Was always interesting when we got spanked as kids. Just curious what it must be like for my parents to do that, and what I'll be like when I do it, because it must be done.

Spanking them is never a lot of fun and should only be done when it has the greatest effect. This is a touch and go judgement because as OJ demonstrates, the kids are employing defensive techniques as well.

My children are notably polite and well-behaved. This isn't just dad talking--this is from the unsolicited testimony of strangers.

Neither my wife nor I have ever hit them, nor even threatened it. So while we may have been inordinately lucky with our children's dispositions, nonetheless it is not necessarily true children must at least get hit occasionally to behave.

Two things aid the task of civilizing the critters: my wife and I walk the talk; there is no need to distinguish between what we say versus what we do.

And, having something of a basso-profundo voice, going from quiet to room-filling command bark in about 0.0 seconds also has a chastening effect.

It's often the only way to get their attention.

I'm with OJ on this one. Unfortunately, the baby is now 6'1" and very fast.

jes don't throw me in that briar paitch!

I remember very mixed feelings when we got those paddles with the rubber balls on a rubber band. Always a welcome diversion and challenge and they were ours until the rubber bands broke. Then we had to hand them over to our parents.

Rick:

Hopefully you had sense enough to remove the staple? Many's the smack we got with those things.

I'll vote with Jeff, at least beyond the age of about three/four. There is nothing more absurd than watching a modern parent trying to reason with a toddler.

Exception:--Persistent, willful rudeness.

I learned my lesson.

I got whupped with a leather belt when I was a kid, and I whupped my son, too.

I regret that now. With the last kid, a trailer who came 11 years after my son, I never had to smack her, except when she was tiny and I would knock her hand away from the hot oven.

Even when she got to be a tween-ager, I never had any trouble. I just told her to stop acting like a teen-ager. She hated that.

But, as Jeff says, you gotta walk the walk. Takes a lot of time.

I am not an absolutist about whipping children, but if the first one or two instances don't get the job done, more won't have any effect.

As Orrin's tale tells.

I didn't get spanked much, but boy did I deserve it when I did. That's something I'll remember as a parent -- because deserving it really helps you swallow your pride.

For us, it was the belt. Compared to the hand, a godsend. But we'd sob and pretend it was the worst thing ever. That way, when the worst was coming, it wasn't really the worst.

In my limited experience, it's something to be deployed minimally and carefully, but deployed it must be. My oldest kept trying to stick his finger in the electrical socket, and no amount of scolding would stop him. Better a smack on the hand than a shock to the nervous system.

It's truly amazing how the Left doesn't see their own cultural bias when they want to change people's behavior. Outside of the world of Western and Northern European Christians and seculars, the use of physical force on children to correct their behavior is universal. One of the shocks for most Europeans and Asians is how badly behaved American children are at the table. The lack of physical correction at an early age is the primary cause of this.

My grandparents used the belt or the ironing cord on my dad and uncle, my dad used things ranging from belts to ladles on me. Getting quickly whacked in the head with a metal ladle when you are 4 years old is a very effective means of discipline.

Who is this twerp to tell parents to change millenia of discipline because she doesn't like it?