Why, in my day...
Feb. 22nd, 2002 04:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
khaosworksAh, me. Another day, another battle with the in-tray. It's almost like one of those ancient myths - you know, the forces of good do battle with the forces of evil, sending them back to the pits where they were spawned for a season, but they emerge once more and the eternal battle is joined again. One of those legends they cook up to explain the cycle of the seasons or night and day or such crap.
Anyway, I was at the Mart yesterday when I bumped into an old buddy of mine, Siva, whom I hadn't seen in a while. Siva and I are the same age, and although we went to different law schools, had taken the bar exam and entered the biz together. Difference is, Siva gave up on lawyering after a couple of years and became a high school teacher. We got to talking about his kids and about our own experiences as students and how old we were all getting.
(Among the bits talked about was the horrifying concept of having Tears for Fears' "Everybody Wants To Rule The World" being declared as a "Golden Oldie" on the radio, and his students refusing to believe that U2 had any albums before "POP." Siva had sworn to himself never to use the phrase, "In my day..." but he finds himself using it more and more. But here's the interesting bit coming up.)
He's the discipline master in his school, and he talked about how the kids that gave more trouble were usually the richer and smarter kids. They were the ones usually in your face, almost challenging you to teach them something, while the slower and less privileged kids, even though they were the ones with the worse reputations, the smokers and so on, were actually more deferent to and respectful of the teachers. In our day, one of the punishments teachers doled out was the infamous public caning. Basically, at morning assembly, the perps go up on stage and get hit on their backsides with a switch. The punishment is not just pain, but humiliation, but it usually did the trick, and was a fun show for the rest of us. Anyway, the punishment still exists, but nowadays, the kids get to wear a book inside their pants to cushion the blow.
Which, I thought, kind of defeats the purpose of the whole exercise. And Siva mentioned even then the kids start bawling after the first stroke, to which we shook our heads and muttered, "Wimps." And of course, we realized that if some of the stuff the teachers whacked us with were done today, they'd be hit by a law suit, or worse.
This put me in mind of when this mother showed up the other day to complain that another woman had slapped her son. Of course, this was only after her son had hit the woman's own son first. The mother's point, and it was well taken, that regardless, the woman should not have slapped another person's child. However, I was wondering about the fact that this woman wanted to involve the Courts, the Police, invoke the Almighty Process as it were, in an incident that, if it had happened to me when I was younger, would have been shrugged off with no incident. In fact, Ma would probably have said it served me right for hitting the kid in the first place, and probably doled something extra to me.
I'm not saying that kids should be beaten, or that all punishments should be corporal. Of course there are benefits to time-outs and non-physical punishments and so on, and of course kids should understand why they are being punished or else it serves no purpiose. But the majority of the punishments I sustained as a kid did not cross the line into abuse, and none of them traumatized me to the point that I needed any kind of therapy. In fact, some of my happier memories involve the crap I pulled with my friends that got me into trouble to begin with, and although we could have done without the punishment at the time, I don't think any of us, even today, would think it was undeserved.
Granted, violence is never an answer, but to a certain extent I think corporal punishment in junior schools builds character. Allowing kids to roughhouse, within limits, also builds character. Is there something wrong with discipline? Or else, aren't we turning ourselves into a zero resistance culture when it comes to minor trespasses? I'm sorry the ideas here don't seem to be too well developed - and I'm not sure I believe whole-heartedly in any of them myself. It's just something that occured to me.
Anyway, I was at the Mart yesterday when I bumped into an old buddy of mine, Siva, whom I hadn't seen in a while. Siva and I are the same age, and although we went to different law schools, had taken the bar exam and entered the biz together. Difference is, Siva gave up on lawyering after a couple of years and became a high school teacher. We got to talking about his kids and about our own experiences as students and how old we were all getting.
(Among the bits talked about was the horrifying concept of having Tears for Fears' "Everybody Wants To Rule The World" being declared as a "Golden Oldie" on the radio, and his students refusing to believe that U2 had any albums before "POP." Siva had sworn to himself never to use the phrase, "In my day..." but he finds himself using it more and more. But here's the interesting bit coming up.)
