fell any guilt for doing what I have to ensure that he survives his early years with out putting his hand into a toaster or reaching for a pan on the stove…

Comment from Phillip
Time: April 7, 2007, 8:20 pm

I can’t believe what I’m reading.

Rebecca, for a budding lawyer, you seem to make remarkable sense. I cannot believe that you have actually said something negative about political correctness. Please hurry up and finish studying law and maybe you can make a positive difference.

On a more serious note, I agree that within reason, there is nothing wrong with smacking. I know a lady who had almost the same experience as Iain, although the errant child climbed on a table and touched a light socket, rather than a power point. His mother had previously said to me many times that smacking was “institutionalised child abuse”, and said she would never smack her child under any circumstances. When I showed surprise that she had resorted to corporal punishment, she said “Well, I had to do something”.

Kieran says:

“Children did not suddenly become “feral” in the ’90s. There was not some mythical golden age in which all children were magically well behaved like in Enid Blyton stories.”

No. there was not, but in my youth, the streets were not full of graffiti, it was unheard of for a teacher to be assaulted by a student at school, or for a gang of school students to gatecrash another school and bash other students. I’m not saying these things never happened before the ’90’s, but we have a generally much more violent society today, despite the oft-heard assertions that corporal punishment leads to the idea that violence solves problems. It seems to me that violence is the first resort of the smack-free generation.

I agree that a parent “going to town” with implements etc is totally wrong, but what I recall from my own childhood is that being smacked taught me that bad behaviour had bad consequences, and I could recognise a difference between “violence” and being smacked.

By the way, as a matter of interest, Dr Spock wrote a book on child rearing in the 1950’s, or it may have been earlier, in which he warned against smacking kids, for many of the reasons cited by commenters on this post. I understand that in the 1970’s he wrote another book, in which he said that the best thing to do with his first book was to use it to whack your kids on the backside.

Comment from Rebecca
Time: April 7, 2007, 8:56 pm

Alex,
I’m entirely aware of the relationship between childhood experience and adult behaviour. You’re still confusing children who are *abused* (which can and does have very serious consequences) with children who are *smacked*, which has zero. To mangle the two, I believe, is utterly offensive to children who do actually suffer physical abuse.

Comment from Fringe
Time: April 8, 2007, 11:21 am

I’ve never needed to smack a child. Appropriate voice tones work for me with children, just as with other animals - dogs, cats and horses. Vocal tones are less likely to create future resentment and they set a lower threshold for problem management.

The wise outcome an adult seeks with a naughty child is for the child to modify their behaviour and eventually realise why their behaviour is counter-productive so they can take responsibility for their own actions, learning to ‘do as they would be done by’. However, if children are taught to use violence in order to force compliance in others, the cycle of violence will perpetuate.

Reacting in anger, albeit controlled anger as with a “gentle tap”, creates a counter-productive model for future interactions with other humans.

Finally, the best outcome in my experience is achieved with ongoing encouragement and support along with setting firm, achievable, recognisable boundaries within which children can feel safe and nurtured.

Comment from Rebecca
Time: April 8, 2007, 12:03 pm

As I said above, it’s a nice argument in theory, but one that doesn’t really pan out in reality. There is no evidence whatsoever that a gentle tap “teaches children to use violence” and “perpetuates the cycle of violence”; there is plenty of evidence, however, that children brought up by pacifist-minded, but completely ineffective means of discipline *do* get violent (due to never having actually had consequences for their actions) - and quite a lot at that.

Comment from Kieran
Time: April 8, 2007, 12:09 pm

Re Fringe: Hear hear.

Re Phillip:

Dr Spock wrote a book on child rearing in the 1950’s, or it may have been earlier, in which he warned against smacking kids, for many of the reasons cited by commenters on this post. I understand that in the 1970’s he wrote another book, in which he said that the best thing to do with his first book was to use it to whack your kids on the backside.

The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care was published in 1946 and updated a number of times until Spock’s death in 1998.

Things did change in Spock’s revisions. Earlier versions advocated circumcision, in a 1986 revision he stated that there was no rationale for it as anything other than a religious rite.

I’ve done a quick web search on the book, but I can’t find any suggestion that Dr Spock renounced an earlier denunciation of smacking.

This page at Dr Spock dot com is apparantly adapted from the 2000 edition of his book (so, revised after his death). It doesn’t take as harsh an approach to smacking as I do, but still strongly discourages the behavior.

Comment from Kieran
Time: April 8, 2007, 12:19 pm

Bec, do I have to send you to time out?

there is plenty of evidence, however, that children brought up by pacifist-minded, but completely ineffective means of discipline *do* get violent (due to never having actually had consequences for their actions) - and quite a lot at that.

You assert, you prove.

Show us the literature.

Comment from Fringe
Time: April 8, 2007, 12:34 pm

Rebecca, I am relating my personal experiences, so it is not accurate for you to state that use of vocal tones ‘don’t pan out in reality’.

The independent, loving children of whom I write are now grown up with successful careers, making valuable contributions to their communities. FWIW, none of them have ever sought psychiatric counselling or been arrested. Yet none of them are what one might call conservative or conventional. For me and them, “the voice” worked admirably.

Different strokes for different folks?

Comment from Alex
Time: April 8, 2007, 12:43 pm

There is no evidence whatsoever that a gentle tap “teaches children to use violence” and “perpetuates the cycle of violence

Firstly, you’re being intellectually dishonest with your continued use of the term ‘gentle tap’. If you walk up to a child and give them a little tap, they’ll laugh at you. What you’re really referring to is a hit that will cause shock and pain.

