# Corporal Punishment on an 18 year old student **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 30, 2014, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560 "2014-12-30T19:56:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2014, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/21 "2014-12-31T18:52:30Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Man, in California, you can get in legal trouble for _hugging_ a student. I had no idea there were still so many places in the country where you could still beat 'em. Is hugging a student really and literally a no-no under the _literal_ policies and laws (e.g. there is a “no touching at all” rule or similar), or is hugging a student a no-no primarily because of the potential ick factor, a very likely subsequent investigation for child molestation, and a general refusal of school districts to hire people who have been investigated for a sex crime, even if not convicted (i.e. it’s not actually against policy, but good luck keeping your job if you do that)? ---
**Author:** ![Tuxie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ee59a6/32.png) [@Tuxie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuxie)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2014, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/22 "2014-12-31T20:34:15Z")
Got a cite for that last part? ---
**Author:** ![Procrustus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/procrustus/32/2994_2.png) [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2014, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/23 "2014-12-31T20:44:30Z")
I’m always troubled by the failure of the government to treat 18 year-olds as adults. When my kids were 18, I refused to sign school forms for them, and had them do it. The school didn’t like it. I said, “they’re 18, they don’t even have to have parents anymore.” A teacher should have no more right to hit an 18 year-old student than the 18 year-old student has a right to hit a teacher. and if they hit **my child** , _at any age_, there would be a lawsuit. ---
**Author:** ![Greg\_Charles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/839c29/32.png) [@Greg\_Charles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greg_Charles)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2014, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/24 "2014-12-31T23:34:03Z")
I turned 18 while a high school senior. I was able to sign my own school forms, but only if one of my parents first signed a form saying that was OK. That irked me at the time, but my mom signed the form for me, so I didn’t make a big deal of it. The school didn’t have corporal punishment though, so at least that didn’t come up. Doesn’t Texas have a “stand your ground” law? What if an 18 year old student responds to a beating by murdering the teacher? That would really pit two insane laws against each other. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2015, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/25 "2015-01-01T01:41:22Z")
If they’d tried to spank me in school at 18, I would have spanked them back. Good for the goose, good for the gander. Actually if they’d tried it an any age, I would have hit back. It’s a parent’s job, not the school’s. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2015, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/26 "2015-01-01T02:12:47Z")
> [@TBG](#): > > Actually if they’d tried it an any age, I would have hit back. It’s a parent’s job, not the school’s. It’s a parent’s job to beat a child with a board? (When “spanking” in schools is talked about, it’s not a light smack, keep your hand away from the hot stove kind of thing. The kind of thing people always rush to defend in discussions about spanking. It’s beating the child (edit: or I guess not a child necessarily) with a board, often to the point of causing welts and bruises.) ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2015, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/27 "2015-01-01T15:44:12Z")
> [@TBG](#): > > Actually if they’d tried it an any age, I would have hit back. It’s a parent’s job, not the school’s. As **Martin Hyde** pointed out, this isn’t true. Parents aren’t with a child at school. The teachers and administrators are empowered to act with the authority and responsibility of parents during these times. This is non-controversial at least as far as the law goes. I wish this thread hadn’t turned into a debate on child corporal punishment as we have done it before. The idea of corporal punishment for _adults_ seems to have no support in our history. The consent argument seems plausible at first blush (the idea that an 18 year old enrolling in school consents to school rules and punishments associated with it) and also putting aside that this 18 year old withdrew her consent, I cannot imagine a scenario where the government can confer a benefit on the condition that a citizen consents to battery. Want to mail something at the post office? Okay, but if it exceeds the proper weight limit, you consent to a caning by a postal employee. Seems silly, right? ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2015, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/28 "2015-01-01T18:33:17Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > Could continuing to go to school, presumably knowing (or being imputed as knowing) the School Rules ™ and the law, possibly constitute consent? My high school didn’t paddle. My elementary school did, but only as part of a behavior plan for a difficult child. There had to be a signed consent from the parents on file, and then the parents still had to be called and notified of a specific incident. My high school did, however, treat 18- (and the occasional 19-) year-olds as though they were underage. The idea is that having one set of rules for some students, and another set for others won’t work, especially since the people enforcing the rules can’t tell a student’s age at a glance. I suppose if the school paddled, they would have had to rethink that paradigm. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2015, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/29 "2015-01-01T18:40:04Z")
