Ending Corporal Punishment: Why you should never spank a child

"Honoring the rights of children is a human rights movement whose time has come. It couldn’t be more needed. “Harsh treatment of children is epidemic in all communities,” states Desmond Runyan professor of social medicine at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine. According to a 2002 study published by “Child Abuse Review,” 80 percent of American preschool children are spanked by one or both parents. Of children aged 8-9, one-half are hit with an object. In March of this year, researchers at the University of Michigan conducted a longitudinal study of more than 2700 new parents. They found that 30 percent of babies, children under one, were spanked by one or both parents at least once in the last month. According to the professors who headed the study, “spanking babies is particularly misguided.” " Amy Wright Glenn