He's the discipline master in his school, and he talked about how the kids that gave more trouble were usually the richer and smarter kids. They were the ones usually in your face, almost challenging you to teach them something, while the slower and less privileged kids, even though they were the ones with the worse reputations, the smokers and so on, were actually more deferent to and respectful of the teachers. In our day, one of the punishments teachers doled out was the infamous public caning. Basically, at morning assembly, the perps go up on stage and get hit on their backsides with a switch. The punishment is not just pain, but humiliation, but it usually did the trick, and was a fun show for the rest of us. Anyway, the punishment still exists, but nowadays, the kids get to wear a book inside their pants to cushion the blow.
Which, I thought, kind of defeats the purpose of the whole exercise. And Siva mentioned even then the kids start bawling after the first stroke, to which we shook our heads and muttered, "Wimps." And of course, we realized that if some of the stuff the teachers whacked us with were done today, they'd be hit by a law suit, or worse.
This put me in mind of when this mother showed up the other day to complain that another woman had slapped her son. Of course, this was only after her son had hit the woman's own son first. The mother's point, and it was well taken, that regardless, the woman should not have slapped another person's child. However, I was wondering about the fact that this woman wanted to involve the Courts, the Police, invoke the Almighty Process as it were, in an incident that, if it had happened to me when I was younger, would have been shrugged off with no incident. In fact, Ma would probably have said it served me right for hitting the kid in the first place, and probably doled something extra to me.
I'm not saying that kids should be beaten, or that all punishments should be corporal. Of course there are benefits to time-outs and non-physical punishments and so on, and of course kids should understand why they are being punished or else it serves no purpiose. But the majority of the punishments I sustained as a kid did not cross the line into abuse, and none of them traumatized me to the point that I needed any kind of therapy. In fact, some of my happier memories involve the crap I pulled with my friends that got me into trouble to begin with, and although we could have done without the punishment at the time, I don't think any of us, even today, would think it was undeserved.
Granted, violence is never an answer, but to a certain extent I think corporal punishment in junior schools builds character. Allowing kids to roughhouse, within limits, also builds character. Is there something wrong with discipline? Or else, aren't we turning ourselves into a zero resistance culture when it comes to minor trespasses? I'm sorry the ideas here don't seem to be too well developed - and I'm not sure I believe whole-heartedly in any of them myself. It's just something that occured to me.
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no subject
Date: 2002-02-22 07:42 am (UTC)>But the majority of the punishments I sustained as a kid did not
>cross the line into abuse, and none of them traumatized me to
>the point that I needed any kind of therapy. In fact,
But...but...but (he spluttered), you became a LAWYER! Doesn't that show how sick and twisted it really made you?
On a more serious note, I thinkt there's a very big (and wrong-headed) tendency to stop kids from getting hurt. At all. So the parents come between their kid and another in a common playground tussle, we can't let children pass or fail on their own merits, and you can't be seen, oh no no, as in any way disciplining a neighborhood kid.
I don't hold with that.
One of the things I tell my kids is that if they're always in someone's face, that person will probably turn around one day and whack them hard and they'll deserve it (in fact, my younger one punched the older one in the nose a few weeks ago and the older one did, in fact, deserve that bloody nose because he was being a pain in the ass and was told, repeatedly, to stop but kept on going).
A little discipline and learning how to handle one's self around others doesn't hurt anyone.
(That being said, I've never hit my kids, although I've held them firmly in place for time out).
no subject
Date: 2002-02-22 09:05 am (UTC)I like the philosophy that a friend uses with his kids: if it's not fatal or *seriously* damaging, it's a learning experience. Yes, of course you teach your kid about hazards, but if he starts to get into something that will temporarily hurt but not do harm, you don't drop everything to yank him away. Let him touch the stove; next time he'll listen to you when you say it's hot.
no subject
Date: 2002-02-22 10:41 am (UTC)It's not just about discipline for behavioural reasons, either. I was speaking to a dance teacher a couple of months ago, and she was commenting on how the kids just don't put the same amount of effort or dedication into things as they used to. Where once they would strive for perfection (or close to that), they now go through the motions without actually putting anything into it. They don't *care* anymore. And that springs from us: their teachers. We don't care as much. Authority figures aren't as intimidating to these kids as they were to us. No one wants to be a hardnose anymore, and those who have tried get accused of all sorts of things.
