While I fully acknowledge an obvious continuum of harm, I choose not to argue for the abolition of corporal punishment in terms of the generally acknowledged danger that a smack may escalate into abuse . This seems analogous to arguing that feeding children a little bit of arsenic each day is not a good idea because one day they may accidentally receive too much. Our laws rightly protect adult persons from being hit by other adult persons. This is because hitting another person would be wrong. It would be harmful, hurtful, disrespectful and humiliating to them.
Children are persons too.
The first point is beyond dispute, and the second rarely contested. Therefore it would seem that it is primarily the question of the child s status as a person that is at issue. Domestic violence is no longer protected by law in our society unless that violence is inflicted upon children. Moreover we have enacted progressive legislation to actively protect partners from spousal violence but have yet to grant children the same rights to protection from physical violence while at home. Perhaps the most fundamental reason to enact legislation which reflects zero tolerance for violence against children, is simply that children have no ability to promote this legislation on their own behalf, and so are dependent upon child advocates to lobby for legislative change.