I noticed from my reading on the subject that students who refused SCP in the UK in the 70s were often suspended until they submitted or were expelled, but by the 80s students were generally give a 3 to 4 day suspension if they refused to be beaten. My question is, what was the reason for this change? Was it a general change in the attitudes toward corporal punishment that made individual schools change the policy just as many choose to abolish SCP altogether, or was it a legal issue that after the European court rulings that the schools would be subject to litigation if they expelled or gave open ended suspensions for refusal, while a specific suspension was legally defensible, or was there some sort of national guidance on the subject that lead to the change?
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hcj44
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Apr 10, 2018#2
This is a good question Dane. I think I can safely say that there was no national guidance that led to change. Until SCP in state schools was banned in 1986, decisions rested with the local education authorities. European Court decisions did not overrule UK Law so any litigation would be a long shot. I believe any change in suspension policy just reflected a general change of opinion towards SCP.
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dane
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Apr 11, 2018#3
its also possible my samplings(mainly from corpun’s press clippings) are either too small to really tell about trends or for some reason skewed one way in the 70s and another in the 80s
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marathon8
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Apr 11, 2018#4
Hello, Dane,
It’s Paul:
Thanks for posting. This is very much a thought-provoking thread and one that is likely to bring forth lots of differing opinions.
I’m with Hcj44 (Hi there, Hcj44. Hope all is well!!!). It certainly wasn’t a national level policy implementation. Hcj44 says it was likely to be a decision made by LEAs. Partly, yes. I concur with that theory. But I think, too, it was more the individual schools that were the main driver. Headteachers retire and new, younger heads come in with a remit or agenda that might have reflected the changing attitudes to SCP at that time during those decades. Decisions could have been made due to changes within the board of governors as well. Or another scenario might have been that any given LEA might have had concerns about one its schools being over-reliant on SCP.
Here’s a ‘golden classic’ on the subject matter that a few of us might be familiar with:
It’s from STOPPs ‘Catalogue of Cruelty.’ (1984).
‘Tricia Watson (name changed), a Warwickshire schoolgirl then aged fifteen, spat at a sixth former. Her parents then received a letter to say that she would receive the tawse. When Mrs Watson complained, she was offered the option of temporary suspension. Tricia’s mock ‘O’ levels were approaching and she could not afford to miss any schooling, so she reluctantly agreed to receive two strokes of the tawse on her hands.’
****
This incident can also be found on pages 49 and 50 in Margaret Stone’s book, ‘The Corporal Punishment of Schoolgirls.’
I’d love more detail but I don’t have it. For example, was it Mrs Watson who persuaded her daughter, Tricia, to get it over with and take the two strokes, rather than risk the results of her mocks? Or did Tricia make the decision to be tawsed? And I wonder who carried this punishment out?
Thank you,
Paul
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Another_Lurker
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Apr 11, 2018#5
Hello Paul,
I’m very glad indeed that you have taken the decision to boldly plunge into the shambolic chaos brave new world of Tapatalk.
That said and meant, I fear that I shall now annoy you.
You said above of the alleged tawsing of ‘Tricia Watson’:
I’d love more detail but I don’t have it. For example, was it Mrs Watson who persuaded her daughter, Tricia, to get it over with and take the two strokes, rather than risk the results of her mocks? Or did Tricia make the decision to be tawsed? And I wonder who carried this punishment out?[
If the alleged tawsing featured in both ‘Catalogue of Cruelty’ from STOPP and ‘The Corporal Punishment of Schoolgirls’ then it probably never happened as both books are works of fiction. That is not to say that essentially similar incidents did not occur, they probably did. The quoted incident however is most unlikely to be anything other than an invention of one book subsequently plagiarised by the other.
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marathon8
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Apr 13, 2018#6
Hello, A.L,
Good to hear from you.
Yes, I’m here in one piece, I think.
