As a child, I was physically abused. I was beat and punished all through elementary school. It stopped when I was a freshman in high school; I had learned fighting techniques from being on the wrestling team. One night my mom's boyfriend tried to hit me and I laid the smackdown on his ass.

One of my best friends was also abused. He was abused a lot worse than I was, and more often, too. When he was four years old, his father kicked him in the stomach really hard, like a football (he propelled into the wall) causing him to bleed internally. He almost died that night. He lived, though. Today, he is in bad shape. He is 300 lbs overweight, and that is the only thing protecting the permanently damaged muscle layer that his father destroyed. He also has intestinal issues, and loses control all the time. He has a big mark in his stomach that he always has to look at that reminds him of it. Kids make fun of him at school, and not just teasing, he gets called fatass by everyone, and people always tell him he smells like shit, and so on. There is nothing he can do, even with today's modern technology.

Hitting a child is unacceptable. There are other ways to punish your children, than smacking them. Your child could end up like me, with big insecurity and trust issues, and a severe loss of temper. Don't do it. Be a better parent.