It just sounds scary and makes me cringe, and just downright infuriates me and worries me that people act so normal about it. Maybe there's something I'm missing?
I don't think you're missing anything, except that you probably had a far different childhood than that of many who have described their punishments here. I too never experienced anything like this, not even a spanking or anything physical in the way of punishment. In our household when growing up it was basically our parents being upset, oh so ever disappointed in our behavior and then acting cold or ignoring us. And sent to bed early, no TV, stuff like that. But no physical punishments.
So in the years I've been reading, these accounts astonished me as well, I had a hard time really believing them to be true. But I fear they are true, especially after learning how my wife was brought up as a child in a very physical punishment oriented household. But with her it didn't result in the creation of any fetishes as described here.
I just fear that there are still many people who believe that physical punishments, beatings, whippings, spankings, extreme humiliation (often tinted to a sexual degree unsuited for youngsters) - all of this does still go on, and just as you write that it infuriates you, I feel the same about it, especially when it is considered to be a more or less normal way to raise children.