Everyone agrees that truancy is a bad thing because it means
1/ The student is losing valuable school time, falls behind and finds it very difficult to catch up again - especially the persistant truant.
2/ He/she is then unsupervised and wandering around the town and liable to be targetted by predators and possibly in other types of danger.
3/ He/she will be bored and may well begin vandallising the place and causing other trouble.

There has always been a truancy problem but in former times it was punished, as was all misbehaviour, by corporal punishment. This meant that there was a real deterrent to skipping school. Now the only real sanction a school has is 'Suspension - in other words, the girl or boy is sent home, losing valuable school time and falling behind with their studies! Is there something I've missed here? The punishment; the ultimate deterrent, is the equivalent of playing truant!

What are the arguments against corporal punishment being employed for truancy and misbehaviour in general, and the reasons for banning it? We are told it is dangerous, it damages those delicate nerve endings etc in the students buttocks (I rule out here all other physical punishment, including on the childs hands) and therefore should not be allowed. And yet schools play rugby and soccer and all sorts of other activities in which a student can be hurt - if you've every been in a rugger scrum or been hit by a cricket ball you'll know what I mean. In such sports the child can sometimes be badly injured or even killed, a number of cases are reported each year. How many kids were ever badly injured or killed from school CP - none as far as I know, certainly not in the last century. We ban schools from using CP but do we ban all those activities I have just mentioned? No! Why, because the benefits outway those other considerations. I believe CP is exactly the same, the advantages far outway the disadvantages.
Another argument is, adults cannot be 'hit' so why should a child. Adults are punished by other means, including fines and imprisonment - do we advocate sending kids to jail or fining them? Of course not, imprisnment would be far too cruel and who would pay the fines, the childrens' parents. So what meaningful punishment is there left for the misbehaving child - no one seems to have come up with the answer to that one. All we hear are cries of "You can't do that!" or "It NEVER worked!" but never "Let's do this instead, this WILL work"
Is CP too cruel? I wonder. When I was at school many boys would rather have had a few whacks with a slipper than do a 500 word essay or miss a football match so it can't have been that bed. It didn't cure all misbehaviour, of course it didn't, but what sanction ever has? At least it was quiick and cheap and didn't damage the child's future prospects.
Does it teach children to be violent? Since it's rapid decline in the 70s and 60s, violence in society has rocketed!

All humans, and indeed all animals, face dangers and deterrents every day of their lives. I believe the way we now treat our children is going to backfire on society in the future in a very bad way!

The physical damage caused by corporal punishment will be temporary, but what about the psychological harm brought about by administering, receiving or witnessing it? It is probable that most of the readers and contributors here have a fetishistic interest in corporal punishment, although they may not admit it to themselves.

There are as many with that fetish who never experienced or even witnessed corporal punishment as those that did. How do you explain that?

the harm comes not so much from the memory but the fact that illicit desire for CP is sparked.
This in adult life is unrealisable or expensive to realise shall we say.
Massive frstration results in the libido ego and this in itself is harmful
its called repression.
the same thing happens to gays.
CPers canmnot fucntion with out indulging in their sport
and the opportunities to do so are few and far between

Mountain climbing is expensive to realise too, so what?

Danny I would disagree your idea that there are as many without the fetish as with the fetish who have not had experiences with childhood CP. It is really only recently that any legitimate poll has suggested that anywhere near even half of the number of parents do not favor spanking at some time and to some degree. Most information suggests that children are spanked most often when they are very young between ages 2 and 4 when long term memory hasn't become firmly established. Some information suggests that a significant number of toddlers are often spanked several times a day. It is also often suggested that parents who spank toddler and who feel it appropriate do not necessarily support spanking when the child is old enough to "understand and be reasoned with". It is possible that a number of people who do not recall being spanked as children or witnessing spanking may have had either experience during a period of their life when memory was not reliable nor developed. How much of what happened to you at 3 do you remember specifically and accurately? Most of us also grew up in cultures where the threat of spanking certainly existed and there were many reference to it on TV and other media.

If you are right, Headboy, they banned the wrong people using CP. There are very few schools with kids as young as two or three. Do I take it that you mean you want the government to ban smacking by parents? If so, that's an argument for another day and another forum, surely?

Its 20 years since the ban. The results are all too obvious.Rightly or wrongly it was certainly more successful than modern nonsense methods of discipline.

Danny, where in my post did I say anything about anyone banning anything?
I was not at all addressing the rightness or wrongness of using CP with children either at home or at school. Why with your response are you diverting from the topic I actually was addressing?

I simply disagreed with a remark you made that there was no relationship between CP fetishism and having or not having had experience with CP as a child.

Your statement does not resonate with any degree of truth based on a number of things I know to be true.

If you have evidence to the contrary to offer other than your own personal opinions, then share it. If not, don't expect others to accept your personal beliefs as truth when there is a good deal of evidence to suggest that your "truth" is incorrect.

Mimi said "Its 20 years since the ban. The results are all too obvious.Rightly or wrongly it was certainly more successful than modern nonsense methods of discipline."

There might be a scintilla of truth in that if CP or its lack thereof operated in a vacuum. It didn't. Decrease in CP usage at school (if not so much at home) has occurred in a society where enormous other changes have also occurred relative to family stability, time spent by parents with children and in actively raising children, changes in societal values as a whole, increased mobility and the decrease of the availability of the nuclear family to help, gigantic increases in the divorce rate, etc, etc. etc. To suggest that non-corporal methods of discipline is the culprit and all those other things have no effect on the behavioral development of children strikes me as a bit of wishful and perhaps fetishistically motivated thinking.

Lack of CP may or may not have had an effect on the change in behavior. There is actually no was to tell as the lack of CP's use can never be viewed outside the context of a myriad of other, perhaps more significant, variables that affect children's behavior.

In the U.S., paddling still goes on routinely in 22 of the 50 states. One of those states that still uses the paddle is Colorado. Columbine High School is in Colorado. Obviously the threat of the paddle and its use throughout grade school and into secondary school in Colorado had little effect on the fact that kids who could be subjected to CP came to school and murdered their classmates and teachers en masse. FBI statistic support the conclusion that there is a direct, positive correlations between rate of violent crimes in an area of the U.S. and rate of school paddlings in that same area. Does one cause the other---no way to know but the relationship is interesting.

