Thanks Niall. You're restoring my faith in my sanity to see that I'm not the only one who's making this connection.

And thanks to everyone here who's submitted so many interesting points in this discussion! And yes I'm picking on Lamott, but she writes opinion pieces for a living- so I'm sure she's used to - and maybe even welcomes this criticism. She's a big girl.

I do however share a concern with many posters here: It is very probably not ethical to be writing about a minor in this way- given that minors cannot give meaningful consent.

Salon needs to find a way of continuing the discussion about slapping children in the future. It's an important one.

Thanks for the article. Timely, given the massive discussion on Ann Lamott's Salon essay a couple of days ago in which she discussed slapping her son.

Let me be the first here to reiterate:

Slapping your wife is domestic violence.... even once

Slapping a coworker will get you fired.... even once

Slapping someone else's child is assault and could land you in jail... even once.

This is not child-rearing. This is assault and it's domestic violence.

I normally don't give my full name when writing letters to Salon. In this case I'm going to, because I want to emphasize that I stand behind these particular comments 100%.

Christian J Burnham

425 Emerson, Apt 14,

Houston, TX,

77006

christianjburnham@gmail.com

Thanks.

I'm not going to respond to your comments because of the name calling (and yes I'm aware of the logical fallacy in pointing this out).

Thanks,

Christian

Yes, there are plently of children who were hit and turned into great adults. I don't think anyone's experiences should be minimized- but anecdotal evidence is generally held to be not sufficient for framing a law or publishing a paper in a medical journal.

In fact, the scientist in me suspects that many of the studies published so far on hitting children that purport to show a correlation between the punishment and the child's later behavior are flawed- because they neglect to take into account the possibility of genetic inheritance of character traits. It's possible that if your parents hit you- then you are just genetically more likely to use violence yourself based on the genes you share with your parents. Maybe someone could clue me in as to whether this has been looked at.

Even if there is shown to be no correlation between 'disciplining' your children and their future propensity to violence- I would remain unconvinced that hitting your children is ethical. For starters, the proponents need to show studies that hitting your children can improve their behavior. But even if this criteria is met, I would still be against it because using violence against another human being in order to improve their behavior just seems wrong to me.

I'm aware that some people are accusing me of trivializing serious abuse. They accuse me of conflating it with practices of the sort described in the article. I think these criticisms are misplaced. Rather, I would suggest that there's a danger that posters can trivialize the seriousness of hitting a child by contrasting it to life-threatening examples of abuse. Obviously, there are many diseases that are not as bad as a terminal illness- but that doesn't mean that they should be neglected.

For the record, I would like to see the use of punishments as outlined in the article to be made illegal against children. (They're already illegal when used on anyone else except your children.)

I guess I was initially surprised to see the negative reactions to my comments on the Ann Lamott article and below. I'm encouraged though to see that there are just as many people who are not cowed to speak up against this violence.

I'm sorry, but I just don't see that anyone is saying that severely beating a child is of the same degree of seriousness as spanking. I don't think anyone has even implied it.

I am steadfast in calling the practices described in this article 'domestic violence'. That does not mean that I equate it to your experiences.

I say all of this with respect. It is not my, or anyone else's intention to downplay the seriousness of what you went through.

A 2 second Google search turned up this page:

http://www.religioustolerance.org/spankin3.htm

wherein I found the quote:

"All of the "pro-spanking" sites on the Internet that we have been able to find are written from a Christian Fundamentalist or other Evangelical perspective."

I can't guarantee that this is true- but it seems credible that pro-spankers consistently use biblical reasons as their defense. If I'm wrong, then please correct me- I don't claim that I know for sure.

Now, this does not necessarily mean that Christianity as a religion sides with either the pro- or the anti- lobby. I am for example quite sure that many on the opposing side of the debate are also Christians (though I'm not one myself).

What the Salon article does (quite well in my opinion) is to highlight how Christianity is used as a justification (rightly or wrongly). That is an important point to make.

I would also point out that the Catholic church has a track record of shielding child abusers among their ranks. It is also the case that church-teachings are partly responsible for the stories recounted in this Salon article. I think it's legitimate in these cases to ask whether the religion and the church bears responsibility.