IT WORKED FOR MY PARENTS

Despite the reporting over the years that spanking is for naught, many parents still seem to do it. More than half of the mothers questioned in the Pediatrics study reported spanking their kids at age 3 and at age 5. Spanking teaches hitting, it's that simple So that if you don't get your way and you're bigger than me, you can hit me to get your way. That's the lesson of spanking.

A  national survey showed more than half of women and three-quarters of men in the United States believe a child sometimes needs a "good hard spanking.

The majority of parents say they spank their kids. Various factors increase the likelihood, including geographic location (children in the South are spanked the most), family income (less money means more spanking), race (African-American mothers spank their children more than other ethnic groups), and religion (parents more fundamentalist in their religious beliefs spank more than those who are less so). But all in all, it's a pretty clear picture

• 94% of 3- and 4-year-olds have been spanked at least once during the past year, according to one study
•  74% of mothers believe spanking is acceptable for kids ages 1 to 3, says another study
• 61% of parents condone spanking as a "regular form of punishment" for young children, according to a different study

So if hard numbers can't prove that spanking is good or bad or safe or dangerous, perhaps it's not a data issue to begin with. The question of whether spanking works, or is safe, is beside the point. Maybe the question should be "Is it really, absolutely necessary?"