And let's face it, in places where CP has been banned, it is very likely to stay banned. Perhaps rather than bemoaning the loss of the good old days of strict physical discipline seem through rose colored glasses, it would be better to expend energy at looking at the realities as they are today and trying to be proactive in actually evaluating and improving what is within the parameters that exist.

My opinion is as good as any other for, as you rightly say, there is no proof one way or t'other. I have never said mine is the truth and I note you don't either. I am merely putting the case 'for' because there always seems a great many folk who are quick to put the case 'against'.
True, there are many factors involved in this question - a general decline in the standards expected of society is the main one. This has come about princibly by those 'do-gooders who think no one should have duties, only rights.
The US has many more problems in this regard, the gun culture being the main one, which give cause to those kids with a grudge against society running amok in US schools.
My opinion, and probably not the 'truth' as you see it, Headboy

Danny

The points as you put it from your post, by comparison could argumentatively stand. Quick, low cost effective for some, etc.

But for many CP didn’t deter. there are more cons than pros

I remember the misdemeanours I got physically punished for, which I can’t say i did for other forms of punishment received. So in that respect it had some influence. Though loss of my freedom was far more important to me and therefore more effective , as was the case for many.

CP didn’t deter, one only thought about it after you broke the rule and caught, then lie your way out of it the best you could, to avoid the consequence. refuse and most of us would have been where most children are today suspended or expelled. We were conditioned to accept such punishments from home, primary school and senior school as the norm,

Yes the physical side subsides very quickly, but I didn’t gain an interest in this subject or site by writing a few hundred lines or lengthy detentions, I admit things I witnessed, experienced, psychologically effected me from primary school age, ask Danny, why people post here, I still harbour a grudge against the person that did that to me, no it didn’t turn me violent or into the fetish scene, but this emotive subject is so taboo out of forums like this you are made to feel a sense of guilt, uncomfortable just in general conversation, why it effects some like this, and not other, who knows.

Yes there were hundreds of children that received CP, but many hundreds more that didn’t,

What made children better behaved then was better parenting, set boundaries, good teachers and a community that cared and a world of not have all. Those kind of values are what we should be progressively aiming to reintroduce today. There are different and increased pressures on life today as a whole, these influence the way kids behave. CP as you suggest Danny as a last result before suspension may work for a small minority and a few saved expulsion,and if it proved I would go with that but only in the older child, but realistically children today are no longer conditioned as we were, You won’t find many that would submit themselves today or teachers getting the backing of their parents even as a last result , it will do the full circle refusal, suspension, expelled, back where the argument started. We have to look for a new approch but that's the the next big question, what.

Ketta

I can only refer to experiences in Britain.
I have no personal knowledge of CP in the USA. The USA is a country that whilst creating money for the legal profession persuing any sniff of child abuse practises a form of CP and suffering in the Middle East.
It is an absolute fact that discipline in British schools was proportional to the use of CP, as CP became unfashionable amongst trendy do gooders then bad behaviour increased.
I would never advocate draconian punishments for every misdemeanor but its threat and occasional use certainly kept the majority in check.
Of course avoiding CP could make pupils lie to cover up their mistakes and normal pupils would avoid it at all costs. This is an education for the real world at least.
I know of schools where CP was not used in the 50s onwards and teachers who never used it. The one factor in these schools is that they were of the type where pupils had to behave or they were out. Usually fee paying or grant/scholarship based.
For the usual common or garden school then pupils needed control because they did not actually want to be there and had no real interest in lessons that did not match their particular abilities.
As for fetishism, I know people who never even went to schools that had CP but enjoy it for their own pleasure.
I also know people who had various degrees of CP but are not turned on by it at all.
Perhaps its something in a persons own personality that forms such things rether than coercion.
The fact is that in Britain I doubt if teachers would be able to administer it if it was allowed.
As usual the tail wags the dog.
Children are all important now even if their rights do them harm, adults have no rights of seniority and are unable to provide firm guidance.
Great business for the social workers et al.

As always, Ketta, I agree with you on most of those points but not all. You say hundreds suffered CP at school - that may have been true in your day but in mine, at all three schools I attended, it was a very rare thing for anyone to escape it. Therefore there must be many hundreds OF THOUSANDS of people my age who experienced CP and a very small minority of those ever post on websites like this or go around bemoaning the way they suffered. The old phrase brought out about people like me is we say "It didn't do me any harm" I would say the reason for that is IT DIDN'T DO ME ANY HARM!
I too remember many of the canings I was given but can't recall much else in the way of being disciplined. That is because it was definitely more effective, as you rightly say.
I too don't think it will ever see a comeback although these things do go in cycles and we are always seeing that theories change around over time. After all, Britain has always said premptive strikes on another country were completely out of the question until Bush/Blair convinced our parliament that it was all right. Having tried it and found it wasn't working they've all now changed their minds back again. Maybe the politicians who voted the banning of school CP will think again in a few years time. Who knows?

Ah, wave the magic cane and whack a bum! Surely all social ills will be solved! Have it whatever way you'd like. The reality is that is it highly unlikely that the cane will return to the classroom in the UK and even as we speak the paddle's use in the U.S. decreases and decreases.

Fact: There are higher violent crime rate in U.S. states where paddling is used in public schools.

Fact: There are lower school achievement scores in U.S. States where paddling is used in pubic schools.

Fact: The school drop out rate on average is higher in paddling states than non-paddling states.

Fact: There is no significant difference in the number of suspensions of students in paddling and non-paddling states.

Fact: The rate of school vandalism is higher in paddling states than in non-paddling states.

Fact: The threat and existence of paddling in certain states has not made them immune to violent crimes in schools.

Fact: No good evaluation of the situation has turned up one shred of evidence that shows that there is any positive difference in the behavior of students in paddling states over non-paddling states.

In the U.S. we can still make comparisons between paddling and non-paddling states. We can compare behaviors of the same type of student in schools utilizing corporal punishment and not utilizing corporal punishment. And the paddle doesn't seem to be all that effective in accomplishing what we claim we want to accomplish with students.

Now if all you want to do is get back at misbehaving students and beat them in retribution then that's a whole different motivation altogether than the one I'm interested in.

Do you think kids in the UK are all that different from kids anywhere even the U.S.?

