From The "Duh" Files: Don't Hit Your Kids

Being a sensitive new-age guy who grew up in the Northeast I always thought that the general cultural consensus in the U.S. now-a-days was that spanking is a bad thing. It only teaches the kids not to get caught and to think problems can be solved by violence. What starts with a spank can "slippery slope" into full on abuse. But it could be worse.

Then I saw this breif article:
http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2011/06/21/texas-mom-gets-probation-for-spanking-her-daughter/

Probation? Sure. Parenting classes? Fine, OK, good. But losing custody?!? Unfortunately there is probably more to this story that we're not getting. You can see hints of it in the line "after the child's grandmother reported the injuries and took the child to a hospital." There was probably more than just spanking going on. But wow, for the judge to focus ONLY on the spanking surprises me.

So maybe that was a possible overreaction by the judge. But then I looked over at the poll listed with the short article:

Should parents spank their children?

Last I checked it was "Yes" at 94.36% and "No" at 5.64%. To quote Phil Plait: Holy Haleakalas!!! Even given that Fox News (this is Fox News Latino) consumers are more conservative and authoritarian, this is pretty sad. It shouldn't take the threat of jail time or losing your kids into foster care in order to realize that hitting a kid is not a good idea. I'll paraphase Plait: Don't be a dick...to your kids.