Rating Classic Spanking Scenes

My last entry was one in which I opined on modern spanking scenes. I lamented that Hollywood usually gets it wrong these days. But there was a time when Hollywood got it right, and in some cases, very right. Tonight's entry is all about those classic scenes. There was a time in Hollywood's Golden Age when spanking a woman was considered par for the course, no one got upset over it and you certainly didn't see women's' groups picketing outside the gates of the major Hollywood studios. Usually, the way it worked in these films was there was usually something about the girl that wasn't quite right (usually her attitude) that needed to be corrected. Sometimes, the spanking would turn the girl into a suitable mate, sometimes not. But they all shared one thing: both the spanker and spankee were always reasonably attractive. The man was usually macho to some extent and the woman was almost always extremely feminine (unless it was one of those tomboys that needed taming). Please note that I'm rating only the spanking scene and not the film as a whole. There are other sites for that. This is a spanking bog and that's what I'm concerning myself with. So, dear readers, it's time to enter the Way Back Machine and go back to a time in Hollywood when men were men and women were spanked.

I'll give the name of the film, the names of the people involved and then give a small description of the scene followed by a photo. I'll give the film the number of stars I think it merits (between one and four). Instead of dredging through the myriad pages of stills to find decent ones, I'm using screen captures from my Cinema Swats DVD collection. Apologies if the quality of the photos is lacking.

"The Naughty Flirt" (1931) ***

Paul Page, Alice White

Silent film comedienne Alice White plays Kay Elliot, a young woman who falls for a man (Paul Page) who works in her father's law firm. She's quite a flirt, as the title suggests and he wants nothing to do with her. In the scene that precedes the spanking, we see him standing in a roomful of men, all of them laughing at him because she has done something to embarrass him. He goes and finds her (actually, she's right outside the door) and without a word, puts her over his knee and spanks her. White, ever the comedienne, plays the scene for laughs. When Page stands her back up, he tells her "There you go. You're just man crazy!". He storms off, leaving her rubbing her bottom.

I gave this film three stars because the build up was very nice, with the long-suffering Paul Page finally getting tired of Kay and giving her her just desserts. Alice White is adorable as the spoiled Kay Elliot. The spanking isn't particularly hard but we see all of it and we see his hand actually hitting her bottom (something Hollywood rarely gives us these days).

"The Footloose Heiress" (1937) ****

Craig Reynolds, Anne Sheridan

The lovely Anne Sheridan plays a spoiled socialite who makes plans to elope with a man her ad executive father disapproves of. When the match is unwittingly thwarted by a penniless hobo, nicely played by Craig Reynolds, the girl's father is so grateful he gives him a place to stay. He also encourages the man to spend time with his daughter. She loathes him from the beginning and makes plans to expose him for what she thinks he is. In reality, he's a college educated man (who ultimately writes a winning ad campaign for her father's agency). But he has enough he-man in him that he doesn't put up with anything from her. Before she can put her plan into action (at an ultra-ritzy party) he takes her by the wrist and marches her outside for a spanking, with a pack of onlookers trailing.

This film gets four stars from me because it's about as close to a perfect spanking scene as you're ever going to get in a mainstream film. Both leads are extremely attractive (and he looks great in a tux) and the spanking was certainly deserved. The spanking itself isn't really that hard, but then it doesn't take much to teach a lesson to a girl this spoiled. She's presumably never had a hand laid on her in her life. As with "The Naughty Flirt", whole spanking is shown, with no annoying cutaway shots.

"Love, Honor and Behave" (1938) ***1/2

Wayne Morris, Priscilla Lane

The early days of a young couple's married life are examined in this film. Priscilla Lane plays the bored housewife whose husband refuses to assert himself. Even his father picks on him for preferring tennis to football. She decides to make plans to see another man but when hubby finds out, there's a knock-down drag-out fight, during which they both end up with a black eye. But she gets something extra--a spanking while her family and in-laws watch through a french door. When they bust in, she demands to know why a man can't have any privacy in his own home. Obviously, the spanking hurts but she's thrilled that her man is showing a side of himself that he hadn't previously.This one gets three and a half stars, mostly because of the violence that precedes the spanking (he punches her in the eye but we don't see it) and because of a couple of cutaways, where the various witnesses discuss this state of affairs. The two leads have good chemistry and the build up is pretty good. All in all, a very good scene.