"Ah, wave the magic cane and whack a bum! Surely all social ills will be solved!"

I wonder where you get the idea that I have ever said or thought that, Headboy! What I did list was some of the pros to counterbalance all the cons most of the contributers to this forum keep putting out as facts. I said that it was as effective as any other sanction, not more so. I said it was quicker and cheaper than any other, not that it would or did solve all our problems. I said it was less disruptive to a students schooling and so does more damage to the child's future prospects. Read my arguments instead of getting into a violent rage (I can almost feel the heat from here ) before exploding, Headboy.

It seems to me that the way of thinking in the STOPP campaigns of the 70s/80s was "Stop waving the magic cane and all social ills will be solved" - Have they been?

You quote statistics for the Southern States of America where paddling is still around as though this means when you paddle you get violence ... I can guarantee that there is far less paddling in those states now than ever there used to be in the 50s/ 60s or even in the 70s/80s and certainly a lot less than in the UK when I was at school. That said, I certainly don't make any connection between CP and violence as you do, the US has always been a violent place with gun-ho adults teaching their kids to fire from the hip.

Unfortunately, we in the UK copy all their ideas and think they're great. It's only in the past year or two we have began to see the US as it is - a nation where its power has gone to it's head! Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely! There lies a great deal of the cause of the ills of the world, Headboy, and no amount of CP will ever change that!

I think the hysteria of those against any form of CP is that it was a rarity in the 70s and 80s when most of the readership of this forum were at school. Seeing it brought out very occasionally meant that it was dreaded by those who had never experienced it. Now they look back on those days and think it was almost Capital Punishment, not corporal punishment! When it was an everyday occurence, it was seen as it actually was - no big deal. As I said before, it was often preferred to other sanctions. It didn't stop the normal boy from misbehaving but it certainly stopped the disruption in the classroom that we see too often today.

I know we are never going to agree on this subject, Headboy, but it would be a dull old forum if we all agreed with each other, wouldn't it? I respect your views and, if I'm honest, I would agree with a lot of them.

That's me lot!

Danny

If you took all the senior schools throughout the UK between the 50’s to the abolition of CP, the percentage of pupils that received CP would be considerably less than those that didn’t.
Of those same schools CP would have been administered on an inconsistent basis of misdemeanour. HB is right that in the UK we have no parallel comparison on the effect or contribution CP had over behaviour.

Last week a corner shop London, a boy 11 thereabouts, walked in dressed in short trousers blazer tie and cap for all purposes he looked like a child plucked from a past generation , his uniform for the end of the school year was immaculate his manners exemplary, the same day a group of four girls on a bus dressed very traditionally summer dress, boaters, very polite, well mannered, one of them gave up her seat for a more senior person. These children were from the private education sector . So what makes them so different in behaviour to their state counterparts.

I went through the state and private, both schools used CP, the state school more than private, but an unfair comparison as it was co-ed. The private sector had much higher expectations of its pupils and maintained a far higher level of discipline. This was 1960’s an era when both types of schools commanded respect, you stood for a teacher entering a room, spoke when spoken to, foul language unheard, punished for breaking silly rules.

Once CP was abolished state school, the majority of private schools followed practice, a few hung out for a further ten year, based on tradition than actual need. State schools which mainly relied on cane wavering as a main deterrent saw nothing replace it, whereas, private schools still had a good system of rigid alternative punishments to fall back on, based on loss of privilege, Saturday/evening detentions, segregation from class, expulsion. You failed to come up to standard, in work set as punishment you repeated time and time again till acceptable. Traditional old fashion standards as we call them today, didn’t decline and fall out of fashion as with the state school, they're were retained and still maintained today. Parent pay highly for such placements they expect their children to be disciplined, reach high standards, they support their choice of schools, take an interest in their children’s education and expect the same standards at home.

Danny you have been in the army it didn’t take long for a group mis match lads to be turned around in the very short time of basic training . Private schools are very similar, pupils are institutionalised very quickly, the high standards required become second nature and follow through life. Yes there will be the small minority that don’t comply, as in every walk of life.

Not every parent can afford this privileged education for their children, nor should they be expected to, and Danny this is a first on this forum for me, to support the private education system, not all private schools have the best academic results, but these basic standards of behaviour weren’t maintained through retaining or reintroducing CP, waving a big stick, beating a few bums, these old fashion values, discipline and pride in appearance never diminished as in state school, they’re expected, achieved, maintained and cost nothing, Those to be in the powers of state education, would do well to study why children in these private schools top in the behaviour stakes and retain such high standards, model a few state schools on their methods on a trial experimental basis, see if improvements in standards are achieved then reinstate across the board .

Ketta

Danny, I have read the counterbalance argument you suggest many times. To easily include hitting children with sticks as just another sanction "effective as any other sanction" is unacceptable to me. The difference is that this particular "sanction" is one that would be considered assault if perpetrated against you by another adult. Imagine the outcry if the assault were committed against you by another adult who was twice your size and weight. I don't consider assault against children disguised as "good discipline" to be simply another sanction. We say we value children but we are so willing to do the "quicker and cheaper" to satisfy our own needs?

Danny said: "I said it was less disruptive to a students schooling and so does more damage to the child's future prospects."

Your opinion. Less disruptive for whom? I found the possibility of CP in my school quite disruptive for me and I was not a child to get into much mischief.

Danny wrote: "You quote statistics for the Southern States of America where paddling is still around as though this means when you paddle you get violence ... I can guarantee that there is far less paddling in those states now than ever there used to be in the 50s/ 60s or even in the 70s/80s and certainly a lot less than in the UK when I was at school."

So are you suggesting that to be successful there needs to be more fear, more pain, more control of children (without any real moral values being taught)? Fact of the matter is that whether there is more or less paddling than 40 years ago, the comparison still is relevant. In states that use the paddle there is no improvement in student behavior and far greater incidence of negative outcomes. You may not like that, but that is FACT. And you keep ignoring the other fact that 40 years ago their were many more things that were significantly having an impact on the life of students/children apart of any increase in the availability of CP. You again attribute the difference to CP while ignoring huge social, economic and cultural variables that existed then and do not exist now.

