Would you like to sign my paddle?

Mary Christensen                                       Final Draft                                      February 14, 2011     

Would You Like To Sign My Paddle?

            Corporal Punishment has been around ever since I can remember. When I lived in Missouri last year one of the options for discipline was getting paddled (or 2 swats). They would give you the choice of ISS or AEP (In-school Suspension/ Alternative Education Program), or 2-3 swats depending on what you were in trouble for. Most students at my school would choose getting paddled over the ISS program mainly because it was just 2 swats and you could go back to class, but if you were in ISS you would get 3 days and they would give you work that wasn’t from the classes you were taking. Plus, it was like prison, you sat in a little cell, you couldn’t talk to anyone, you had to stay quiet, and you were facing a wall the whole entire day, not to mention; the room was white and in a room isolated from the rest of the school. Growing up in a state where corporal punishment is allowed, and then moving to a state where it is not made me realize how wrong it really is to beat a kid with a paddle when they do wrong.

            Missouri is not the only state in the south that allows corporal punishment to be exercised in their schools; this state along with 9 other southern states still allows corporal punishment to be legal in their schools, including 8 other states like Arizona, Idaho, Indiana, and Colorado. Living in a state that allows corporal punishment most of your life, makes it easy to speak out against. In my case, there were many times where there was not one classroom that I could walk into, even in Junior High, where the teacher did not have a paddle. They even made a little joke out of it, where if you were paddled, you could sign it, and by my sophomore year in high school, my name was right on the tip of the principal’s own personal paddle. I remember sitting in class and then all of a sudden you would hear the sound of a swats echoing through the halls. All my classmates would run to the door to peer through the window to see who the next victim of our principal’s paddle was, and most of the time you would see the poor little kid running to the bathroom to hide their tears from the sting of the wooden board.

            My experience with being paddled happened because of a misunderstanding between my World History teacher and I. She said I didn’t turn in a paper that I did and I ended up being sent to the office over it. Since she wrote me up with an office referral I had either the choice of 2 swats or 3 days of ISS. My mother had put me on the “no paddle” list but I chose swats because it wasn’t worth those dreadful days with my face towards a bright white wall. It stung for a few minutes after I got my swats, but I got to sign the tip of his paddle. Honestly, I shouldn’t have had to make the choice between being paddled or ISS, they could have offered an afterschool detention with that teacher or an early-morning detention, but it’s the south. I guess they do things the confederate way.

 I’ve come to realize that the reason that most southern states allow corporal punishment to be allowed in school is because as southern states, they are more adapt to the idea. Thinking back to the civil war, the southern states where the ones with slaves, and their owners had them doing a lot of manual labor which they were extremely underpaid for and mistreated over.Corporal punishment was yet another way to show the bias between the north and south at that time. No, it doesn’t explain why states like Arizona, Idaho, Colorado, and Indian still allow it, but it is a reasonable explanation for how the south is still keeping some old traditions from the past.

            You should not be allowed to hit a kid when they do wrong. It doesn’t teach them anything but the idea that it is okay to hit your children, and let’s face it, there are people in this world who would and do take the idea too far. The school that I attended did offer a “No Paddle” list, that your child could be put on, but then that meant that you would be sent to consolatory confinement for 7 hours 3 days in a row as a punishment, and given a packet of assignments from classes they weren’t enrolled in. They didn’t even offer detention, unless it was during lunch. Who would want to do that when they could get hit with a wooden board 1-2 inches thick? Yeah, seems like we all jumped in the front of that line right? The school’s disciplinary system was created unfairly and around the idea of corporal punishment. There really were not very many other options to choose from when you were sent to the office. Every southern school that I attended had similar systems. Whereas one school did offer after school detention, the other maybe would offer early-morning detention. Or for instance, the school I attended in Sikeston, Missouri offered the “no paddle” list next to ISS, and after and before school detention. But once again, you also had the choice to be paddled, and most of the time unless your name was on that “no paddle” list, that was the punishment you would receive.

            So where did the idea of corporal punishment come from? You can thank the Greeks and the Romans for that. In the Medieval times corporal punishment was encouraged by the attitudes of the medieval church towards the human body, flagellation being a common means of self-discipline. This had an influence on the use of corporal punishment in schools, as educational establishments were closely attached to the church during this period. Nevertheless, corporal punishment was not used uncritically; as early as the eleventh century Saint Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury was speaking out against what he saw as the excessive use of corporal punishment in the treatment of children. From then on, new trends were seen in corporal punishment that even led to public beatings of citizens, some of them children. Many philosophers did not find this okay and began speaking out to their people; some were put into jail where of course corporal punishment was used against them.

            Sometimes it’s hard to understand why there are states in the USA that still allow corporal punishment to be practiced, but I do know that I am glad that I can speak out against it. As a student, having the option to be hit or put into ISS, I of course would rather be hit. It’s quick and easy option to ISS, and it’s not very logical but it’s a sting you’ll never forget. Maybe you do learn a lesson by it. It depends on the person though, and let me tell you, some will never do anything to deserve being paddled again, others just don’t care either way, and some will just laugh it off and just move on. Even though a person might take Corporal Punishment as a joke, or don’t take it as a big deal; it’s still wrong, and since we are our own person, let me ask you, would you like to sign my paddle?