No, no, I could never be annoyed with my associate here!! We have shared some excellent posts, especially when the badly behaved Lisa has been involved. (But of course there was my……. forgotten FR posts……!!!!! LOL). Just joking…..or am I???
I do disagree with you on your thoughts surrounding the ‘Tricia Watson’ incident. Regarding STOPP, it was very apparent what STOPP’s objectives were. How they went about achieving those objectives were at times questionable. But they were darn useful for getting facts, of that there is no question.
I have said this many times before that STOPP’s two publications that housed the regulations of CP from LEAs and that of individual schools that took the decision to respond to STOPP cannot be distorted. If the schools or LEAs had lied and had been proved to have lied then there would have been repercussions. What would an LEA or school have achieved by lying to STOPP? Conversely, if any given LEA or school had proved that STOPP had distorted submitted regulations then I think the organisation would have been wholly discredited, especially by teachers and heads that had supported their views. I doubt it would have received any further information. Therefore, I think what is published in the aforesaid publications is the facts. We all know that, in the main, albeit for the court cases we all know so well, that if we look at girls, for example, they were either not subject to SCP or, if they were, it was a couple of strokes on the hand with a cane, or the slipper on the behind administered by female staff. If we look at those two books, then that it what is stated.
However, they did try to manipulate in other ways. For example, with the use of emotive phraseology and words such as, ‘degrading,’ ‘beatings’ and ‘thrashings.’ ‘purple marks.’ They tried to make two reasonable strokes of the cane on the hand as something as bad as a judicial birching.
Furthermore, and I shall pause here to say that I’m uncertain if this was indeed a STOPP anti-SCP promo, or it belonged to another anti- SCP group, but it relates to something that I saw on a local TV news programme one tea time during the 1980’s. (I have mentioned this here before and nobody had seen it). This is an example of STOPP, or whoever, going for the lowest common denominator or going for the jugular! Sitting contently, watching the local news show, the issue of SCP was mentioned. With my eyes popping wide open, I saw a side-on view depicting a girl of about sixteen years old walking into a poorly lit room. She had dark clothing on, but her skirt was brown corduroy, short and tight fit. A male teacher was in the room.’ Spluttering,’ I saw her walk briskly to a classroom desk and she bent right over it. I’m certain she had long mousy hair but at no time did I see her face. I saw what looked like a slipper. The film ended. I’m amazed nobody has ever picked this up. But do you all see what I mean? Rather than showing a film of a boy getting the cane on the hand, they show a senior age girl in a short skirt, bending over a desk to be slippereed by a male teacher!!!
Raising another point that maybe sits with what you, A.L, allude to, is that I have a newspaper cutting in a file somewhere from an angry headmaster who believed in ‘swishing the cane’ at his school. He had willingly submitted information to STOPP regarding caning policy. However, he was adamant that what STOPP published been exaggerated. Tom Scott’s counter-argument was that it was total nonsense that his organisation would distort the facts. From the other end of the spectrum,, it was said in another report that teachers opposed to SCP submitted exaggerated information about ‘beatings’ in the schools in which they taught.
A.L, we have discussed many times dishonesty and the distortion of the facts in many walks of life. Politicians in this country, for example? Very fine exponents of the art, I’d say.
I don’t believe STOPP fabricated the Tricia Watson’ incident. Maybe the parents and the girl didn’t want their names disclosed. I guess, too, that’s why the name of the school was not stated. You have to remember, that STOPP had a regular publication called ‘STOPP News.’ In it were many similar snippets to the ‘Tricia Watson’ incident, of which I shall give examples anon. The magazine would house lots of information and updates. Why should they need to make up incidents? Some submitted names, others didn’t.
Regarding Margaret Stone’s. ‘The CP of Schoolgirls,’ I did buy a copy at the time. Yes, I enjoyed some of her ramblings. But the reality is that all the information she has gathered has been found in STOPP, newspapers and other publication and anybody here on this esteemed forum, who has a similar a collection, could have put that book together. Agreed?