Danny said: "That said, I certainly don't make any connection between CP and violence as you do,"

I always find that sort of statement to be both irrational and self-deceptive. You take a stick and beat a child with it with the intent of causing pain. Often the stroke of the cane causes welts, subcutaneous bleeding, and damage of tissue that can last for hours, days, or weeks depending on the viciousness of the particular caner. And it is done in the hope of causing a change in the child's attitude and behavior through fear. But this you do not see as violent? And this type of sanctioned violence you see as having no connection in how children perceive the rightness or wrongness of inflicting violence on others when they have the upper hand? I would find affirmative answers to these questions amazing.

The caner is no different than the classroom bully except that he has been given permission to be a bully and hides behind a platitude suggesting he is trying to help, guide and educate the child whom he beats.

And when one cannot argue through logic then I suppose one has to attack the U.S. I know my country has problems and our present leaders especially leave much, much to be desired. However, I've read your history and it is truly a violent one. For you to suggest that Great Britain has any less a history of violence than the U.S. would be laughable.

Danny said: "I know we are never going to agree on this subject, Headboy,"

A very reasonable conclusion!!

Danny continued: " but it would be a dull old forum if we all agreed with each other, wouldn't it? I respect your views and, if I'm honest, I would agree with a lot of them."

While I certainly respect your right to say anything you want and to defend any aspect of CP you want, I have a really difficult time respecting any point of view that suggests that beating children and that one promotes real moral development in children through coercion, pain and fear even as just another sanction that is "as effective as any other."

Ketta

You have hit the nail on the head there. Punlic Schools - and the good private schools - have an alternative to CP, the parents! They usually go to great lengths and expence to get their child into a school and so make damn sure that child complies with the rules.
There are many good State schools as well and 'Coopers Coburn' in Upminster, Essex is a good example where everyone wants their son or daughter to be given a place there. These types of schools do not need any more than mild sanctions to keep good discipline.

Headboy

I am amazed that an intelligent, upright, politically correct and reasonably open to debate sort of guy like you can agree with an old fashioned deperado like me on anything at all so it was good to read that you agree on one thing - that we'll never share the same views about corporal punishment.
Yes I'm a wicked old geezer who has a cynical view of the world today but I still maintain that a system that worked reasonably well for a couple of centuries without too many problems was thrown aside at the whim of a few hysterical marchers. The House of Commons vote on the issue was one of the narrowest so I don't think I'm the only one in the UK who thinks it was such a wicked practice.

Never mind, I did promise myself I wouldn't say anymore on this thread but I thought I should just deflect one of your brickbats before I go.

Danny wrote: "You have hit the nail on the head there. Public Schools - and the good private schools - have an alternative to CP, the parents!"

So for those students who don't have the "alternative to CP, the parents", they not only pull the short stick on parenting but the get the short stick aross their bums in school. So much for helping the underdog or the kid that needs help the most.

Danny wrote: "These types of schools do not need any more than mild sanctions to keep good discipline."

You finally have something right. Provide kids with goods schools, good teachers, interesting lessons and some respect and you've got most of the battle won with most of the kids.

Danny: "I am amazed that an intelligent, upright, politically correct and reasonably open to debate sort of guy like you can agree with an old fashioned deperado like me on anything at all so it was good to read that you agree on one thing - that we'll never share the same views about corporal punishment."

You have no monopoly on being an "old-fashioned desperado". I just happen to be one who would prefer not beating on children and who sees discipline as something far more than punishment especially corporal punishment even as only an option.


Danny wrote: "Yes I'm a wicked old geezer who has a cynical view of the world today but I still maintain that a system that worked reasonably well for a couple of centuries without too many problems was thrown aside at the whim of a few hysterical marchers."

Bring back medieveal medicine. Bring back bartering. Damn why did they have to invent the wheel or discover fire, our system worked reasonable well before all that new-fangled stuff. Nothing wrong with old practices, Danny, when they really work. Just as there is nothing wrong with change and new practices when situations change and logic and evidence is behind that change. You may wish it were the 1950's and so may the minority in The House of Commons but you know if wishes were horses, beggars would ride. There seems a huge disparity between what you would like 2007 to be and what it actually is. And that doesn't even address the issue of why you support hitting children on purpose to inflict pain with a stick.

I"ll buy the fact that I am at least educated if not all that "intelligent" as you suggest. If "upright" means that I think (despite any efficacy that may or may not derive from caning children) that there is something morally wrong about a adult who is twice the weight and twice the size of a child beating him to purposefully inflict pain, bodily damage and fear while hiding behind the tag of "dedicated teacher" or "caring disciplinarian", then I gladly accept that description. As for "politically correct", some have tried to make those words dirty words that can be used against something against which they have no cogent argument and which they wish to demean. It is the adult equivalent of one child giving another the raspberries when they have no comeback.


Danny wrote: "Never mind, I did promise myself I wouldn't say anymore on this thread but I thought I should just deflect one of your brickbats before I go."

What you didn't do, however, is address the real issues I have raised.

You'll singe your beard if you're not careful, Headboy! Take a couple of heart pills quickly, there's a good chap.

I have a feeling you've been in the States far too long because you think that there is only one correct view on anything and yours is always the right one.
If you think I want to beat the daylights out of kids, you must, as always, be right. It may surprise you to know I'm a very loving father, grandfather, and great-grandfather and not one of my family wouldn't recognise the picture you're painting of me!

As for addressing any issues you've raised, I think I have answered them as well as you have answered mine. The one point where we differ is that you believe that a few whacks with a slipper or a cane is abject cruelty and I think it's common sense. I do not advocate beating, there is a great difference and anyone guilty of harming a child should be locked away for a long time. However, a mild slippering of a few whacks with a light cane is as different as is the Queen knighting a lord with a tap on his shoulder with a sword to the antics those in Irak who cut off prisoners heads! Let's get things in perspective, Headboy, instead of raving at my medieval ideas on educating kids, think - use that vast brain of yours and calm down Dear!

And before you jump on it and say it was a Freudian slip, I should have said my family wouldn't recognise the picture you paint.

Danny wrote: "You'll singe your beard if you're not careful, Headboy! Take a couple of heart pills quickly, there's a good chap."

Sarcasm like labeling something "politically correct" is that raspberry thing again when there is no cogent argument to be made.

Danny: "I have a feeling you've been in the States far too long because you think that there is only one correct view on anything and yours is always the right one."