"Look For The Silver Lining" (1949) ***




Gordon MacRae, June Haver



This musical is a biopic of singer and dancer Marilyn Miller. In the scene in question, the two leads are arguing over whether or not she should take a part in a play being put on by Jerome Kern. During the argument, she slaps his face because she thinks he's insulted her. Whereupon he does the manly thing and takes her over his knee and paddles her until she promises to come to her senses and do the show.
This movie gets three stars from me. It's a great scene and the two leads are lovely to look at. MacRae is certainly handsome and has a beautiful baritone. But it's hard to take a man seriously in pajamas. Also the scene is interrupted by the appearance of the maid, whose eyes are as big as silver dollars. Her cries of "Excuse me, Mr. Carter!" take away from the scene for me. Physically, the spanking seems half hearted to me, but the dialogue during the spanking, where he holds his hand over her bottom pending her answer to his questions, is very good. The scene is perfectly framed and shot, which is a plus.




"Stagecoach Kid" (1949) ****



Tim Holt, Jeff Donnell

Cowboy star Tim Holt had a rather interesting Hollywood career. He spent part of his career making B-westerns at Republic Pictures and part of it working with A-list directors in movies like "The Treasure Of The Sierra Madre", "The Magnificent Ambersons" and "Stagecoach". He also made the very interesting cult film "Hitler's Children" (with screen brat Bonita Granville). In this film, he plays Dave Collins, a stagecoach driver with a load of gold to deliver. There's a young woman on board, Jesse, who father is taking her in the opposite direction from the man she loves and so she goes AWOL and disguises herself as a boy. It's a not-too-clever ruse and it doesn't fool Collins for long. In the spanking scene, she's walking off to find a stage to take her to her boyfriend. Holt is a fine rider and roper and we see both talents put to good use here. He ropes her like he would a stray calf, puts her over his knee and spanks the dust out of her jeans.
This spanking scene gets four stars from me for a number of reasons. First, I love Tim Holt. Second, almost never in the annals of Hollywood was a spanking more deserved than this. Jeff Donnell as Jesse has a voice that grates my nerves, she's annoying and whiny and there's just nothing endearing about her. The spanking takes place in the middle of the desert, where there are no people around for miles but, as Holt takes her over his knee, she cries "I'm gonna holler!" How lame is that? Physically, the spanking is pretty brisk, even though Holt keeps his gloves on. The locking down of her legs is something most of us bottoms can identify with. But it's beyond me how a man can look at that girl's bottom and not know it's a girl. We see the entire scene without cutaway shots.



"Captain Lightfoot" (1955) ****



Rock Hudson, Barbara Rush



Rock Hudson plays Michael Martin, an Irish rebel forced to turn highwayman in order to finance his rebellion. In the course of this, he is befriended by a man and taken under his wing. The man has a daughter, Aga, who hates him on sight. The lovely Barbara Rush plays a girl engaged in a rebellion of her own, one Martin is determined to put down himself. The girl's father is called away and puts him in charge. He becomes aware that Aga is spending time with a man of questionable character and he forbids her to see him. She laughs at him, calling him a "bogtrotter dressed as a gentleman". He doesn't take kindly to the insult and turns her over his knee for a hard spanking. When she says "You wouldn't dare!" he replies "A bogtrotter would dare!"

The spanking scene in "Captain Lightfoot" gets four stars from me because it's a perfect spanking scene. The buildup, beginning with Aga listening at the door to the conversation in which Martin says he will speak with her about her relationship with the unsuitable Captain Hood, to the argument, where she tells him it would be a pity to see him die so young (assuming that Captain Hood would challenge Our Hero to a duel) is priceless. Aga goes from haughty to humiliated in the time it takes Martin to get her over his knee. The spanking is surprisingly hard and Hudson looks like he's laying it on with gusto. I'm not a big fan of either of these actors, but I'm a huge fan of this scene. We see the whole thing, with only one or two cutaways, but the action is always close by and the cutaways don't really detract from the scene."