Just some more snippets to finish with:
‘Hannah McGrath, a fifteen year old pupil at St John’s RC secondary school in Liverpool, was given two strokes on her hand in 1984 for fighting with another girl.’
STOPP News. April /May 1984
***
‘The mother of a girl at a school in the London Borough of Redbridge told STOPP:
“My thirteen year old daughter tells me she’s going to get the cane on Monday. Another girl insulted her, and my daughter got involved in a fight.”
Catalogue of Cruelty. STOPP 1984
***
Thanks,
Paul.
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2015holyfamilypenguin
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Mar 18, 2020#7
Caning the schoolmaster.
1903
https://newspapers.library.wales/view/3 … ng%20girls
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Another_Lurker
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Mar 18, 2020#8
Hello American Way,
A most interesting item linked in your contribution #7 above. Not because of the assault on the unfortunate schoolmaster by the mother and her son whom the schoolmaster had caned for absenting himself from a Maths lesson. The stupid, ignorant and violent are ever present regardless of date and 1903 was no exception.
No, the interest lies in the size of the class the schoolmaster was teaching when he was assaulted. His class was eighty children, and they didn’t have teaching assistants in those days! What, I wonder, would modern teachers make of that? I have encountered young teachers who have refused to believe that the classes throughout my junior school days in the early 1950s were consistently over fifty pupils and that one unassisted teacher managed them so eighty would probably be totally beyond their comprehension.
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dmp
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Mar 20, 2020#9
why do you assume the mother who valiantly defended her child was either stupid or ignorant. i would say defending your child even at possible legal jeopardy expresses the highest virtues of maternal care… as for violent who is to say if these individually were generally violent or only driven to extreme necessity by the cruel circumstances imposed upon them by this brute of a school teacher.
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Another_Lurker
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Mar 20, 2020#10
hello dane,
As you know I have high regard for your opinions. I suspect that we shall have to agree to differ, but I will explain why I regard the mother as stupid and ignorant. Note also that the court took the view that she was culpable, found her guilty and fined her for assault.
I think we must first consider the time, 1903. In the UK at that time SCP was pretty universal. Classes were large and order was maintained by classroom CP. Quick, minimum disruption to other students, and often effective in achieving at least some of the desired effects. Pretty much the same situation still subsisted during my primary education in the late 1940s and early 1950s, although classes were a bit smaller by then.
That doesn’t make SCP right today in the UK in a very different world, but we must consider the historical context. Where parents disagreed with SCP (some did, but not many) the acceptable and reasonable recourse open to them was discussion with the school. Assaulting the teacher does not constitute discussion, reasonable or otherwise. Further allowing her son to assist in the assault was merely encouraging him in behaviour which could only result in further future punishment. So sorry, but stupid and ignorant remains my verdict.
I said that the stupid and ignorant are always with us, and indeed they are. I am acquainted with a case where long after SCP was abandoned in UK schools the Headmistress of a local primary school was saddled with a little pyromanic amoungst her pupils. I say saddled, because it is not easy for a school to shed a disruptive pupil. Despite frequent requests to his parents not to allow him access to them the boy frequently produced matches and lighters in school which fortunately were promptly confiscated. Things came to a head when a teacher looked the wrong way for a little bit too long and the boy struck a match with the intention of setting fire to a waste-paper basket. The teacher did the only thing possible, grabbed him and removed the match and the danger.
The parents were called, but instead of expressing horror and regret they stormed into the school threatening to assault the Headmistress if anyone had laid a finger on their son. Fortunately she kept her head and instructed a member of staff to call the police, whereupon the parents beat an abusive retreat taking the son with them. No action was taken, but happily for the Headmistress of my acquaintance the boy was moved to another school. Now in my opinion those parents were of very much the same ilk as the mother in the 1903 case, stupid and ignorant!
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bripuk
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Mar 20, 2020#11
A local comprehensive school was almost completely destroyed by fire when a young arsonist, a pupil at the school, deliberately set the school ablaze. He had been expelled from another school for precisely the same action. A long period of detention was the outcome. It does make you wonder if it had been treated in a more traditional way in the first instance whether much time and money could have been saved.
