Pyrpolizer wrote:Erolz for a start I got confused of your terms public school Vs state school. Just curious, is this the terminology used in the UK?
In any case I will use the terms private Vs public (meaning state) schools in my post.
Yes thanks for pointing that out. I may go back and edit the OP to make things less confusing for those not familiar with the Orwellian newspeak nature of how such schools are labeled in the UK. Public school in the UK, public schoolboy or girl, in the UK means a private fee paying school.
Pyrpolizer wrote:The question is do such things still happen and go unpunished in the UK?
I mean even in Cyprus such things can almost never be hidden these days, and there are severe punishments ranging from getting fired to ending up in jail.
I can not stress enough that this is not 'just' about sexual abuse of children in schools. It is about how 'public' schools in the UK are structured and designed to be brutalising, That they were the product of a previous century. That we just do not and should not do this to our children any more. In one of those strange examples of 'co incidence' todays Guardian carries this article.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... dApp_GmailThis is what I am talking about. Yes attitudes to the sexual abuse of children in the UK have changed. In UK terms there is 'before Jimmy Saville' and post 'Jimmy Saville'. However if sexual abuse of children was removed entirely from society, the issues of the structural brutality of such schools systems would still remain. The focus on sexual abuse specifically is just the result of the calls to 'prove it'. That some of those here that made such calls to 'prove it' just turn around and say your proof is wrong
without themselves taking even 5 minutes to test the proof, says something imo.
BTW the Guardian android app gives access to 'below the line' on articles such as these. To the comments of readers. The website does not seem to do this. In any case these can be and often are more interesting that the article itself. If anyone has any genuine interest in these issues I would recommend searching out these 'below the line' comments. People relating their own experiences good and bad. There is much 'data' there than can lead to better understanding.
If my contention is true, that such things are more prevalent in british public schools than state ones, the question becomes why is that so. The answers to this are many and complex but one aspect of them can be seen in Paphitis' responses in my opinion. This 'reverence' and 'respect' to and for 'higher / better' authority and experience is part of the of the equation. I never went to my parents and said 'do not send me back there, that man is doing bad things to me'. I did go to them and say things like 'let me do design and technology (basically woodworking) and not latin, I want to do DT. I dont want to do Latin'. So my parents would troop off and speak to the school and the school would say 'do not worry about what your child wants. We are the experts. We know what is best. That is what you are paying us for. It is better for him to do Latin and not DT'. That the reality was it was better for the school that I did Latin and not DT is immaterial. My parents, like lambs to the slaughter, in awe of the 'expertise' and 'superiority' of the 'experts' they were paying huge sums to because they were experts acquiesced. Latin it was. This 'dynamic' is intimately linked to how in so many cases sexual abuse in such schools even when reported was not stopped quickly enough. It is only one aspect but it a real one. It has parallels with the respect shown for institutions like the Catholic Church in places like Ireland and how this allowed abuse scandals to go on for so long in so many cases. The exposing of these scandals has led to profound and positive changes in Ireland. It is now more progressive than say NI on issues like abortion and same sex marriages and this is a direct result of the demolishing of the myth of the infallibility of the church as an institution. The church is no longer the all pervasive force on society it used to be and that is good. As an aside this is a process that still has a way to go in the RoC imo.
There are many other reasons why abuse is statistically more prevalent in public schools that sate in the UK. More than I can delve in to in this post alone. One aspect is related to the 'physical opportunity' that boarding presents. Not just physical access but the increase in vulnerability of the victim that such (enforced) boarding results in.
There is much else in Paphitis' post that is for me 'telling'. In terms of how and why does abuse at such schools not just happen more often in such schools but is allowed to go on for so long and in such plain sight. when he says "The Alumni of this school is very sophisticated and it reaches the Medical Boards of Australia, the Halls of Power and politics, and the Legal Fraternities" and "News Limited (Murdoch) for instance is full of Journos from a few certain schools and so on."
There is also much in his posts about the 'dynamics' of how such schools 'work'. About what it is you are really buying when you send your child to such. About how you are essentially buying access to an exclusive club for you children than can and does lead to them having access to higher paid jobs, to roles of 'power and prestige'. It is my experience that the idea such schools offer better teachers and teaching is simply a myth. I suspect that is true generically as well but providing the proof of this is not something that can be done easily. Something I did learn from going to such schools is that confidence is a 'trick'. From being in the somewhat unique position of having gone from poor to rich 'overnight' , having gone from a 'ghetto' north london state school to a prestigious public school in the leafy Hertfordshire countryside, I was able to notice many things. The kids in these better schools were no brighter than my previous one, no more hard working, no more able. The standard of teaching was not better and in my case markedly worse in some cases. So much of the whole edifice was built on illusion. On self fulfilling prophecy. On telling children, over and over that 'you are the elite, you are the ones that will go on to be the business leaders of the country, the political leaders of the country'. Such can and does lead to those children having a better chance of a higher paid job but at what cost to the child, their development, their ability to discover who they really are ?
Paphitis talks about his experience of being told as a child that he was 'possessed by the devil'. Now in his case that may not have damaged him in any way. Imagine however a 7 year old child, taken from the safety and security and love of their family and placed in a boarding environment being told by someone who is a representative God himself, that they are evil and wicked. That kind of thing can and does fuck people up for life. Is the chance of a higher paid job really worth the price of such damage ? This is why I believe educators should start from the same place that doctors do. First and before anything else 'do no harm' or 'do as little harm as possible'.
Oh I could go on and on and on.
When I got up this morning my partner said 'have you seen the Guardian front page today yet ? Looks like you have started something'. I did not start this. What 'started' this was the the Labour party conference resolution on public schools. When I read about that my immediate thought was 'yes' and 'about time'. Being the kind of person I am I did not just go 'yes' and 'about time'. I started a process of asking myself why do I instinctively support the idea of change. This in turn lead me to think about my own school days and experience. It lead me to, for the first time, searching 'Aldwickbury Mr Brown'. I was not surprised to be met with the Times article I linked to earlier. It is time we as a society faced these issues, discussed them, bring them out in to the light. The Labour part resolution is starting this process. For me individually and society generally. We do not need to do this to our children any more. I do not raise these things because I hate the rich, envy the rich. I raise them because no child, not even the children of the rich should have to face such risks such life defining damage anymore. It is 2016 not 1916 or 1816. It is time for real change.
just a few more 'resources'
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/041569003X/ ... WDbHPQHA2Vhttps://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... dApp_Gmail (again I recommend searching out the juice that is in the below the line comments)
I can assure you that I do not hate or envy but have nothing but love and pride for my niece , former pupil of Dame Alice School in Bedford the sister school to the boys school I attended, law graduate of Oxford University (really Oxford university, not some university that happens to be in or near Oxford), who then passed the Bar exams and is now working in chambers as a barrister.
