child abuse?

the adrian peterson case basically asks us to define child abuse. is it any kind of physical punishment towards a child? or is "light" physical discipline okay, but nothing "excessive"? [i'm only focusing on physical punishment in this post]

my parents didn't beat me. i don't remember ever being spanked, whipped, or hit, though i probably was at some point. (let's call this type active physical punishment [app]). the worst thing i remember is that my mom would use a wooden ruler with a metal edge and hit my open palms with it. she hit pretty hard, but i can say with near certainty that i never bled from it. i think it was more of a shame thing. i do not feel traumatized.

my friends told me some of what they went thru: kneeling in the corner, pulling their own earlobes, holding their arms straight forward for extended periods of time (this sounds easy; it isn't!). this type of physical punishment doesn't leave scars (tho apparently kneeling a lot causes your knees to become hairy?) let's call this passive physical punishment [ppp].

i don't know which is worse, or which is more effective, or if any type of physical punishment is effective at all. app is probably more traumatic, but it's usually over faster. i don't know what the average duration of ppp is, but i would think that forcing a kid to keep their arms out for half an hour would hurt a lot more than a spanking that doesn't leave bruises!

personally, i think physical punishment is permissible, and yes, even app. so where do i draw the line? i think that if you ever leave bruises, welts, or break skin, you are doing it too damn hard. you're trying to teach a lesson, not mentally or physically scar your child. you are an adult; you are very strong compared to your kids. you should not ever purposely semi-permanently hurt them physically. it is unacceptable.

and that's how i judge adrian peterson. his kid was bleeding from multiple wounds. peterson should have stopped as soon as his kid started bleeding. he should never have gone on to further inflict that amount of physical abuse. if you wouldn't let another adult put you thru that much, you should never put your kid thru that.