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six of the best
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Mar 21, 2020#12
A_L is absolutely right. Some facts and dates concerning UK SCP. Back in 1903, 117 years ago corporal punishment in general was commonplace. Youngsters and for many their parents too didn’t have a great deal of money so fines were impractical. Youngsters had virtually nothing of their own that could be confiscated. Detentions in school was inconvenient for staff as well as pupils. So SCP was the most common method of discipline. The UK’s courts had power to order birchings and canings to young offenders.
It wasn’t until 1918 that there was a national education act creating a law that all children must go to school from age 5 to 14 prior that only local rules existed. In 1944 the school leaving age rose to 15. That remained until 1972 when the senior school fifth form became compulsory. This continued until 2008 when the leaving age was increased to 18 with some flexibility between education and other fulltime training options.
Back to 1903 there was no fixed school leaving age and education often had to be paid for. Even the 1918 Act meant youngsters could leave school on their 14th birthday. In today’s terms that means a youngster whose birthday falls in early September would just be in Year 9, the old third form, just two years into a modern senior school.
In 1903, juvenile corporal punishment, at least for boys, was totally accepted with very few rules controlling it. I believe the great majority of parents used CP in the home then too. Youngsters in the armed forces could be birched or caned too. Throughout the 20th century the use of CP was used less and less.
In my own schooldays I knew of no parent complaining to any of my schools about the use of CP on their offspring. Parental CP was gradually being used less. I knew of it being used in the 1950s/60s by many parents but by the 1980s it was only used by a minority of UK parents. I remember a good friend of mine saying that he’d had to use the slipper on one of his sons that evening. The lad was about 12. I was surprised to learn that spanking was still used in that family but I didn’t regard my friend as abusive or cruel. So in much less than one hundred years UK SCP moved from commonplace to banned.
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dmp
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Mar 21, 2020#13
the recourse of discussing it with the school would almost certainly have resulted in their contemptuous dismissal by the arrogant thugs who ran things as their brutal hearts choose and who were backed up by the judiciary who supported such thugs almost without exception, the only recourse for a brave and intelligent parent was direct action, standing up to the thugs no matter the cost in defense of their child, a verdict against them by the corrupt old boys network of the courts was a badge of honor not shame.
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KKxyz
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Mar 21, 2020#14
DMP,
Your corrupt world is not one I am familiar with. Mine has been benign even if not perfect. My teachers had good motives. They operated with the support and respect of the communities in which they live and worked. They made mistakes, as do all humans. There was no war between schools and the communities they served. Getting the strap or the cane was not the end of the world and was not afforded much significance.
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Another_Lurker
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Mar 21, 2020#15
Hello dane,
I am quite fascinated by how as a US citizen and apparently not of an exceptionally great age you consider yourself so familiar with the world of 1903 Leyton, Essex, England that you feel confident in the following statement:
dane wrote:
the recourse of discussing it with the school would almost certainly have resulted in their contemptuous dismissal by the arrogant thugs who ran things as their brutal hearts choose and who were backed up by the judiciary who supported such thugs almost without exception, the only recourse for a brave and intelligent parent was direct action, standing up to the thugs no matter the cost in defense of their child, a verdict against them by the corrupt old boys network of the courts was a badge of honor not shame.
Have you lived a previous life or lives in Leyton? Did you have contact earlier in life with a very old person who was in Leyton in 1903? How have you attained this detailed knowledge of a long gone social order please?
I’m with KK as regards my teachers. I have grateful memories of almost every one of them at both primary and secondary school. It is said that nobody ever forgets a good teacher and I certainly remember nearly all of mine with affection. They gave me the education which enabled me to earn a good living and that in turn assisted me in having a happy life.
