a question for the United Kingdom and Canadian people

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And anywhere else outside the US English is the official language.

Do schools there let cruel kids get away with the type of sadistic treatment adults here would be jailed for like our junior highs and high schools do? I'm trying to figure out for an essay I'm writing whether this tolerance for cruelty is an American educational phenomenon (preparing us for the "real world" no doubt) or is just part of the way things are internationally in the English-speaking world.

Thanks in advance for any insights! I don't mean to preclude Americans from speaking their minds either (testimonials to wonderful treatment in American schools would wrinkle the argument I'm considering quite interestingly).

― floating, Friday, 18 February 2005 19:00 (twenty years ago)

I believe tolerance for cruelty was started back at Eton.

― Huk-L, Friday, 18 February 2005 19:04 (twenty years ago)

Um, I suspect that our notion of what 'cruelty' might mean here would be conditioned by our cultural backgrounds - can you be a bit more specific?

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Friday, 18 February 2005 20:16 (twenty years ago)

If you mean bullying - I'm sure it's relatively the same between Canada 7 the U.S.

― Thermo Thinwall (Thermo Thinwall), Friday, 18 February 2005 20:23 (twenty years ago)

Thermo it's 7&7 or Canadian Club, not Canada 7, unless you're referring to some new Maroon 5 offshoot act. ´:þ

― Michael White (Hereward), Friday, 18 February 2005 20:26 (twenty years ago)

SMART ASS1

― Thermo Thinwall (Thermo Thinwall), Friday, 18 February 2005 20:29 (twenty years ago)

How's that, floating, for some North American, international verbal cruelty?

― Michael White (Hereward), Friday, 18 February 2005 20:31 (twenty years ago)

Search for Reena Virk, a teenage girl beaten to death by a group of her peers in BC a few years ago. There have also been a few very young suicides that blamed bullying in Canada in the last few years.

― Huk-L, Friday, 18 February 2005 20:37 (twenty years ago)

There was that shooting at some school in Alberta too, as I recall.

― Thermo Thinwall (Thermo Thinwall), Friday, 18 February 2005 20:46 (twenty years ago)

Sorry I wasn't more specific! I'm thinking of habitual harrassment or violent behavior committed by children that schools condone ("kids will be kids") that in, say, a corporate business office, would be grounds for jail time. In other words, kid bullies can swirly kids knowing the worst that can happen is Saturday detention, whereas Mean Mr. Office could get the cops called on him.

I'm not sure if that's entirely clear. Part of the problem with my argument as it's developing as that kids van't get fired from school the way employees can from work. It's dicey--my main point is that the environment of tolerance for cruelty is looser at schools than it is at work, which is strange, because we consider children more sensitive and impressionable than adults.

Sorry about the incoherence above. I hope it helps though. More anecdotes, please--I want to see if I'm on to something here (and what that exactly might be, I'm not sure)!

― floating, Friday, 18 February 2005 21:42 (twenty years ago)

On that level, I'm sure it's absolutely as common in the UK as in the US - I think the real difference is at the extreme. We get fewer guns and shootings in schools here, that kind of thing. Petty and non-petty bullying is commonplace.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Friday, 18 February 2005 21:56 (twenty years ago)

Martin probably OTM - guns arent a real problem in Australian schools, not like in the US, but of course bullying is endemic. I saw awful examples of it when I was at school (eg a girl from a v poor family being coated in spit globs by a group of guys harrasing her; vicious fist fights, and of course the lovely female psychological torture). I get the feeling that nowdays teachers are more on the alert for it, and kids can lodge complaints with more legal power than they could when I went thru school.

― Trayce (trayce), Saturday, 19 February 2005 04:15 (twenty years ago)

I thought the whole Zero Tolerance Policy included bullying and swirlies etc? Or does it only apply to GUNS and DRUGS and SEX!

― Catty (Catty), Saturday, 19 February 2005 06:46 (twenty years ago)

swirlies? What are they?

― thee music mole, Saturday, 19 February 2005 08:44 (twenty years ago)

Swirlies sound kind of enticing, I'm dying to know.

― Onimo (GerryNemo), Saturday, 19 February 2005 10:48 (twenty years ago)

From Urban Dictionary:

1. swirlie
Holding someone's head down the loo bowl and flushing. A "punishment" often meted out by jocks to decent people who never did the jocks any harm but the jocks, being sadistic bastards, do it anyhow.

Also takes place in the UK. There, is is referred to as "The Flush" or an "Initiation Ceremony".

I don't know anyone in the UK this has happened to.

― Onimo (GerryNemo), Saturday, 19 February 2005 10:55 (twenty years ago)

Oh, it's been used in the UK for decades - and I think it is known as a swirlie here too now.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Saturday, 19 February 2005 11:18 (twenty years ago)

Thanks for sharing all this. I guess these circumstances are not isolated to the US.

I wonder if tolerance for cruelty ever gets discussed officially by school superintendents and deans and whoever, as much as funding and football field bleachers and things like that. Probably not. I imagine, growing up in one of these schools, given how tense they tend to be, it would be incredibly weird to feel responsible for what's going on in them.

― floating, Saturday, 19 February 2005 20:26 (twenty years ago)

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