We (as we became adults) went through this "whatever" phase - where it didn't matter what anyone thought about us. Where we learned to be individuals instead of following in the footsteps of our parents or other role models. We fought to do things our way, and we succeeded. Getting to that point takes kids less time nowadays, but they miss out on valuable lessons along the way.
Discipline (corporal or otherwise) worked on us because we gave a damn what people thought. Kids today, and even adults today, don't - at least not to the extent they did in the past. Adults can't take the 'liberty' of disciplining another person's child, because that's as good as saying the parent is unfit and incapable. No one wants to be insulted like that, whether they deserve it or not. Unfortunately, all that does is hold children back from learning what's right and what's wrong.
Well, but....
Date: 2002-02-23 08:12 pm (UTC)I did. Which seems to me to indicate that perhaps there *are* other methods of motivation than fear.
Also, as someone who likes reading about archaeology and history....it seems to me that to an extent the older generation has always thought the younger was going to hell in a handbasket. I used to have a typed-up translation of a letter from a father to his son lambasting the latter for his hairstyle, his poor school attendance, his disreputable friends. This letter was written around the year 2000. 2000 BCE. It was written in cuneiform in the city of Ur (if I recall correctly) in Sumer.
no subject
Date: 2002-02-25 12:07 am (UTC)There's a difference between instilling fear and instilling respect.
Any punishment--the idea of which is generally to instill respect for rules and/or the person(s) making the rules--can be taken too far, at which point it instills fear rather than respect. Fear makes people want not to earn punishment. Respect makes people want to earn appreciation. It's a hard line to walk, sometimes, but it does need to be walked, or neither fear nor respect is instilled.
What really bothers me, these days, is that kids aren't taught to respect themselves. I suspect that the sort of thing Terence is talking about "in his day" very much had overtones of "You should have known better, and in fact, we know you know better": disappointment in a failure of judgement, because that judgement--the child's judgement--was respected in the first place. When those in authority don't have that respect for those they have authority over, eventually people lose their self-respect, their sense of personal honor and pride. I think even more problems come from that loss than from a lack of respect for authority.
no subject
Date: 2002-02-22 10:43 pm (UTC)I often got beaten for "crimes" I never committed. Back in kindergarten every time someone would vandalize the school station wagon I knew I was going to get spanked -- and it hurt -- rather than humiliated me. I didn't feel any emotional pain (other than not being believed when I was telling the truth) over it, but my butt was perpetually sore.
While I was growing up my father would spank me whenever I didn't agree with something he said. Most of the time Dad would use either his leather belt or a flat-paddled metal hairbrush (Dad barely had enough hair to brush!), and if I already had a bruise, he'd often aim for it to make me hurt extra bad.
My brother even got in his share. He's 6.5 years younger than me, so when he wanted to see Dad torture me he'd scream, "Dad, Lynnie's hitting me!" Dad would run in, hold me down, and let David get in "a good beating." All I was able to do to "defend" myself was a carefully-aimed preemptive strike with my knee at a particular part of his body.
What did I learn? I learned I was a victim. I learned that men beat up women, and that this was my lot in life. I grew up to become a battered wife. I "learned" I was helpless to defend myself from anyone and anything. I feared my father until shortly before he died -- only because he was so weakened I could finally outrun him.
It has taken me many years of therapy to overcome the damage done to me by corporal punishment.
Corporal punishment sometimes gets abused, and when it does, it does bad things to the victim.
My two cents
Date: 2002-02-24 10:23 am (UTC)I believe there is a difference between spankings and beatings. I don't believe in using anything other than a hand to spank, nor do I believe in hitting any part of the body but the bottom, or in some circumstances a mild slap to the hands. I don't believe in hitting out of anger. And I don't see any problem with a healthy bit of fear (not terror) to keep kids behaving. Even as an adult, many of us are motivated to do things the way others want them done because of fear. We fear getting yelled at, we fear getting abandoned, we fear getting fired.
I guess corporal punishment is a lot like a gun. It isn't bad in itself, but how you choose to use it makes a whole lot of difference.