Ah...there is that states bashing again. What's the matter, Danny, still haven't got over that we won the war with your King?

Danny: "If you think I want to beat the daylights out of kids, you must, as always, be right. It may surprise you to know I'm a very loving father, grandfather, and great-grandfather and not one of my family wouldn't recognise the picture you're painting of me!"

That's your description not mine. All I have ever suggested is that you support the act of hitting children as punishment and using the cane in school. There is a distance on the continuum of beating the daylights out of a child and administering three stingy strokes of a cane but both acts on on the same continuum and string from the same motivation. My question is where does the kind of hitting you find acceptable end and abuse start. And who defines that? You or the kid experiencing the pain but helpless to do anything about it?

Danny; "The one point where we differ is that you believe that a few whacks with a slipper or a cane is abject cruelty and I think it's common sense."

Right, you think hitting children is "common sense". I think it is an unnecessary evil.

Danny said: " I do not advocate beating, there is a great difference and anyone guilty of harming a child should be locked away for a long time."

You advocated inflicting pain on children as discipline. Your argument is similar to saying that you are not as bad as I would like to think because you see a big difference in loosing finger as opposed to loosing both arms. Granted one is worse than the other but both are bad events.

Danny: "However, a mild slippering of a few whacks with a light cane is as different as is the Queen knighting a lord with a tap on his shoulder with a sword to the antics those in Irak who cut off prisoners heads!"

Nonsense! You are comparing apples and oranges and the tap on the Knight's shoulder is not intended to inflict harm. Again it is an erroneous argument designed to avoid providing real evidence of the efficacy of hitting children and to make it sound reasonable to inflict pain as a teaching devise.

Danny: "Let's get things in perspective, Headboy, instead of raving at my medieval ideas on educating kids, think - use that vast brain of yours and calm down Dear!"

Your concern for yourself is certainly obvious. Your compassion for children is a tad underwhelming.

One small point, Headboy (to repeat myself) corporal punishment has never ever been meant to INFLICT HARM! It has never been so and it is insulting to the thousands of schoolmasters over the years who employed it. It is discipline, it hurts - as all punishment does - but it is not meant to inflict harm on a child. There has always been laws against that and you really do have to get a little sense into your arguments instead of making out anyone who believes it was wrong to ban the only discipline which was quick and did no harm to the child's education - as the present method of throwing them out of school does - is a cruel monster!
I would never want the schools to go back to the way things were in my schooldays but if a few strokes of the cane was on the cards when a child gets to the point where they are to be excluded, I think you would find the very thought of it would deter most of them from ever getting to that point.

I said I agreed with many of your views but this over-the-top attutude to a way of educating kids, perfectly acceptable for centuries, really makes me cringe to think I could agree with anything you advocate.

Tes, perhaps it was a shame the yanks threw our king out but, in hindsight, I for one think it was a blessing in disguise.

Danny said: "One small point, Headboy (to repeat myself) corporal punishment has never ever been meant to INFLICT HARM!"

You remind me of Dr. Pangloss, Danny---with your best of all possible worlds while the clear evidence is that CP has and does do harm whether that is what it is meant to do or not. And clearly, you cannot disagree that it certainly IS meant to cause pain.

Please do insult rational thought by suggesting that in most cases CP doesn't do physical harm...sometimes more than other times but it certainly does do harm. Pain is the body's response to harm, by definition "a symptom of some physical hurt." Now you are trying to use semantics to disguise reality. Pain hurts. Pain indicates harm. You support hurting and therefore harming children as a punitive measure. If you're going to support it then at least have the courage to own up to exactly what it is you support.

Danny said: "It has never been so and it is insulting to the thousands of schoolmasters over the years who employed it. It is discipline, it hurts - as all punishment does - but it is not meant to inflict harm on a child."

Semantic game playing dancing around the truth. Do you think I have not seen the results of a caning or talked to any number of Old Boys who described weals and bruises that lasted hours to days to weeks. What were those? Products of their imaginations? And it was common whether you admit it or not. The same holds true for the paddling that occurs with children in America and it is defended by your American counterparts using the same tired arguments and unsupported statements of belief that you use to defend caning . I have also seen the results of paddlings that have been deemed just "discipline" as you would also have. It's pain and it's damage. Sometimes significant damage.

Danny wrote: "There has always been laws against that and you really do have to get a little sense into your arguments instead of making out anyone who believes it was wrong to ban the only discipline which was quick and did no harm to the child's education "

You really have no clue do you as to the amount of damage that has been inflicted on children? Post an email address and I send you some evidence of what passes for good "discipline" in schools and then tell me that CP doesn't harm.

Danny wrote: "I think you would find the very thought of it would deter most of them from ever getting to that point."

That's another fallacy perpetrated by those of your opinion. There is no evidence to show that other non-physical punishments (removal type) do not deter equally well or better. And there is a lot of evidence to show that incentives, rewards and praise works far better at eliciting a wanted behavior than any punishment does at reducing an unwanted one.

If caning deterred so well, why was it used so often? What caning could be more severe than the judicial caning in Singapore? Yet the numbers of those caned year after year remains fairly constant if not slightly on the upswing. It is your wishful thinking to suggest that the threat of caning deters better than a more civil or humane approach can.

Danny said "I said I agreed with many of your views but this over-the-top attutude to a way of educating kids, perfectly acceptable for centuries, really makes me cringe to think I could agree with anything you advocate."

Given your advocacy of hitting children as discipline and what that means, I have no problem with you not being on my team. Oh and by the way, slavery was also perfectly acceptable for centuries as was racial discrimination and husbands treating women as if they were property. Again, I repeat, just because something has longevity does not make it moral, useful or defendable.

Danny wrote: "Tes, perhaps it was a shame the yanks threw our king out but, in hindsight, I for one think it was a blessing in disguise."

So how long has American-bashing been your hobby, Danny? When one cannot provide an adequate argument using facts and needs to resort to name-calling and country-bashing, the shallowness of one's argument becomes readily apparent.

I've seen the light, Headboy, you are right! Maybe all that beating I suffered so long ago really did harm me, Okay?

And give my regards to your friend George W, he could do with a lecture on violence too.

Danny said sarcastically: "I've seen the light, Headboy, you are right! Maybe all that beating I suffered so long ago really did harm me, Okay?"