In primary school especially there was a lot of in-class corporal punishment and I was certainly quite fearful of this and anxious to avoid it. But even as a youngster I could appreciate that it was essentially pretty fair and unbiased. Boy or girl, regular troublemaker and at the base of the academic pyramid, or almost never stepping out of line and sitting firmly on top of it, if you transgressed you found yourself up in front of the class being whacked then it was on with the lesson with minimal delay. With classes of 50+ and a single unassisted teacher it did the job and it got results.
In 1903 even more was expected of teachers. When Ms Treloar attacked him teacher Thomas Minett had a class of 80 children. In the absence of any evidence to the contrary I see no reason to suppose that Mr Minett differed very greatly from the people who taught me. A hard working teacher doing his best to give all his pupils an excellent education using means and methods proven successful in that time and that place.
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dmp
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Mar 21, 2020#16
i think its not so much a matter of my knowledge or lack there of, of the social order at the specific time, but that i have a different understanding of the general nature of the social order than other members of the forum… i do not see it as generally benign so i don’t expect it was benign in 1961 alabama or 1755 bavaria or 2020 warren pennsylvania in 1903 leyton . you however assume barring overwhelming evidence to the contrary that it was… agree to disagree
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Another_Lurker
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Mar 21, 2020#17
Hello dane,
Done! ????
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kirsty_smith16
1
Mar 27, 2020#18
if we refused corpal punishment at school we got expelled and it was very hard getting into another school
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neilmc32
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Mar 27, 2020#19
bripuk wrote: ↑Mar 20, 2020
A local comprehensive school was almost completely destroyed by fire when a young arsonist, a pupil at the school, deliberately set the school ablaze. He had been expelled from another school for precisely the same action. A long period of detention was the outcome. It does make you wonder if it had been treated in a more traditional way in the first instance whether much time and money could have been saved.
I’m not so sure. One of our church members recently revealed that she’d been a head of department in a tough school in Liverpool and had been forced into caning a troublesome boy, something she’d rather not have done. Later he did set fire to the school.
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Another_Lurker
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Mar 28, 2020#20
Hello kirsty_smith16,
Thank you for making what appears to be your first contribution here. In the current state of the Forum new contributors are especially welcome, at least as far as I personally am concerned.
I believe that in some places at some times the situation was exactly as you describe. Corporal punishment was part of the school disciplinary system. If you committed an infringement of the disciplinary rules which incurred corporal punishment and then refused to accept that punishment the school banned your continued attendance. If other schools in the locality had similar regimes, or indeed wished to avoid pupils who might prove to be trouble-makers, they in turn would either refuse or be very reluctant to accept an inward transfer.
Fortunately that situation didn’t pertain everywhere at all times. For instance had I done something at my UK secondary school in the second half of the 1950s for which the school deemed that I should be caned and I’d refused to accept the caning I am pretty certain that I would have been expelled. I am also fairly sure that, apart from possibly one or two very progressive institutions, other schools of a similar type would have rejected me as a pupil. However I am fairly confident that I would have been found a place in a state school, even though not necessarily a very good one.
If you have the time it would be most interesting to hear about your school’s corporal punishment regime, whether you had personal experience in receipt of it, and whether the refusal of SCP followed by expulsion and subsequent difficulties in securing a place at another school happened very often. I strongly advise against identifying a school unless you particularly wish to do so, but type of school, time period and approximate locality are most helpful in putting your experiences in context within the overall world-wide spectrum of SCP usage.
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Another_Lurker
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Unread postMar 28, 2020#21
Hello neilmc32 and bripuk,
I would suspect that in the days when SCP in the UK was current even the best regulated schools and most experienced teachers might have had difficulty in determining whether evidence of pyromaniacal tendencies would be best dealt with by the cane or a psychiatrist. I further suspect that they would have experienced problems in securing prompt and reliable assistance with the matter.