> [@Lord\_Feldon](#): > > It’s a parent’s job to beat a child with a board? > > (When “spanking” in schools is talked about, it’s not a light smack, keep your hand away from the hot stove kind of thing. The kind of thing people always rush to defend in discussions about spanking. It’s beating the child (edit: or I guess not a child necessarily) with a board, often to the point of causing welts and bruises.) Well it depends to be honest. I was born in the 50s and paddling was widespread throughout my childhood, but that was the extent of it. Misbehave and up through early Junior High you were summarily told to assume the position on the (almost always female) teacher’s desk and she spanked your ass with a paddle. I still remember my fifth grade teacher, ancient as a gnarled oak, thin as a rail, and by god the biggest guy in class didn’t lightly cross her, she could wield a paddle with the strength of a Titan. In Junior High and on, it kind of changed and instead a Vice Principal assumed responsibility for corporal discipline, and it was done in his office. In all that time, and I was a genuinely-shit headed kid until about 9th grade for various reasons, meaning I got paddled plenty, I never once bled or had serious injuries from it. Done the way it was then at least, paddling hurt, but it didn’t cause harm like what was described in the article. My parents and grandparents used to describe a far harsher school regime. They said that in their day teachers would slap you in the face if you spoke out of turn, slam a book into the back of your head, or beat you with a yardstick til you sobbed like a baby. Like **jtgain** I’m not super interested in the corporal punishment debate. I’ll just say that in general schools reflect the corporate punishment values of the societies in which they live. In my dad’s day if he misbehaved say, in a store, the store owner would thump him and send him home, and when my grandpa heard about it he’d thump him twice as bad. In my generation generally only teachers (who act _in loco parentis_) would whip kids other than the kid’s parents or close relatives. And my dad probably would have beat someone half to death if say, a shopkeeper slapped one of his kids…but in his day he would’ve expected it from any adult who saw him misbehave, and his parents would have only been grateful that a nearby adult had corrected his bad behavior in the appropriate way. I’ve always felt my generation was transitioning from a period in which kids were essentially beaten in a way we’d recognize as domestic violence today, to one in which kids aren’t spanked at all. The more regimented and less violent paddling was kind of the transitional practice. As parents stopped being so accepting of corporal punishment, schools largely stopped doing it. It’s really fairly unheard of in the United States, most people actually don’t even know it still goes on. The last report I read about it showed that in the States that still do it, something like fewer than 10% of school districts practice it. Typically these are more rural districts of Southern States, and thus probably why most people I know are unaware it even goes on. ---
**Author:** ![LH75](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lh75/32/4438_2.png) [@LH75](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LH75)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2015, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/30 "2015-01-01T18:48:16Z")
Like my friend GusNSpot, I went to Catholic School starting in the late fifties. Corporal punishment was the norm, but it tapered off by high school. As a parent, there is no way I would have tolerated a teacher physically punishing my daughters. Had one of my daughters been paddled as describe in the link from Lord Felton’s post, an assault charge would have been the absolute best the teacher would have received. This would have taken all of the self discipline I could gather to let it go at that. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2015, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/31 "2015-01-02T18:51:52Z")
> [@LH75](#): > > Like my friend GusNSpot, I went to Catholic School starting in the late fifties. Corporal punishment was the norm, but it tapered off by high school. > > As a parent, there is no way I would have tolerated a teacher physically punishing my daughters. Had one of my daughters been paddled as describe in the link from Lord Felton’s post, an assault charge would have been the absolute best the teacher would have received. This would have taken all of the self discipline I could gather to let it go at that. Well in the school districts that still do paddling, you have to sign a consent form. I believe in the ones that still do it, you either sign such a form or your kid doesn’t go to the school. “As described in the link”, would seem to go beyond normal paddling. But the real distinguishing factor to me is 18 years old. At 18, it’s really not even the parent’s call, the child should be the one who decides–okay, I’ll let them paddle me because that’s the crazy rules here in this Texas charter school, or no I won’t do it. She said no, and they physically restrained her and paddled her anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2015, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/32 "2015-01-02T23:33:11Z")
\ I wonder what school officials do when they encounter a kid who has developed a spanking fetish and appears to be enjoying their “punishment.” \ ---
**Author:** ![Enola\_Straight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dec6dc/32.png) [@Enola\_Straight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enola_Straight)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2015, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/33 "2015-01-03T02:35:14Z")
How many teachers/administrators/etc. who regularly administer CP suddenly found their homes burnt to the ground? ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2015, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/34 "2015-01-03T02:46:46Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > …This is non-controversial at least as far as the law goes. I wish this thread hadn’t turned into a debate on child corporal punishment as we have done it before. The idea of corporal punishment for _adults_ seems to have no support in our history… Is there any precedent for corporal punishment of adults in the US or the greater Western world? Was it _ever_ permitted for university professors to paddle college or grad students? It is certainly not permitted _today_, but what about 1750? Did they paddle at Oxford in 1430? ---