Secondly, your claims about there being no body of evidence linking corporal punishment with future maladaptive behaviours are incorrect.

From a brief examination of my library!

• Children whose parents use corporal punishment to correct unacceptable behavior show more antisocial behavior over a long period of time, regardless of race and socioeconomic status, and regardless of whether the mother provides cognitive stimulation and emotional support (Gunnoe & Mariner, 1997; Kazdin, 1987; Patterson, DeBaryshe, & Ramsey, 1989; Straus, Sugarman, & Giles-Sims, 1997).

• Corporal punishment adversely affects children’s cognitive development. Children who are spanked perform poorly on school tasks compared to other children (Straus & Mathur, 1995; Straus & Paschall, 1998).

The articles refer to legal “corrective” behaviour, not so called legally defined child abuse.

Comment from Alex
Time: April 8, 2007, 2:24 pm

A more recent study conducted by John Hopkins University.

White non-Hispanic children who were spanked more frequently before age 2 were substantially more likely to have behavior problems after entry into school, controlling for other factors.

Comment from Iain Hall
Time: April 8, 2007, 3:36 pm

Alex neither Rebecca nor I are talking about across the knee spanking here but we are talking about the very occasional slap on the wrist to reinforce an important modification of dangerous childhood behavior. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of time that I have had to do it for either of my children. But in your all or nothing mindset what I have done is the same as some one who puts their infant into hospital. Perhaps I would be clearer if we were to refer to the sort or regime that I say is some times necessary as Homeopathic smacking where a very little goes a very long way in the overall scheme of things.

In any case for every one of your “abusers ” who were smacked as children I bet that there are many more well balanced adults who had some corporal punishment as children and who did not grow up to beat their own wives and children.

Comment from Phillip
Time: April 8, 2007, 10:07 pm

Kieran,

O.K., you’ve got me there.

I did say I “understand” Dr Spock recommended his earlier book be used to slap kids on the backside, but that was because I read it somewhere quite a few years ago, and I accepted what I read.

It appears that everybody’s opinions on this are pretty well fixed in place, but I will say two things.

Firstly, I have three bright, well-adjusted, respectful and productive kids, the youngest just turned 18, and on rare occasions, they got a slap. Obviously, it’s difficult to be objective but I really don’t think it did them any harm, and both their mother and I have a great relationship with them.

Finally, I agree wholeheartedly with Rebecca’s comment about “confusing children who are *abused* ” ……, “with children who are *smacked*”, and that “To mangle the two, I believe, is utterly offensive to children who do actually suffer physical abuse.”

Comment from Kieran
Time: April 8, 2007, 11:52 pm

It appears that everybody’s opinions on this are pretty well fixed in place,

Since writing this post I’ve spent a bit of time talking to one of my parents about this issue. I still hold to my position, I do not believe any child should ever be, or ever needs to be, smacked.

That said, I am somewhat more forgiving of this particular parent, and I certainly appreciate their eventual decision not to resort to such actions.

Comment from Alex
Time: April 9, 2007, 12:20 pm

As I said Iain, I’ve deliberately chosen references that refer only to so called ‘corrective smacking/hitting’. The more aggressive styles of (legal) child discipline can produce an even more disturbing picture.

Comment from Verity
Time: April 9, 2007, 7:10 pm

I’d have to say that I agree with Rebecca on this one. I was smacked occasionally as a child, and that was probably less than five times. And it was also the “gentle tap” or slight slap which was used. As I remember it, and I guess i think it holds true for other children on account of this, it was the indignity of being smacked which I resented most, not the actual instance of pain.

I think this is how smacking works, not by associating the bad behaviour with pain but by conveying to the child that they are not the centre of their universe. It is a sharp reminder of the parent’s authority and an insult to the child’s sense of themself as master of the world.

Would I be completly out of line in suggesting that this perhaps has a greater impact on boy children than on girls? I think in today’s society girls are still more conditioned to accept that they will not always be the most important in power relationships. Girls are meant to be little angels, boys little kings and so often take more offence when reminded that they are not.

Clearly abusing children is wrong but I don’t agree that smacking is about using fear and violence to control behaviour. In fact I think it is when it can be so defined that it is abuse, a smack is about power relations within the family. Toddlers believe that they are the centre of the universe, smacking is meant to show them that this is not the case and that they are answerable to adults. I can’t help feeling that those adults who still resent a slight smack in their childhood are suffering from hurt pride as much as ongoing emotional disturbance.

That all said, I have no real experience in this field either theoretically or practically so I can’t really claim that my possited theories are infallible.

Comment from David Bath
Time: April 10, 2007, 12:48 pm

As a medical student many years ago, we learnt that pain was a great behavioural modifier, but only immediately after the action to be extinguished: the "wait until your father gets home" discipline method was counterproductive.

This calls into question the effectiveness of long-term punishment such as withdrawal of privileges.

The most effective way of extinguishing unwanted behaviour in rats is a subcutaneous injection of histamine (hurts like hell, but is almost harmless) immediately after the behaviour: only one application of pain was required.

Personally, I often chose to get the strap from teachers in primary school: stinging hands for 5 minutes was less of a bother than half an hour of homework that was pointless as I had already mastered the work.

It is worthwhile comparing the amount of pain inflicted by corporal punishment (which according to the politically correct is harmful) with greater pain levels and injury that should be treated stoically (such as a badly sprained joint during sport, or gravel rash when falling of a bike).

When children hit parents (and they often do it without restraint, and without thinking which part of the body they are hitting), should they be charged with assault and marched off to juvenile courts?

Its a complex subject, and nuanced thinking is required, as with so many other areas where human psychology is involved.