In the case of your Church member, neilmc32, you don’t say that a prior history of setting fire to things had any bearing on the reason that she caned the boy. Had that been the case, or indeed if there had been such a history I’m sure that in the context she would have mentioned it. Personally I’d say that the lady had absolutely no reason to reproach herself as to the boy’s subsequent actions. She would have taken the decision to cane in the light of her own experience, the boy’s past history and the then current policy of the school. That is all that can reasonably be expected of a competent and conscientious professional person. Very, very few of us can accurately predict the future.
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KKxyz
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Unread postMar 28, 2020#22
If a boy had refused to accept a deserved caning at my school he would have been widely ostracized by other boys, a fate worse than the cane. Indeed, an occasional caning, taken well, was necessary to avoid an unsavory reputation as a “goodie goodie”, “teacher’s pet” or worse. If you were lucky there would be no delay between detection and punishment and you would get it from a reputed caner.
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six of the best
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Unread postMar 28, 2020#23
KKxyz wrote: ↑Mar 28, 2020
If a boy had refused to accept a deserved caning at my school he would have been widely ostracized by other boys, a fate worse than the cane. Indeed, an occasional caning, taken well, was necessary to avoid an unsavory reputation as a “goodie goodie”, “teacher’s pet” or worse. If you were lucky there would be no delay between detection and punishment and you would get it from a reputed caner.
I think KKxyz is right. To refuse to take a deserved caning at school back then was virtually unheard of. Corporal punishment for youngsters was fully accepted by most youngsters and their parents alike. True some parents didn’t really approve of it but they had to accept that many schools used it. In those days there was very little any parents could do about SCP provided it was appropriate, deserved and not excessive. I suppose some of the acceptance came from the great majority of the adult population doing as they were told and accepting ‘orders’ a kickback to respect of authority also wartime military discipline.
I remember at about age eight getting a proper bottom spanking at home. Despite the fact it hurt I was somewhat delighted to become a member of a new, to me, elite group of those who were spanked at home. I’d heard other boys talk of it and almost felt I was missing out!
How the world has changed!
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Stuartsummers
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Unread postMar 28, 2020#24
I agree. At a boys public school 75-82 including sixth form cp was used certainly up til 1980 . No boy as far i recall ever refused cp be that the cane or a slippering with a gym shoe. You just did exactly as you were told, it was unheard of. I recall very clearly being slippered at school aged 12 and then it repeated by my father at home. Fortunately most of my school punishments he never got to hear about!
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WWT
Unread postMar 28, 2020#25
KKxyz wrote: ↑Mar 28, 2020
If a boy had refused to accept a deserved caning at my school he would have been widely ostracized by other boys, a fate worse than the cane. Indeed, an occasional caning, taken well, was necessary to avoid an unsavory reputation as a “goodie goodie”, “teacher’s pet” or worse. If you were lucky there would be no delay between detection and punishment and you would get it from a reputed caner.
And lowering your underpants to let your classmates see the results of a recent caning was like putting a badge of honour on display.
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six of the best
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Unread postMar 28, 2020#26
Stuartsummers: Do you think a home spanking helped you to accept and cope with a school punishment?
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Unread postMar 28, 2020#27
WWT: And lowering your underpants to let your classmates see the results of a recent caning was like putting a badge of honour on display.
I remember a boy in my class getting three strokes of the cane from one of the older teachers in my boys grammar school. The boy was about 12 or 13 and the year about 1960. He was caned in the morning and we had PE that afternoon. I remember being shocked when I saw the marks on his bottom. I’d seen boys being slippered before that and had been spanked a few times at home but the cane and the marks it left was very different.
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bripuk
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Unread postMar 28, 2020#28
Yes I often saw marks on boys backsides left by the cane. I was always amazed by how long they took to disappear.
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six of the best
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Unread postMar 28, 2020#29
bripuk wrote: ↑Mar 28, 2020
Yes I often saw marks on boys backsides left by the cane. I was always amazed by how long they took to disappear.
But never felt it yourself?
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Another_Lurker
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Unread postMar 28, 2020#30
With regard to being in receipt of the cane six of the best asked bripuk:
But never felt it yourself?