Perhaps it did....in the empathy department. And it certainly seems to have perpetuated your acceptance of the tradition of whacking children with sticks. But I know all about "expectation and acceptance" phenomenon and conditioning. I've read Mercurio and know all about the cult of the cane.

And as far as Dubyah is concerned. Voted for Gore in 2000. Voted for Kerry in 2004. Will vote for any Democratic nominee in 2008. Live in the state where Dubyah has the lowest approval rating and they don't paddle children in schools either government or private. Have also worked with kids with significant behavioral issues and never once had to whack any of them with either a paddle nor a stick.

I apologise, Headboy, I didn't realise you are an American, I suppose I should have done. I thought you were a Brit and had only worked in US schools.
I can see where you're coming from now and it explains a lot. I've seen all those movies where the brave yank in WW2 saves the day and rescues everyone from evil. You are certainly worthy to walk those broawalks with the best of them!

I can't wait for the next 'Danny says' !!!

Danny said: "I apologise, Headboy, I didn't realise you are an American, I suppose I should have done. I thought you were a Brit and had only worked in US schools."

Sure! Right! Back peddling on the anti-American comments now, Danny?

Danny said: "I can't wait for the next 'Danny says' !!!"

I can't wait until Danny runs out of his "Danny Says" anti-American, anti-child, pro-infliction of pain comments. But I suspect there is enough bile there to keep him running for years---probably a lot of repressed anger and hostility for all the whackings he got in school as a boy <G>.

You know when I visited England a couple of years ago, Danny, I met so many nice people wherever I went--courteous, friendly, helpful and with a genuine sense of politeness and care that they naturally showed toward their fellows, even children. I guess you were not among that group.

And I bet every one of them were caned at school!

Danny,

I know you'd like to think that....you like to think anything that gives you a rationale for supporting hitting children with sticks, inflicting pain and feeling good about it.

Of course other alternatives are that they weren't caned or, if they were, were simply able to see it for what it was---adults being bullies to children and managed to rise above it. That's would be unlike some others who want another generation of children to be beaten.

I think we're going round in circles here, Headboy. We can get nowhere when you keep returning to this single point - namely that I want to beat children. You won't get past that point and look at anything else. This is a forum, which means we all put our different points and discuss them. If we totally disagree on the basic point of the forum i.e. Corporal punishment in schools - which means using an implement to physically chastise a young school student - then we may as well stop here. We could easily have said "I agree with it" and "I don't agree with it' and left it there - some forum!
I will now again outline my reasons for agreeing with it, none of which you have attempted to debate, other than to tell me and the rest of this forum that it is absolutely wrong to even slap a child at any age because it may get a complex. Fair enough, that is what you think and I respect that view. I do not think it is a good reason to dismiss all the reasons I gave at the start of this thread.
My main point is I believe it is sometimes more sensible to hurt a child by giving him some form of physical pain if all else has failed and he or she is about to be excluded from the education system.
If the parents and their offspring knew, well before that stage comes anywhere near, that a caning would come before the finality of expulsion there would be a great many youngsters who would leave school with qualifications who otherwise would have been throw-outs of society because they lost that education by being excluded.
Your contention that this may give them a complex later in life (you say at 2 or 3 years of age but we'll assume it could be later) I don't think is valid because there are only a very small minority of my generation with such a complex (or at least one that affects them adversely) when we were subject to corporal punishment for most of our schooldays.
Some time ago I raised a thread here called in place of expulsion where I made my case exactly as I outlined above. That is my position and you do not agree so I see no point in discussing it further when we don't agree on the basic principle.
The USA points were in response to your statistics on the Southern States - of which I admit I know very little - and were perhaps uncalled for. I apologise for that but I'm afraid there are very many people all around the world who share my feelings in regard to the way the US act at present - by the sounds of it, you are one of them - but I hold Blair equally responsible for being Dubya's poodle and dragging us into the hatred which abounds in the Middle East for both our nations now.
There I leave it. I said this before (it seems like years ago now but was only yesterday or the day before) but I will hold to it now. Enough is enough.
Once again I apologise to you but you won't change my views any more than I'll change yours.
Have an nice day now, Headboy!

What an interesting discussion my bloody lackadaisical ISP has made me miss!

I think it should be put in permanent detention. Or,rather, like truants, part of its' summer holidays should be spent making up for the lessons it's skipped.

Now there's a good old British compromise-pain may or may not be a deterrent. Imprisonment in school must be worse-would also teach them a valuable life-lesson:


If you can't do the time, don't do the crime


as my fellow South Londoner,Frankie Fraser,might say!


Steve M

Danny said: "We can get nowhere when you keep returning to this single point - namely that I want to beat children."

But Danny, that IS the essential point. For whatever the motivation or all the good intent gone awry, the essential point is simple: You condone taking a wooden stick and hitting children with it to cause pain in an attempt to somehow improve them. That stands alone whether or not you ever admit that such a practice does and has caused both physical and psychological damage for many children.

Danny said: "I will now again outline my reasons for agreeing with it, none of which you have attempted to debate,"

I strongly disagree. I have provided evidence, statistics, rationale and reasearch to debunk your assertions both in this thread and others. You're projecting. It is you who has provided nothing but your personal observations and opinions.

Danny said: "My main point is I believe it is sometimes more sensible to hurt a child by giving him some form of physical pain if all else has failed and he or she is about to be excluded from the education system."

You go back to the fallacy that "all else has failed". There is always an alternative to beating children. You simply are not willing to make the effort to find that alternative but are willing to resort to that "last resort" of caning. Caning is never a "last resort" unless you allow it to be. Beating children into compliance is the frustrated result of adults who do not have the creativity nor the moral authority to elicit respect and obedience without using force.

You can offer all the excuses and rationale you want, Danny but the essential point remains the same---you find the purposeful infliction of pain to coerce compliance by children to be effective and moral. By your own word, you believe it is "sensible to hurt a child". I do not. I find it to be an immoral position.

So yes, we will never agree. You have said many times that you are done with this discussion. If you are, all you have to do is stop. But you seem to have a real need to defend your position. I can understand that. When you take the position that it is sensible and necessary to inflict pain on children when other option are always available then I can see why one would need a defense.

