Pathetic or what

[Ian]

Hehe, you can't beat a stream that digresses.

[cosworth151]

A thread here taking twists and turns. Imagine that! 

Corporal punishment was the norm when I grew up. It didn't seem to do us any harm, and it seems to have done us considerable good.

[Ian]

Obviously I am in total agreement with that Cos.

[Jericoke]

A thread here taking twists and turns. Imagine that! 

Corporal punishment was the norm when I grew up. It didn't seem to do us any harm, and it seems to have done us considerable good.

From a purely sociological point of view... is that true?  Obviously there are plenty of people who were subjected to corporal punishment and are better for it, but is society as a whole?

How many world wars have there been since corporal punishment has been phased out?

How has the stock market done since?

Technological progress?

Quality of cable TV shows?

Sure, we can always argue whether these are good things in an of themselves, but corporal punishment means learning to live in fear, while 'progress' means learning to live without fear.

[cosworth151]

Sure, we can always argue whether these are good things in an of themselves, but corporal punishment means learning to live in fear, while 'progress' means learning to live without fear.

I would argue that corporal punishment meant living without fear. As I said, I grew up in a society where it was the norm. In that time, the locks on home I grew up in didn't even work. We kids could walk about town freely, without fear of harm. The crime rate was miniscule. Most all of us learned young that our actions had consequences.

How far have we "progressed" since corporal punishment was vilified?

Quality of cable TV shows?

We didn't even get cable TV here in Lancaster until several years after I graduated from high school. In any case, we didn't have anything like Jersey Shore, Buck Wild, Here Comes Honey BooBoo..... 

[Jericoke]

Sure, we can always argue whether these are good things in an of themselves, but corporal punishment means learning to live in fear, while 'progress' means learning to live without fear.

I would argue that corporal punishment meant living without fear. As I said, I grew up in a society where it was the norm. In that time, the locks on home I grew up in didn't even work. We kids could walk about town freely, without fear of harm. The crime rate was miniscule. Most all of us learned young that our actions had consequences.

How far have we "progressed" since corporal punishment was vilified?

Hmmm.  An interesting point.

Of course, corporal punishment isn't in isolation.  Its decline is also in line with the ascension of the working mom, and the single parent family.  Not to mention several other phenoma that are part of the 'permissive' society we've got going on in the 'free' world.

I still stick by my assertion that being 'scared straight' means that people take less risks, though I don't really have any evidence to back that up.  (And of course, the very idea that taking risks is better or not...)

Quality of cable TV shows?

We didn't even get cable TV here in Lancaster until several years after I graduated from high school. In any case, we didn't have anything like Jersey Shore, Buck Wild, Here Comes Honey BooBoo..... 

I haven't watched any of those shows.  It would be wrong for me to comment on their quality... however I plan to continue avoiding them 

[lkjohnson1950]

At some point, someone in Hollywood decided that stupid = funny. That eliminates a lot of programs for me automatically. Including all of the above.

[Alianora La Canta]

The very idea of being hurt by a (Canadian) flapjack is absurd.  Maybe if you were sleeping and someone put one on your face you might suffocate.  Or you could be like McDonald's, and stuff flapjacks with egg, cheese, sausage and salt.  That would work too, but more of a long range plan for hurting someone.

So what is a flapjack in England?

They're what you would call a granola bar. Some places in the UK do, in fact, sell them as granola bars, though a few places sell both (in which case the flapjacks will be the softer and less healthy version with fewer "additions" to it). Shakespeare mentions them in one of his minor plays, "Pericles, Prince of Tyre".

Flapjacks in the UK are easily portable snacks, usually made of oats, honey/treacle/syrup, butter and sugar. Sometimes dried fruit, chocolate, nuts, jelly sweets and/or other grains are included, but a classic flapjack will just have oats, honey, butter and lots of sugar. They are usually sweet but occasionally savoury (the latter are usually for backpackers and walkers, not schoolchildren). They are baked, and low-quality ones (such as usually seen in schools) are baked until rock-hard - hence why they are hard enough to be an effective offensive weapon. Good-quality flapjacks are squishy, quite soft, and would probably fall apart if thrown (but are also less healthy in "classic" format and 2-3 times the price because oats are cheaper than honey, treacle and sugar).

Most British flapjacks are rectangular or square, but triangular ones are a recognised and reasonably common variant. The one that has been banned by the school is the less common version of the triangle flapjack - it is more often seen half-coated in chocolate (which takes the sharp edge off and is both safer and tastier).

Of course, the real problem is that school clearly hasn't got proper discipline in its dining halls. If children can't throw flapjacks, they will probably throw their textbooks, pencils and rulers, all of which are more dangerous than flapjacks. Perhaps the school should consider introducing a prefect system with mass participation and detentions involving boring duties such as cleaning and tidying up displays (my sixth form had both, and even the 11-year-olds never misbehaved in dining halls)? The "no one got into trouble" worries me. At the very least, I expected the thrower to be told that food is for eating rather than throwing. If no connection is made between thowing and bad behaviour, the school has effectively approved such behaviour. I watched my secondary school start doing that sort of thing, and wonder 4 years later why there was no discipline any more.