Hello bripuk,
If indeed you haven’t felt it yourself, don’t be intimidated by the Forum’s caning snob community! ????????????
Stand proud and join this estimable Forum’s most exclusive community, errm, me! There’s a whole thread devoted to convincing me that I missed out on an essential element of life by not being caned at school. I remain to be convinced! ????
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bripuk
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Unread postMar 28, 2020#31
I feared the slipper more than the cane. A fit, young PE teacher delivering up to 6 whacks as hard as he could after the recipient was made to change into shorts left a raised welt across both cheeks that really hurt. My worst caning occurred curiously enough when I was in the lower 6th and decided to skip assembly with two of my friends. We were given the choice of 4 1 hour detentions or the cane. The other boys opted for the detentions but 4 hours of my life were too valuable so I decided to be caned. The headmaster obviously took exception to missing his assembly and really laid it on. Although the skin wasn’t broken 2 purple parallel wheals decorated my backside which hurt immensely probably due the strokes being laid one on top of the other. My bottom was sore for a couple of days and the marks lasted for ages.
I can assure you A_L you did well to miss such a traumatic experience.
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six of the best
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Unread postMar 28, 2020#32
I’m not sure it was a matter of snobbery but I am told that the private sector used the cane much more than the state sector. As I have only really ever met one person who actually went to a minor public school as a boarder I have very little knowledge of that side of the UK side of education.
State schools of the 1950s/60s used various methods of CP and the amount of it varied enormously. That said many escaped all CP at school. It is a fact that far more youngsters completely escaped the cane or slipper in school than received it.. However plenty were caned in school. Those in the state schools generally went to local schools. The ‘lucky’ ones who passed their 11 plus exam often went to grammar schools a bit further afield. The ones who went to private or public school usually went to schools of their parents’ choice. There were the clever youngsters who gained entry to the better private schools by passing exams.
I’m not sure that I knew of any kudos of receiving the cane. That said I was intrigued on the few occasions that I saw marks on other boys. Also in many schools the cane was only used across the hands.
As to girls being caned in schools I have even less knowledge of that but I am certain it did happen to some girls but only to a tiny minority compared to boys and in the main that was across their hands.
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Stuartsummers
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Unread postMar 29, 2020#33
six of the best wrote: ↑Mar 28, 2020
Stuartsummers: Do you think a home spanking helped you to accept and cope with a school punishment?
@Six of the best . Yes indeed. My parents believed in cp so i was well versed in spanking at home before I ever got it at school. Up to the point of going to senior school, my father would spank me over the knee bare bottom and then after that he would slipper me bent over an armchair. So yes i was able cope with the punishment but school was different especially when in front of others in class or with another one or two after class. Much more embarrassing than at home , except for the few times at home i was spanked when visitors were there
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six of the best
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Unread postMar 29, 2020#34
Stuartsummers wrote: ↑Mar 29, 2020
six of the best wrote: ↑Mar 28, 2020
Stuartsummers: Do you think a home spanking helped you to accept and cope with a school punishment?
@Six of the best . Yes indeed. My parents believed in cp so i was well versed in spanking at home before I ever got it at school. Up to the point of going to senior school, my father would spank me over the knee bare bottom and then after that he would slipper me bent over an armchair. So yes i was able cope with the punishment but school was different especially when in front of others in class or with another one or two after class. Much more embarrassing than at home , except for the few times at home i was spanked when visitors were there
Hi Stuart,
Spanking at home was the norm for many youngsters at home back in the 1950s/60s but not all families used it. There seemed to be no defining difference between bigger or smaller families, ones with both sons and daughters and the better off and more working class families. In all these categories some families spanked and others didn’t. Many primary school of that era used no CP and going to the ‘big school’ was often a terrific shock for many.
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Another_Lurker
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Unread postMar 30, 2020#35
Hello bripuk,
With regard to being caned at school you said to me in contribution #31 above:
I can assure you A_L you did well to miss such a traumatic experience.
