Violence in the FFO...

[Poppy]

Yes, the characters in the 70's series certainly do seem most suited to be up for a bit of violence! I've only seen a few episodes of the 90's series so I don't know them that well, but what I have seen of it, the characters do not seem to kind to be fighting with dangerous men!

[Dick Kirrin]

Right, but once again I think that's nothing to do with the characters themselves, but with the directing. Marco could have looked better, and so could the others, but the makers of the series obviously didn't want any trouble with the department of political correcting. Someone there might object to dangerous criminals acting the way they would realistically do...

[Moonraker]

'Sfunny, but none of us (as schoolboys) ever thought of a caning or other forms of corporal punishment as acts of violence. It was deemed as a (usually) just punishment to deter us from re-committing the offence or misbehaving again -- until the next time, of course.

[Anita Bensoussane]

Did girls get caned too? When I was at school, I can only recall boys getting the slipper (primary school) or being caned (secondary school).

[Moonraker]

I only went to a boys' school, but to my knowledge, schoolgirls weren't caned or given any physical/corporal punishment.

[Poppy]

That's very sterotpye/sexist.
Surely it's only fair to give out the same punishment for both boys and girls.

[Julie2owlsdene]

Girls weren't caned at our junior school, or even slapped unless the crime was awful, probably like murder or something!!!

[Katharine]

At my primary school children received a drumstick or 'Jaws' which was a plimsole across the palm of the hand for bad behaviour. I do remember at least one girl receiving it, although generally speaking I think girls were more likely to have to write lines. Whether that was because their misbehaviour was usually along the lines of talking in class and the boys committed worse 'crimes' I don't remember.

At high school I only remember one occasion where children got the cane - both boys, but I think the threat of the cane was the same for everyone, regardless of sex.

[Moonraker]

That's very sterotpye/sexist.
Surely it's only fair to give out the same punishment for both boys and girls.

Not in the 50s!!! If you hit a girl, you could do untold damage. Girls were the weaker sex. They had to be looked after and nurtured. As for going outside with wet hair.......not in a month of Sundays.

[Dick Kirrin]

Nigel made an important point I think. Corporal punishment was something completely different than violence handed out by villains by EB's standards.

Corporal punishment may nowadays be a no-no thing, but that was different when the books were written. I don't want to go into any corporal punishment is a good/bad thing discussion, so I shall stay with violence by villains.

Even here, we can see different patterns:

1. There are wicked villains, who really have it in for the children like Rooky in Five get into trouble. These want to do them harm just for the harm's sake. Truely wicked and nasty characters which we don't see too often in EB's books.

2. Villains caught out by the children. These usually don't do them any more harm than necessary to stop them from calling the police, i.e. lock them into some room or cave or tie them up. Not nice, of course, but not too cruel either. In Five go off to camp, the men tie the boys up, but as good as promise them they'd be looked after till the men have cleared out the tunnel.

3. Like 2. with the subtle difference that these villains don't care if the children get free or not. So even though they might not have the 'courage' to take them out, have them kneel down and shoot them in the back of the head, they take their dying from cold, thirst or starvation into account.

4. Violence for a certain means, i.e. kidnapping one of the children for a ransom of some kind. Usually George is the one chosen...

5. Violence by others persons, not the villains, like Mrs Penruthlan who boxes poor Ju's ears.

6. Violence done to minor characters like Nobby, Sniffy or Jo. Usually it's a wicked father or uncle who does the beating and normally to force them into submission.

Also there is one "mixed situation' so to speak. I'm referring to Five fall into Adventure, where George is kidnapped for ransom, whereas Julian and Dick are just interfering and therefore end up in the shed. Red actually tells Julian they are to wait for the police to free them.

[MARKTAYLORUK]

Girls most certainly were - an old friend went to.a convent school.in the 70s which seemed to regard it as a form.of exercise. The case that started the ball rolling on abolition involved a girl being caned with her skirt lifted - for full details see Jennifer Saunders' autobiography.

[IceMaiden]

Sad to remark that, since the more vigorous and colourful teacher responses noted above have been reigned in, schools have actually become more threatening and violent places, only today the aggro is inflicted (on a regular basis) by a small number of children.....go figure!

'Aurélien Arkadiusz'

I wish caning had still been allowed when I was at secondary school. I might have been able to actually enjoy going to school then because the awful bad behaviour would have been properly dealt with instead of the offenders just laughing at the teacher's hopeless attempt to say "don't do that"...bad decision to stop the use of corporal punishment in schools.