**Author:** ![get\_lives](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ecb155/32.png) [@get\_lives](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/get_lives)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2015, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/35 "2015-01-03T03:58:17Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > Is there any precedent for corporal punishment of adults in the US or the greater Western world? Was it _ever_ permitted for university professors to paddle college or grad students? It is certainly not permitted _today_, but what about 1750? Did they paddle at Oxford in 1430? The whipping of slaves, being pilloried in the stocks…maybe others. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2015, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/36 "2015-01-03T14:14:05Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > Is there any precedent for corporal punishment of adults in the US or the greater Western world? Was it _ever_ permitted for university professors to paddle college or grad students? It is certainly not permitted _today_, but what about 1750? Did they paddle at Oxford in 1430? Corporal punishment (and I mean flogging that leaves scars) was essentially universal in the military for most of human history. It was tapering off in the 19th century but it was well known as a punishment in the British Navy of the period. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2015, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/37 "2015-01-03T21:23:38Z")
> [@get\_lives](#): > > The whipping of slaves, being pilloried in the stocks…maybe others. The [scold’s bridle](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scold%27s_bridle) being another example, mostly used on women to silence them. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2015, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/38 "2015-01-03T22:59:40Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > Is there any precedent for corporal punishment of adults in the US or the greater Western world? Was it _ever_ permitted for university professors to paddle college or grad students? It is certainly not permitted _today_, but what about 1750? Did they paddle at Oxford in 1430? Plenty. Delaware didn’t abolish judicial corporal punishment until 1972 (and last used it in 1952). Regarding Oxfor,d they didn’t use corporal punishment at Oxford in 1430. It was first allowed in Cambridge in 1440 and Oxford in 1480. It was part of a general Europeanwide educational movement to increase the quality and professionalism of Universities, which had had a reputation of being fairly rowdy places. The University of Paris and some in Germany started legalizing corporal punishment at around the same time. > [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > Further, everywhere I’m familiar with eighteen year old school students can leave school premises at any time. The case in Texas, the student asked to leave and withdraw from the school. Someone dropping out of High School is not an uncommon thing, and in most States the schools have no power to act against it even if the child is under the age of eighteen as long as the child is above the cutoff age for compulsory education (16.) In special circumstances they can restrain the child if they need to for safety reason, but adult High Schoolers in their senior year drop out all the time. Schools don’t have the authority to imprison them to keep t hem in school. Taken to its logical absurdity, if they did they could hold someone for the rest of their natural lives if that person refused to say, take exams and such and thus never satisfied graduation requirements. That part is discussed in the decision: > [@](#): > > As for thesecond, Serafin argues that adults are not compelled to be at school and therefore, they maintain stronger due process rights than minors while there. This argument relies on the false premise that Serafin was not required to comply with SEE’s attendance policies on the day in question. Without doubt, she did not need to attend school after her eighteenth birthday and was at liberty to withdraw from SEE. However, having voluntarily chosen to attend classes after her eighteenth birthday and remain enrolled, she was not free to disregard school rules and attendance policies. > > In Texas, “[a] person who voluntarily enrolls in school or voluntarily attends school after the person’s 18th birthday shall attend school each school day for the entire period the program of instruction is offered.” TEX. EDUC. CODE § 25.085(e). Serafin was a student at SEE at the time of this incident. Nothing in the caselaw exempts non-minors from the corporal punishment of students. Furthermore, the Texas statute governing the use of corporal punishment in schools, makes no differentiation between adults and minors, stating that all students are eligible to receive corporal punishment. TEX. PENAL CODE § 9.62. > > Because Serafin was obligated to comply with school rules and subject to its disciplinary policies, we see no basis for affording her greater due process rights than her co-students. As this Court explained in Fee: “we have avoided having student discipline, a matter of public policy, shaped by the individual predilections of federal jurists rather than by state lawmakers and local officials. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2015, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/39 "2015-01-04T01:31:03Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > [It is not only in Texas, but in a number of places in the US (not to mention a number of places in other countries).](http://corpun.com/) Something about that site rather makes me question what intent it is published with. ---
**Author:** ![MichaelEmouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/michaelemouse/32/101_2.png) [@MichaelEmouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MichaelEmouse)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2015, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560/40 "2015-01-04T01:55:33Z")
I am curious about the following: What would happen if a child at that school hit the person administering the punishment or the people holding her down? Are children who hit their parents when their parents are administering corporal punishment committing assault/battery? What would happen if this 18 year old had hit the principal? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporal-punishment-on-an-18-year-old-student/708560.md?page=3)