Quote Originally Posted by Alpha Weapon View Post
However, my concern is that in a courtroom, when a child abuser is in front of a jury, a crafty lawyer could just pull out some nice oratory to show that no, this person did not abuse their children, they just smacked them to teach them a lesson. The distinction between abuse and physical punishment is hard to define; in order to prevent child abusers from getting away from their crimes, smacking needs to be criminalised. Using your own example, under a legal system where smacking is legal, it is likely that both your aunt and your father would not be convicted (I base this on the fact (assumption?) that your aunt's abuse was not as bad as some of the cases where a jury said 'reasonable force had been used'). If smacking had been criminalised, realistically, though what your dad would've technically committed a crime, he would unlikely have been charged.
Crafty lawyers can make the sky green half the time. Even if it were criminalised half of them could probably find some sort of loophole or something.

Again notice your usage of 'reasonable force'. Believe me if a kid is marked, they don't feel 'reasonable force' was used unless the parents were at threat from the minor. I don't know of the NZ equivalents of our own but if a kid is taken to hospital here with unusual marks, bruises, whatever half the time before going to court the cops get called and sometimes if the parents seem responsible the child will be taken by DoCs (the Department of Community Services I think? That or child services or something). Legal peeps get VERY strict with usage of 'reasonable force' and if you have left marks or something it's an assault.