I was mugged in NYC and I turned out all right. (corporal punishment school paddling)

http://nospank.net/n-u88.htm

I was mugged in NYC and I turned out all right. If I met him again I wouldn't even want to break his arm.

BUT IF I MET MY 7TH GRADE TEACHER WHO BEAT ME I would want to break his 90+ year old arm -- AND HE WAS A CHRISTIAN BROTHER WHO GAVE UP HIS LIFE (POVERTY, CHASTITY AND OBEDIENCE) TO TEACH ME.

If I met my 5th grade brother who was only going to paddle me in the 5th grade (same: he dedicated his life to work for me for free thing) I would refuse to speak to him because he was going to beat me. I was so terrified I wore six pairs of underpants to school that day and I guess that amused him so I didn't get beaten so badly I could still remember it like it happened yesterday.

What happens when you become an adult is that you realize the you were violently beaten (almost always the MOST PHYSICALLY PAINFUL EXPERIENCE OF A PERSONS LIFE) for NO REASON AT ALL.

NO REASON -- THAT IS THE KEY TO THE WHOLE ISSUE. Repeat: NO REASON.

The thing to try to get people to understand is not the more than occasional light psychological damage or the occasional severe harm -- or how it affects 12 years of childhood development knowing you can be beaten for normal imperfect behavior -- not for breaking school windows...

...It is not even the IMMEDIATE violence itself which is all you need to be charged with a crime if you deliberately inflict hellacious pain (the thing about a paddle is the broad area of the instrument and the broad fleshy area of the target free the adult to swing for absolute maximum pain) on an adult...

...If you can just get people to understand that the violence is for no reason -- not doing your work never gets an adult a painful as possible beating, then, you can automatically win the issue because that is the way we are wired automatically to think. Being late is just not a beating offense.

NO REASON -- THAT IS THE KEY TO THE WHOLE ISSUE. Repeat: NO REASON. If I had done something really wrong like breaking windows or spray painting lockers I would not resent these two brothers today (though beating could have been a big mistake if the behavior were linked to serious pathology -- no more rare than alcoholism or delinquency itself)..

PS. For all the shocking stories about priests molesting children (the active ingredient is "failed adults" who cannot make it with their own age -- read the book "Scout's Honor" by Patrick Boyle -- not celibacy or homosexuality) you never hear of priests paddling students. Why? The priests at my high school heard confessions. They knew the REALLY bad things we were doing (on a weekly basis?). They could not possibly take playing hooky or not doing homework -- or simply forgetting to bring it -- the slightest bit seriously -- as something that is seriously ethically wrong -- which of course is what every paddle swinger (who is not a pervert) is positively convinced it is.