Danny wrote: "I apologise for that but I'm afraid there are very many people all around the world who share my feelings in regard to the way the US act at present - by the sounds of it, you are one of them"

Indeed I am. I firmly believe that Mr. Bush is the worse President in my lifetime (almost 60 year) and perhaps in the history of the country. Not only is he inept but I believe him to be immoral.

Do not, however, make the mistake that you can define America easily. Most in Europe do not understand the size of the U.S. nor the huge diversity of opinion on many, many issues. Republicans in the East are considered Liberals by Republican in the South. There truly are Red and Blue states. Traveling from the East Coat to a state such as Texas one often feels like you are traveling to another country and that a passport should be required. The coasts are hugely different from the middle of the country. North is different from South. Unfortunately America is perceived by many from other countries as being like the people in power and for the last two terms that representation has been by a man whom I believe was not elected the first time and stole the election and who used any number of dirty tricks to just squeak through the second term.

Danny "Have an nice day now, Headboy!"

You too, Danny. Passionate people feel passionately. Perhaps if I get back to England some day we can share a pint of bitters. Is that pub where they cane customers still open? <VBG>

This durn thread is beginning to haunt me, I just can't resist replying again!!!

I would agree with your proposition that everything should be tried first and then tried again and then again. The trouble is - in this country, I don't know about yours - there are so many exclusions of kids actually taking place every week. I would hope that every help and assistance has been tried and found wanting, if not it should have been. So we now have these hundreds of kids up and down the country who have been rejected, put on the scrapheap of society with no future to look forward to. Yes, if there is still more that can be done, as you say is the answer, let it be done. However, what of all those who now languish in isolation because they couldn't behave? If my suggestion had been on the table a few years ago, and they knew that before they reached the point of no return, there would be real punishment in store for them, I maintain that a great many of them would have seen the light and made a big effort to perform - thus escaping the dreaded cane! Steve M puts it in context, if you don't want to do the time, don't do the crime!

I haven't seen any response to my new thread from you yet, Headboy, have a think about it, please.

I don't know of the pub you mention but The pint sounds very inviting. I do love a good argument, as you may have gathered.

Best wishes to you and yours.

Danny wrote: "I would agree with your proposition that everything should be tried first and then tried again and then again. The trouble is - in this country, I don't know about yours - there are so many exclusions of kids actually taking place every week."

Suspension is a huge problem. In my opinion it is just substituting one bad action for another. In fact for some disenfranchised students suspension is experienced as more a reward than a punishment.

Personally, I think the problem is far deeper than we like to admit and it has much to do with a variety of complex social variables that all have to be addressed simultaneously in a very proactive, comprehensive way.

Unfortunately, I think we often look only for the easy way out, the cheapest way out and the most expedient way out and we usually focus on punishment rather than efforts to make school a place that children want to be and in which they feel valued, important, listened to, and respected and a place where the teachers are dynamic, interested, centered on educating children rather than pontificating and showing how much THEY know and the lessons are more than mere memorization but problem-solving activities that allow for thinking, sharing and effort which is valued. I don't really want to get into my personal history here with children but you can either accept my word for it or not but even the most difficult student can be turned around given the effort and right set of circumstance.


Danny said: "I would hope that every help and assistance has been tried and found wanting, if not it should have been. So we now have these hundreds of kids up and down the country who have been rejected, put on the scrapheap of society with no future to look forward to."

My experience is that suspension is another of those last resorts that end up becoming first resorts with kids. Like caning it is easy, quick and has the benefit of removing the kid from the equation. I believe that suspension, like caning, is more for the adults who are frustrated than the students who are in need.

Danny wrote: "If my suggestion had been on the table a few years ago, and they knew that before they reached the point of no return, there would be real punishment in store for them, I maintain that a great many of them would have seen the light and made a big effort to perform - thus escaping the dreaded cane! "

I absolutely disagree that the cane is the deterrent you seem to think it is. I have worked very extensively with young adolescent boys who were no strangers to CP in the home---and significant CP at that. Taking a cane to them would result in taking a gun to you. The children that the cane can control, don't need Draconian measures. The real problem students would be just as likely to take the cane and jam it down your throat---and frankly I wouldn't blame them. What adult doesn't react when someone tries to assault them? You can reach them but not with a stick.

Danny wrote: "Steve M puts it in context, if you don't want to do the time, don't do the crime!"

I'm an not sure that a line from Baretta, a TV cop drama, is the best philosophy on which to base social actions. And it doesn't fit anyway. The crime is not necessarily the controlling variable that determines who gets punished in schools. I've spent decades in schools working with students and teachers and the evaluation of the "crime" depends on a number of variables as does the determination of "sentence". And if I have learned anything during that time, it is that bullying a student with your power and ability to punish is the least effective way to turn a behaviorally difficult child around.

Danny said: "I don't know of the pub you mention but The pint sounds very inviting. I do love a good argument, as you may have gathered."

I thought it was called something like School Dinners or such. And its waitresses were known for caning naughty male customers who were not behaving. I think it may have cause a bit of a stir for a while. Not sure if the place still exists or if the caning piece has been eliminated.

Danny is being being baited by Headboy, or is it the other way around?
Still at least it is all being discussed very civily.
It would be far better though if people posted their own opinions rather than constantly trying to put down other posters, all this Danny says nonsence is wearing.
I think it should be appreciated that their is a culture difference betwen the USA and Britain. There is also a culture difference between most of the various states in the USA.
Heck the North and South are still differeing ( thankfully) many moons after the civil war.
Is it worth considering perhaps that in the states that have corporal punishments that the culture of those states and the behaviour of certain pupils means CP is a needed evil.
In England in particular the demise of CP has had a noticable affect on behaviour. The rot starting almost immediately.
I don't think it is neccasary to use CP on every pupil for every missdemeanor. I just think that if the sanction was available it would control the majority without needing to be used too much.
For a country that still fries people ( generally coloured folk of poor background and low mentality) to worry about deserving bottoms being paddled is a bit hypocritical.

mimi said (deal with it mimi): "Is it worth considering perhaps that in the states that have corporal punishments that the culture of those states and the behaviour of certain pupils means CP is a needed evil."

I have no clue what that is supposed to mean nor how you can come to the conclusion that CP is a needed evil in the South.

Perhaps you should read the information posted in the Southern USA CP regulations thread. Seems to me that CP has solved no problems in the South and may have created a few.

mimi said: "In England in particular the demise of CP has had a noticable affect on behaviour. The rot starting almost immediately."