Wise wise words I think, and very much the conclusion I came to in the period when such a fate might have overtaken me. There was no caning at my primary school, although I was slippered once. Probably very lightly, because I have no recollection of the actual impact of the slipper, just of the shame and loss of face involved in the top of the class having to trudge through the ranks and queue up to bend over a front row desk facing the class to be whacked just like the usual suspects.
At secondary school though the cane was an ever-present threat. Most here have reported being caned by an assortment of male teachers and headmasters, probably the most common experience for schoolboys. A few lucky lads have reported being caned by attractive young lady teachers and being envied by less fortunate classmates as a result – allegedly!
Alas though except in the most exceptional circumstances if I’d been caned at school it wouldn’t have been by either of those groups, or indeed by any member of the school staff. The Headmaster did occasionally wield the cane for really serious transgressions bordering on expulsion. However the vast majority of canings were administered by the prefects for serious or repeated minor violations of the school’s standards for appearance, behaviour and conformance to tradition.
I had sight of the cane laid on the table of the prefects’ court as a symbol of their authority early in my secondary school career. A prefects’ court appearance as a result of running in a quadrangle where running wasn’t allowed. I concluded that having to bend over for up to three strokes of the terrifying looking thing wielded by a boy only a few years older than me and almost certainly a hearty featuring in one of the school’s top sports teams, a breed I rather despised at the time, didn’t appeal at all. And nor did the fact that the punishment would be witnessed by any other prefects who happened to be in the prefects’ room at the time.
I determined that I would avoid it, and I did whatever was necessary to achieve that. It wasn’t too difficult, though some boys found it impossible. The main reason for falling foul of the prefects was uniform transgressions, in particular the wearing of the school cap, compulsory when in uniform in public. In the street, on public transport, in cars, even in your own front garden walking up to your own front door if you were visible from the road.
The only relief from that rule was to become a privileged sixth former, priv for short, a sort of sub-prefect or, not usually possible until the third year sixth form, a full prefect. The latter sometimes wore their caps, because they had a splendidly elaborate version with a tassle, much admired by girls from the surrounding girls’ schools. I was lucky, I made priv as soon as I got into the sixth form, so instead of fearing a write-up in the prefects’ book, a court appearance and possibly the cane I could actually put erring boys in the book. Not that I did.
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Unread postMar 30, 2020#36
Hello six of the best,
You said above:
I’m not sure it was a matter of snobbery but I am told that the private sector used the cane much more than the state sector.
I fear that I may possibly have misled you by my reference to the Forum’s caning snob community. As indicated by the three smiling emoticons which followed it this was a jocular reference, and was intended to encompass those here who see having been caned at school as one of the essential components of a properly spent youth – or perhaps that should be a properly misspent youth. No names, no pack drill! It wasn’t intended as a reference to any differences between types of school as regards SCP.
I’m not at all sure that the UK private education sector used the cane much more than the state sector, taking into account the relative numbers of pupils and schools involved. Differently perhaps, possibly sometimes more severely. Relatively few boys seem to have been caned on the bare in the state sector whereas within living memory this was sometimes a feature of a certain type of prep school. But more per se, I suspect possibly not. What do others think?
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2015holyfamilypenguin
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Unread postNov 15, 2020#37
It is amazing that so many high school students willingly submit to corporal punishment. I think their parents would be upset if they chose suspension. In England they had a No Caning sign but I don’t think you will ever see a No Paddling sign.
I would imagine the 1911 California boys and girls (fifty strong) were spanked frequently and perhaps like Miss Butcher and Miss Dennis in 1904 having to lay across the principal’s lap. Maybe they were paddled in a similar fashion then as now but some even now resent it and write that it makes them feel childish for their foolishness.
Ask the Board to stop the board.
https://cdnc.ucr.edu/?a=d&d=LAH19110411 … 22——-1
Not all go down without a fight as recently posted as an example are these two 1904 Timberwolves.
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn … nge&page=1