Okay, go ahead and try explaining how it makes sense for it to be a serious crime to spank an unrelated woman, but no crime at all for a 16y ear old daughter - that's an honest question. I think if you try to answer it you'll either have to come out saying it's ok to belt your wife, or wrong to belt a teenage daughter.
If you insist.
Because outside of law enforcement or self-defense, there is no general legal responsibilities that involve beating an adult woman. There is a legal responsibility to raise your kid. The moral aspects to both get even more murky. Thing is, there is a wide grey area between raising your kid that involves physical violence as an aide in teaching responsible behavior and physical abuse. It's entirely subjective, as you see in this thread. Some see any physical violence as bad, and others draw the line at something just short of the activities involved in Hostel or Saw. I've known adults who saw it as a positive thing to get drunk and beat the hell out of their kid as recreational activity.
So it's in the eye of the beholder, common public opinion or a judge.
In fairness, I see no moral difference between using physical violence as an instructional aid for children or adults. To give an example, one time a soldier made a very crude and disrespectful sexual remark towards a female. This female was an officer. Obviously, there are strong ethical, moral, legal and practical implications to this behavior, which needed to be corrected. Talking to the soldier in question would not have corrected the thought process behind the behavior, nor would even an Article 15. The ethical, moral and practical solution was physical violence that was not physically permanently damaging. In this case, a quick butt-stroke to the base of the skull, locking and loading a magazine in the M16, moving the selector switch to 3 round burst, and putting the muzzle in contact with the right eye socket. The soldier learned more in about a second and a half than a month of restriction under an Article 15 about the proper conduct of an enlisted soldier in reference to proper comments and thought process towards an officer.
According to a nonofficial and off the record discussion with a JAG officer, this action was entirely legal as the US was being at a time of war. It technically would have been legal to pull the trigger under Articles 90 and 94 of the UCMJ. Although legal, under normal circumstances, it was uh, military culturally disapproved. Technically, legally, I'd be guilty if I did NOT do what I did under § 894, Article 94, Section A(3), "fails to do his utmost to prevent and suppress a mutiny or sedition being committed in his presence".
Granted, special circumstances, but the idea is the same. There is a time and place for physical violence. It can be legally, morally and ethically tricky, and highly dependent on circumstances.
