Why is it that this kind of thing didn't happen so much in the past. What is so different about today's society?

Parents aren't allowed to discipline thier children anymore........a good spanking will do wonders

OMG.
You've never heard that almost all people who commit violence crimes come out of violent social backgrounds, have you?

I was panked a few times total growing up and I turned out just fine.

I was never spanked and - as far as I can say - I also turned out just fine. What does that prove? Nothing but the impossibility of judging by singular cases. The fact is that persons who get beaten by their parents have a much higher probability of becoming criminals than persons who grow up in non-violent families.
Discipline is important, but violence is not the only and not the best way to learn discipline. Usually, spanking kids is just an act of desperation by parents who did a bad job in the time before.

We'll just have to agree to disagree. You have your beliefs and I have mine.

I think the greater abuse is ignoring your kids which is the root of the problem here.

Marilyn Manson?s real name isn't even Marilyn Manson,
He's a skinny public high school Kid from Florida,
Not some monster from out of this world and like of a lot other skinny long hair public
High school kids he was sick of getting
Beaten up by the pulling guard all week only to go out on the weekend,
And watch the Quarterback get all the girls so,
He formed a band man
Now' he gets all the girls,
A few years later a couple of latchkey kids go tragically
Mad and everybody's standing around the television store at the mall trying to figure out what went wrong,
This guy says,
You think the life of a kid going to high school could've gotten so bad this other guy says nah,
It's just the words to one of them goddamn Marilyn Manson songs,
You know the one

You know, every ten years or so our country and some other little country,
We start firing all of our newest weapons
At each other for some reason or another, right or wrong,
Like it or not, it happens, and when it happens
People get shot and when people get shot,
They show it on tv a lot every night at six o clock
And you don't even have to be eighteen to see it you don't even have to be in first grade,
First grade where they teach the kid pride
They tell him he'll need to thrive,
In a world where only the strong will survive,
So he's taught the art of more
To compare to and to keep score Monday thru Friday while
He stares at the floor til' Sunday they make him go to
School once more only this time they make him wear a suit and a tie
And listen to some guy who claims to know Where people go
When they die tell him that only the meek are gonna inherit the earth Well poop,
By this time the kid doesn't know what anything
Is worth, now brothers and sisters I am only one guy
And I don't even know the words to that song Louie,
Louie but I can tell you right now without batting an eye
That the next time some latchkey kid goes wrong
It aint gonna be cause that Eminem gets to say the word Fag in his song
And I'm not trying to preach to ya either,
I'm just trying to sing to ya too, you know string a few words together

Adults have no clue what kids are going through these days.

Not saying its not true...but its not like I haven't heard that before