I'm kind of reluctant to say it's never okay just on the basis that someone usually constructs some weird hypothetical in which it might be okay to do whatever immoral thing is being discussed. And child development and parenting is so complex that the parents who never hit their kids but give them bad diet might be doing a worse job than the parents next door who gave their kids a tap half a dozen times lifetime but feed their kid better, have them read more, and exercise more.

It's really easy to come crashing down on parents who have ever used some physical punishment, but there's a lot of gradations and a big difference between the one time tap I got and people who actually talk about belts (which makes me cringe even thinking about).

As I said, I wouldn't hit my dog so I'm not going to hit my hypothetical child.

As a parent, I almost never judge another parent's way of raising their child, unless I thought it was particularly egregious. I've never been in that position yet.

Do other parents in the thread generally agree with this? Or are you guys quick to say something?

I judge parents all the time. Not that I think I'm perfect, just a lot of parents are really terrible.

I never was that judgemental about it I think, but still less so after doing it myself.

they all say that

In public? What I mean is would you voice your opinion out loud to the parent directly or just keep it internal?

So very, very unsurprising.

It's a huge social taboo to criticise someone's parenting. I appreciate both sides of it, but it does seem like a problem that even when it comes to something like spanking, where parents actually hurt their child to some degree, we're very reluctant to say "That's not right". Things typically have to escalate to the level of serious abuse before anyone will say to them that there's a better way to go about it.

True.

Keep it internal or discuss it with my wife. It is hard to voice your opinion to other people about parenting, people and very defensive.

I have a close family memeber that has 2 children 5,7. They've spent 40+ hrs a week in daycare since they were 1 and are animals, they do nothing there parents to tell them. I feel like asking them why they think it's that way and having the discussion but it's hard to bring up.

I might say that spanking looks like assault, but I wouldn't call parents who spank assaulters. Really, a challenge to provoke people out of thinking " we have always done it this way."

The "spank debate" is as much of a "debate" as the "global warming debate" or the "evolution debate." The science is literally overwhelming that it is harmful and shouldn't be done ever.

Sure, just deep psychological scarring they'll have until they die.

The science shows that it has no positive effects at all over other methods and tons of negatives, so yes, it should be ruled out completely. Maybe if they're trying to stab someone with a knife is a good time to hit them. Maybe.

You have absolutely no idea what sort of subconscious scarring they may or may not have. You are not qualified to make this sort of determination, least of all with your own children.

Just as a side note, AlexM, you know you can multiquote, right?

That's a bunch of BS. Safe words are for D/s. Without that, "stop you *******/bitch" is just fine.

I detest multiquote and have posted multiple rants about that. It makes threads harder to read IMO.

Well it sounds as if you already have passed judgment on them spending that amount of time in daycare.

Honestly, every family needs to make their own decisions. Each family dynamic is different and they need to make the decisions that best fit into that particular family.

For example, my best friend's child has never been to daycare a day in his life. My child has been to daycare 2 days a week since she was a few months old. We made a decision that we wanted her to have social interaction with children her own age, even though we didn't need to send her to daycare. I'm delighted at her progress of social ability and her talking. My friend's child barely speaks.

I suspect that the social interaction of daycare has helped my child, but I really have no proof that is the reason it seems my child is so much more advanced. Also, my child is female where as my friend's child is male. I had another friend tell me that his daughter blew his son out of the water in every category until she was about 5 years old, where his son "caught up" then outpaced her. I don't know if that's a real thing or not, but it could be just those particular children.

So in your instance you believe the overuse of daycare is the cause for their children's behavior, but I'm sure there are children that go to daycare full time that are well behaved. In other words, your conclusions may actually be incorrect. I'm not saying they are, I'm saying they might be, and that should be a reason to hold your tongue. There are just too many factors involved to be sure that is the reason.

Personally, I grew up in a wild house where we were very rough and did very dangerous things (played with matches, threw rocks, made slingshots and shot everything, etc). I always thought it was because we had two boys and a girl in our family and that was typical. My wife's family had 2 boys and 2 girls and she said they grew up in a super calm environment and they were extremely well behaved. We both had almost identical family structures (grandparents helped raise the kids while parents worked, etc), but we turned out extremely different as far as personalities go.

It's just too hard to tell what factors are involved unless they are blatant, and even then some people turn out fine.

Banned and people actually doing it aren't the same. I was in grade school in the 80s in two states that are still red on that map, but there was no corporal punishment. Of course, I didn't go to a Christian school.

Not explicitly made illegal at the state level does not mean it's actually legal or allowed though. A similar map done for the whole world would show the US as red.

Ya I agree that many different factors come into play, and its not just daycare, but if there are bond issues the 40 hrs a week someone else is raising the children is the first thing I would look at. It's scary because both parents are well educated but are very career driven. They live in a nice neighborhood and it seems like the norm there is to put your kids in daycare.

My children have never been to daycare, but they do activities and have play dates and stuff like that every day. My toddler gets along just fine with other kids. Does your friends kid get out much?

Not really. He stays home a lot. He has 1-2 play dates a week. I almost want to say something, but it's not my place. It's just weird because I know all kids advance at different rates but it just seems weird when you can see such a huge difference right in front of your face.

As for what you described above, me and my wife had the same discussion. We discussed one of us dropping out of the work force and decided against it. Both of us are career driven (or was, in my case) and have pretty good salaries. After discussion we agreed that the financial benefit of both of us working and bringing home incomes outweighs the downside of her not being around us a little more. I'm sure some parents out there would judge me and me wife harshly for that decision. Not many, but some.

Shrug. Having a child is an incredibly demanding and difficult thing. It's just so much work. I love it, but it's really a LOT of work (and money).

I'm generation X too and never saw officially sanctioned physical discipline in schools. (The football coach threw my into a wall once, but he would have gotten into big trouble if I reported him.) My Dad says even when he was young it was mostly only private Catholic schools that did it.

Massachusetts is pretty liberal though. (Edit: from the wiki Massachusetts banned it in 1971. Still legal in my Dad's youth, but likely never used except for Catholic schools.)

So far I've smacked my 8 y/o daughter on the ass once. I can't even remember why so it most likely could have been handled better. We definitely don't believe in spanking in our household.