Reply #11: They banned corporal punishment in my school in about 1982

[muriel_volestrangler]

and that was an extremely traditional public school (founding member of the Headmasters' Conference). In the last couple of years before then, perhaps 1 in 10 boys got corporal punishment in their time there (though five years before that, it was more common, from what my brothers tell me). I'd guess that maybe 1 in 5 boys at my prep school before that were beaten at some stage in their time there. It was legally banned in state schools in 1986, and private schools in 1998 - by which time almost none of them were using it (they banned it at my school because prospective parents didn't like it - they told them about it long before they told us; they were happy for us to remain believing that if we went really too far we could get beaten). I was never spanked, by my parents or at school, and I'm 38, and I would say that is fairly typical amongst the people I know - perhaps half were, half weren't?