[Alianora La Canta]

If we'd have started throwing food at lunchtime when I was at school it would have been the cane, no suspensions or lines, just, hold your hand out boy, you wouldn't have thrown food again.

At primary school for me (note I grew up in the post-corporeal punishment era), it would have been lines, and a written apology to the cooks for wasting the food they'd been kind enough to cook. In lunch break, and not getting lunch until the lines and apology were complete. The apology would have to be handed in personally and gracefully before it was accepted and permission granted to join the line. The longer it took for the lines and apology to be completed, the fewer of the "best" items would be available, and there would be no possibility of seconds - something which good students were occasionally allowed free of charge. (I think a cold lunch would have been brought if a student had been really slow to get the hint, but as far as I'm aware no student needed that long to take their punishment).

In secondary school, thrown food would have been treated with a shrug, and possibly a rant in next week's assembly if lots of people had done the same thing.

In sixth form, it was detention with extra duties. Since my sixth form liked to tie the duties in with consequences of the misbehaviour, the most likely duties for that rule-breach would be cleaning a dining area (there were two halls, plus sixth formers were allowed to eat in certain classrooms or the common room), filling the dishwasher or extra prefect assistant duty in the dining room (they'd have to take the prefect on duty's orders to help him or her maintain discipline, and probably fetch him or her lunch).

Guess which of the three was the only one to have significant dining hall discipline problems?

[Alianora La Canta]

That was a good one vintly, yeh Scott, my son didn't think it was that funny either.

Given the number of my classmates who misbehaved severely despite such treatment, I find it very unfunny. It seemed to encourage more misbehaviour (particularly against parents and other "authority figures") than it discouraged, at least where I lived.

[Irisado]

Alianora's post has outlined a whole range of, in my view, better options to corporal punishment.  Actually cleaning up the mess, having to apologise to people face to face, and having to explain your actions face to face is a far better way of solving these issues, especially bullying incidentally.

The fear of being beaten is not a good way to improve behaviour.  That does immense psychological damage to a lot of people, and actual physical beatings are even worse.  Fear just leads to anger, hate, resentment, and a whole lot of other negative emotions which can have far reaching consequences.  This is one of the reasons why they stopped beating children in schools.

Sorry, but explaining the error of their ways just does not work, a simple analogy explains why.....

As a teenager you never gobbed off the big boy on the block because you would get a pasting.
A teacher is the big boy on the block, ergo, you gob him off and you get a pasting.

I hate to take you to task Ian, but I can't agree with this.

'Getting a pasting' is not a constructive way to think about this at all.  When I was bullied (most bullying is psychological based on my experiences), the way to deal with it was to actually have a good teacher make the bullies sit down and face me in the same room, and explain why they were doing what they did, and for me to tell them how upsetting and hurtful it was.  This is far more powerful, and far more effective, in my experience, than any form of beating.

[Alianora La Canta]

Often, we would get a three day cycle: First day, spaghetti. Second day, chilli. Third day, spaghetti soup (the left over spaghetti and chilli mixed together & watered down enough to stretch it out.)

Primary school had a weekly menu, with occasional alterations. So everyone knew Tuesday was pasta day, Wednesday was vegetable bake day and Friday was fish and chips (or vegetable risotto). Roast meat with two veg was Monday or Thursday depending on when the meat for it turned up at school. On the other day would be the experiments: one week it might be turkey twizzlers (this was before they were banned), another it might be cauliflour cheese. If ever meat was served, there was a vegetarian option, and for non-vegetarian students, there would have a choice - until one or the other ran out. Puddings changed each day, though guarantees included a fruit option each day and at least one ice cream-based dish per week.

Secondary schools and sixth form were more limited. Secondary was worst - half the students had chips every day (and fish once a week) while the other half had sandwiches or an unidentifiable dry blob every day (and fish twice a week). At least sixth form managed to have a selection of items, though these were again the same item every day (and lunch boxes were banned).

[Alianora La Canta]

Sorry, but explaining the error of their ways just does not work, a simple analogy explains why.....

As a teenager you never gobbed off the big boy on the block because you would get a pasting.
A teacher is the big boy on the block, ergo, you gob him off and you get a pasting.

Speaking as one of the teenagers who frequently had to "gob off the big boy" because it tended to lessen the resulting pasting (compared to keeping my mouth shut), this theory only applies in certain circumstances (being someone who thought bullying other people was bad and who was interested in getting an education meant some sort of pasting was inevitable either way). If students routinely have to "gob off the big boy" to gain benefits or lessen downsides - and this is increasingly the case in peer groups - they will assuredly treat other "big boys" the same way.