Can you leave a bruise when you spank your child?

Answer 1

well if you leave a bruise, i call that abuse, so i wouldn't hit that hard at all. but if you spank on the bottom it shouldn't. just don't leave welts or bruises. or spank for practically nothing at all.

What if you don't spank that hard but still leave a bruise because the child's sensitive skin?

I'm not a counselor. However, a lot on the subject spanking is laden with bias. You can get a bruise without even feeling it if your mind is on something else. Bruising is a manifestation that blood vessels have broken beneath the skin resulting in internal bleeding. However, that doesn't prove cruel or an unreasonable amount of force caused that. That's an assumption by those wanting a bright line test to provide evidence against people who spank their kids.

Bright line evidence makes a simple case. However, it's unfair to assign so much meaning to such proof when an association of bruises with a specific amount of force has never been correlated to my knowledge. Then, we have to figure out the amount of force that's unacceptable. Here's where uncertainty should favor the parent who is really trying to discipline their child.

That said, you can use too much force when spanking a child and there are cruel people who spank in anger rather than in patient discipline. There is an amount of bruising that's unacceptable. However, I don't think light bruising is the definitive proof of child abuse that some would make it out to be.