I Have Been Caned

@Thomas52 I became a non-smoker in 10 minutes, thanks to a special treatment by my mother.

@Thomas52 Dad's cane worked on me, Thomas !!

@smacked30D I can understand that. I think for individuals it did but overall, I think addiction cannot be 'cured' by punishment. Perhaps you had not become too addicted at that point.

@smacked30D I really went through the roof, but I was a non-smoker after.

@Thomas52 Smoking at my school meant a guaranteed six of the best. I don’t think it worked, and I could never quite see the point of it, because smoking didn’t carry the opprobrium that it does now. It was also hypocritical, because the majority of teachers smoked in the staff room and the headmaster who did the caning smoked a pipe. I think the main things that have reduced smoking among young people are knowledge of the health consequences, absence of smoking in public places, and increased smoking of things other than tobacco.

@Alfred22 Not sure about the duration. I wasn't really addicted to nicotine when that happened. It was one of the most intense experiences that I remember.

@MartinII I agree. The smoke pouring from the staff room if you had to go there for any reason probably gave half of us boys a head start on lung cancer just breathing it!

@Alfred22 ... and it's interesting that boys my age were inofficially allowed to smoke. Nobody cared about it.

@helenS Seems as though being a boy had real advantages or perhaps disadvantages! Any envy?

@smacked30D [quote]Dad's cane worked on me, Thomas !![/quote]
Neither my parents' nor teachers' canes worked to stop me smoking.

@Sharon You were one brave person when you were in school. Do you still like to smoke?

@Sharon They failed to teach you. It was just the pain, without the achievements. I feel sorry for you.

@Alfred22 Nothing to do with bravery. The cane was used so much it ceased to be a deterrent.
[sep]
@helenS If they didn't cane us for smoking they would have found something else to cane us for. That's how things were for many of us, especially boys, back then.

@Sharon 6 of the best for you my girl, !!

@smacked30D A quite frequent event in my teens at school.

@Sharon [quote]That's how things were for many of us, especially boys, back then.[/quote]
I'm still surprised about the inverted double standard you experienced.

@helenS I didn't experience that double standard but I am aware that some schools proudly published the fact that they practised sex discrimination.

@Sharon I remember an incident that was reported in my local paper in the late 60s. A mother had complained that her daughter had been caned (across the legs apparently) at a mixed school near where I lived. The implication of the complaint, and the subsequent comments in the paper, was that it was all very well for boys to be caned, but there was something inappropriate about caning girls. However, I’m not sure that all parents would have taken the same view!

@MartinII Very strange to me, because, where I grew up, there was a "boys will be boys" attitude, and boys got easily away with things we would have been punished for. An inverted double standard, so to speak.

@helenS I think there’s a generational aspect. In the 60s in England there was still an old-fashioned sense of chivalry, and many people regarded girls and women as delicate flowers to be treated gently. (That attitude was by no means universal in schools, as many stories here testify, but I think it was fairly widespread. It certainly seemed to me to be the case at the time.) Feminism changed all that.

@helenS I became a non smoker in the same way.lol