THE CANING OF GIRLS
[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] Sin,—Many of us who are interested and concerned about the above subject are very grateful to you for the paragraph you wrote in The Spectator and to Dr. Kitehing of Wetherby for what he has written in the British Medical Journal and elsewhere. A rather prolonged controversy, in which I have been concerned, in the local Press leaves me with several unshaken convictions which I should like to state.
Caning in schools, whether of boys or girls, should be regarded as a confession of failure, and a proceeding to be excluded as soon as possible from all schools for the following reasons : 1. The idea is instilled into a child's mind that power and force are synonymous. As the child grows, the idea is not easily eradicated. The power of love is thus hard to grasp. This has a definitely bad effect on all peace-propa- ganda and postpones the dawn of international peace. We cannot condemn Hitler's methods of asserting authority and use similar methods in our classrooms.
2. Corporal punishment instils fear into children's hearts.
In many cases those who only watch the punishment inflicted wince as the cane whistles through the air. Fear and learning are thus associated in a child's mind. This has a bad effect on his education. Since from 5-18 he must learn, it is most important that learning and happiness should be in the same set of associated ideas.
3. Those of us who are interested in the practice of psychology are alarmed to notice how often the neuroses of adult life have their origin in a traumatic incident in childhood. Your correspondent " Assistant Schoolmaster " actually defends the caning of girls by men and defends their being bent over a desk for the purpose. Not only so, he wishes caning were " more widely used," and quotes with approval a secondary school where girls of 18 are caned for specific offences. He then naively adds that " no com- plaints " were received of any damage to health. If he had read any psychology surely he would recognize that such punishment could hardly be inflicted on any mature girl without the most disastrous effects on psychological health. Through you, Sir, I wish to ask whether any responsible Education Authority really allows " Assistant Schoolmaster " to do what he is doing. In my view he should immediately be removed from his post or be required to alter his methods. A medical friend of mine recently reported the ease of a girl of 14 being caned by a headmaster and the Education Authorities took the very gravest view of the offence.
4. A most important argument against caning is that sexual perversion is liable to be set up in the administrator, the victim and the onlooker. That this is not generally recognized does not detract from the importance of the point made. In my own psychological work again and again have traced sexual abnormality to receiving, watching or giving a thrashing.
The regulations in regard to Leeds schools are, I believe, as follows : (a) Corporal punishment is to be regarded as a last resort ; frequent resort to it shows incompetence in the teacher.
(b) It is never to be inflicted for dullness or inability.
(c) It is to be inflicted on the hand only, with a cane which is kept by the head-teacher. Canes are not allowed in infants' departments.
(d) All cases of corporal punishment must be recorded in a punishment book.
(e) The head-teacher may delegate authority to cane to assistant teachers, but this must be done in writing and in no case can such a teacher give more than two strokes.
To these I would add Dr. Kitehing's most valuable point, " That the caning of any girl by any man in any circum- stances whatever - should be forbidden by the Board of Education."
If the above regulations were kept and insisted on by Act of Parliament, a progressive step would be taken towards the ideal of the complete exclusion of corporal punishment. At present in some schools incidents take place which belong to the savage and ignorant barbarism of the past. Terrible and often permanent harm is done to the minds of children. I do hope The Spectator will not allow this matter to drop.—
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