Spanking is such a personal belief system and journey of ethical decision making and your choice to do it or not is going to very based on your own upbringing and reflection on 'why' you think it works or not ... I was spanked as a child and participated in spanking other family members in my youth cause it was the 'norm'.

That said my own philosophies have changed on it over the years in this field based on discussions with other advocates in my field around the practice and people posing questions like 'What is the magic age when spanking is no longer acceptable form of behavior management?' 'What makes that age 'special'? Why is it ok to spank a certain age group but others it is considered 'assault'? 'Why is it socially acceptable to spank our own children but i our child misbaved in a park and another parent 'smacked them' we would loose it?' Why is spanking by teachers and educators taboo? 'If they have more children to 'control' spanking should be considered more of an option and necessity for them than for a parent with only one or two children to 'manage'?' ..... the answers to those questions for me posed 'conflict' because the only thing that it came back to was the in one circumstance the child 'belonged' to someone and in the other they did not 'so are children our property and do they have less rights and privileges than children who are NOT our property?'

It is important to have these kinds of discussions and reflections not to JUDGE but to grow as a society ... after all at points in our past there were MANY normal practices that people thought were just fine and dandy and WORKED so to speak .... for example at one time daughters were 'sold' to their new spouse as property via a dowery and they were treated like property that the spouse was free to beat, to rape and well treat as they saw 'fit' in order to break them in and teach them how to be a 'good wife' so while it was illegal to beat or rape a women who was NOT your wife your own wife was your's to do with as you chose .... but over the centuries we advocated and reflected and changed our 'views' on this being necessary because a women should have the same rights regardless of being married to a man or not .... so at this stage in our evolution it is natural for us to start 'questioning' the same practices with our children ... after all if you read history books man at the time that women gained 'rights and protections' there were men who argued there was nothing wrong with giving your women a smack if she forgot to iron your shirts the way you liked or if they were about to do something that would break a piece equipment on the farm or they questioned something they'd done ... cause it worked they would not make that mistake more than once or twice....and there are still men who think this way

IMO the key to helping children or anyone for that matter develop socially acceptable behavior is CONSISTENCY in expectations and natural consequences for when they make a mistake .... and just like a housewife in the 1800's a smack might work as a consequences but there are also 100 other just as effective ways to help someone learn better choices