When you replace coercion and threat of pain with nothing or something as idiotic as "suspension" then you should expect that. You cannot justify the use of CP by saying it's better than doing nothing, a bad job, or using ineffective substitutes. Perhaps rather than support CP, more effort should be made to actually create a workable and effective alternative that both solves the problem and doesn't reduce teachers and school personnel to child beaters.

You think that CP would be allowed as a sanction with some pupils. Which ones? Your relatives? The children with whom CP will have an effect can be just as readily dealt with without CP. Those children whose behavior is so outrageous and disturbed will never be changed by being beaten. They will simply bring a gun to school to exact a bit of retribution.

The cane will stop misbehavior only with those children who really could easily be managed by a creative, excellent teacher without it. Why the desire to beat children with sticks when clearly other approaches are workable with all children if you make the effort.

Headboy

I can see where both sides of the argument are coming from, but it won’t take many to tell you that a classroom once ruled by teachers, by fear, pain or respect , has reversed to a situation where teachers often work in fear of pupils. I don’t remember teachers being knifed or shot as has happened in recent years, why are so many leaving the profession.


Ketta

Ketta said: "but it won’t take many to tell you that a classroom once ruled by teachers, by fear, pain or respect, has reversed to a situation where teachers often work in fear of pupils."

Having just finished a career of 38 years in education as both a teacher and school administrator in a variety of settings including some inner city settings, I don't agree with that conclusion.

I believe that there has been huge changes in society, its values and what it values over the last 40 years. I think we give lip service when we say we care about children and the rising neglect statistic speak to that. More now than at any time in my career, children come to school---hungry, improperly clothed, have fewer contact hours with parents or other family adults, are often either latchkey or farmed out to strangers to be watched for long periods before and after school and worst of all taught that they have no responsibility for their actions. I cannot tell you then number of parents with whom I have dealt on issues of misbehavior of their children who refuse to accept that their child has made a bad choice but rather always blame the school, the teacher or the other students. (If anyone deserves a caning, it is perhaps this type of parent.) More than at any time in my career, I see parents who really are not interested in raising children and who like the idea of being a parent far more than they are willing to engage in the work and effort it entails to do it well. Less than at any time in my career do I see parents who support and respect schools and teachers. More than at any time in my career do I see quality individuals being drafted to be teachers.

And these are the children whom we get in schools. I think it is a naive person who sees corporal punishment's return as a solution or even a good idea. I wonder how many of us as adult would like to go to work under the conditions that we could be beaten for displeasing the boss. And I wonder if that would really motivate us to do better.

Ketta said; "I don’t remember teachers being knifed or shot as has happened in recent years,"

Are you attributing that to the lack of CP in school? If that is the case, I wish someone would explain to me why there has never been a school shooting or knifing of a teacher in the non-CP state where I have worked for the last almost 40 years (CP was eliminated in my state approximately 50 year ago) yet it did happen at Columbine which is located in a state that allows CP of students in 2007.

Ketta asked: "why are so many leaving the profession."

I suspect it has to do with a lot of variable none of which have anything to do with the elimination of CP. As I have said many times before, it wasn't the elimination of CP with its coercive and fear-producing effect that created the present problem but the removal of the pain and fear factor without replacing it with a workable, productive alternative. Fix what it broken in a way that respects students, education and teachers not by advocating for the return to intimidation of students and the infliction of pain. That's not a solution but simply a way to compound the problem. How many of those gun-toting, knife-wielding students do you think are going to bend and present their bottoms for a caning because they are told to do so?

Lord knows, I know that I am likely a sole voice crying in the wilderness on this issue in this forum. I get it. What I don't honestly get is the ability of so many adults to minimize exactly what caning is and what it says both about the adult who resorts to inflicting it and the system that promotes.

Anyone who played silly word games like a certain poster does on this site would not have been tollerated by any teacher in my schooldays.
My best friend who was a teacher, her relatives who were teachers and all of her ex colleagues could not wait to get out of teaching as early as early retirement was available.
The reason? They were/are all quallified succesfull career minded people who could no longer tollerate being secod class in their professions to ignorant parents, violent disruptive pupils and governments who have no understanding of education.
The majority of these people did not teach in schools with CP in fact most of them were trendy 60s students straight to teaching types who originally thought their liberal ways were progressive and that they knew better than their predecessors. They tend to now admit that access to the sanction of CP would have been benificial.
At the risk of being politically incorrect I think it is also much to do with having to attempt to teach increasing amounts of immigrants who have no interest in education or the country they are in. They come from countries where bad behaviour is not tollerated and are able to exploit the liberal system here.
Its the truth but of course the truth must be spun to suit votes.
My opinions, my observations. I do not need to be corrected by those who wish to appear important by creating unneeded complications to a system that was not broken. So don't bother knocking.

OOOOOHHHHHH, mimi. Are you getting the cane? Is that how you're going to get me to behave as you want. Now just try to get me to bend over. Just try!

Oh and mimi, according to you, your qualified, successful career-minded friends who could no longer tolerate being second class in their professions and who did
not teach in schools with CP, now admit that access to the sanction of CP would have been beneficial.

How do they know that? Wishful thinking? They've not worked in schools with it with the same population they worked with without it. They and you want to apply the mob control means of the past (beating and fear) to students of the present as if the lack of the stick is the only change that has occurred in schools and society over the last two decades.

I'm still waiting to hear why Columbine happened in a state and school that was free to use corporal punishment on students if hitting today's student will solve the ills that you complain about as you suggest. Why are achievement scores lower in states in the U.S. that use CP than in states that do not? Why is school vandalism greater in states that use CP than in states that do not? Why is the drop-out rate higher in states that use CP than in states that do not? Why is there no difference in the suspension rate in states that use CP than in states that do not? Try tackling some of those question for me, will you? If CP is so great and such a force for good, why doesn't it show itself that way in the US where some states do use CP in schools and some do not? Care to give it a try or do you only wish to persist in insisting that CP should be brought back without providing any other rationale than YOU believe it will work and making thinly veiled snide remarks to me about how teachers in your day would have known what to do with someone like me who has the audacity to not simply quietly accept the assertions of those who eagerly assert the need to and efficacy of hitting children to make them comply.