"Holiday For Lovers" (1961) **1/2

Gary Crosby, Carole Lynley

This movie centers on the romantic entanglements of two sisters, while the older one is working in South America. It's the relationship between the younger sister, played by the delightfully spankable Carole Lynley, and an American GI, played by Gary Crosby, that provides the spanking scene in question. Crosby plays Paul, a lonely Army private studying for the sergeant's exam who falls for the lovely Carole, even though she seems a bit young for him in my opinion. Somehow, he loses contact with her, but he's so smitten with her that he goes without food and sleep and blows the sergeancy to find her. When he does, he tells her that he wants to marry her, to which responds that she can't marry him because she has to have more education and doesn't want to give up water skiing, the only thing, admittedly, that she's really good at. On being rejected, he takes her over his knee and spanks her.

This is my least favorite spanking scene of the films I'm rating here. The delightfully spankable Carole Lynley deserved a much better scene than this. First, the positioning is a disaster. He puts her over his knee as though he's going to spank her left-handed, but spanks with his right hand anyway. This is terribly awkward, not to mention aesthetically displeasing. Second, the camera focuses on her facial reactions so we don't really see much of the spanking. Not that it's much of a spanking. The blows are obviously pulled and then, when it's over, he shakes his hand like her bottom hurt it. This is more along the lines of how most spanking scenes would go in films.

So there you have it. This is all I'm doing for tonight. I'll post another review some other time...when I have the patience for it.

Modern vs. Classic

For me (and many other spankos of my generation) my introduction to spanking as something exciting and titillating came via movies. There was no Internet in those days and no uncut and unedited films anywhere but the theater (at least until Home Box Office came along). And of course, only network television had series in those days. As I cut my teeth on movie spanking scenes, it should come as no surprise that I still like a good movie spanking. However, modern films offer us precious little compared to those "old standbys" from my youth--"Kiss Me Kate", "McLintock!", "Blue Hawaii" and others.

So tonight, I'm going to critique a few modern scenes. I will note when I haven't seen the entire movie. On some of them, I don't know anything beyond the two characters involved. But on most I've at least read a synapses of the plot. So here goes. First up, the movie I believe opened the floodgates."Secretary" (2002) delves into the ugly private lives of two people--Edward, a perfectionist lawyer (played by James Spader) and Lee, his very troubled secretary (well played by Maggie Gylenhall). In the spanking scene, I feel the scene is well set. Lee makes many typing errors and one day Edward calls her into his office. He asks her to bend over the desk and place her elbows flat, which she does. Then, he spanks her as she reads the error-laden letter aloud (and more than once). The spanking scene, with its build up, is very well done except for Spader's hand. As the spanking progresses, it looks more like he's doing some kind of martial arts than spanking a bottom. This movie also sends a negative message: only someone who's as psychologically damaged as Lee is would be interested in having a man spank her. I was a newbie in the spanking scene when this film came out and I was disappointed in how it portrayed us.

Next up, spanking as a diversionary tactic. British actor Clive Owen spanks a woman in a museum in "Shoot Em Up" (2007). I've already blogged about this film but I felt I need to include the scene here. Because both participants are standing, it's bad from a positioning standpoint. We never really see his hand strike her bottom. Aside from that, the movie is unbelievably, orgiastically violent. This is one of the movie's lighter moments.

Next, a British film that's so dark and depressing it makes "Secretary" look light and breezy. In "Fish Tank",(2009) Michael Fassbender (the oh so lovely Michael Fassbender) takes his girlfriend's bratty, foulmouthed daughter, Mia (well played by Katie Jarvis) over his knee and spanks her for insulting him. Unfortunately, he also sleeps with her so a creepy element comes into play. The scene is realistically brief and Mia's overreactions to the moderate spanks is adorable. Obviously, no one has ever done this before. I haven't seen the complete film but it looks like a fairly sordid film.

Another teenager who endures a spanking is Hailee Steinfeld in the Coen Brothers' remake of "True Grit" (2010). This is another film I have already blogged about but I felt it worth a mention. Matt Damon as the puffed-up Texas Ranger LaBouef takes the stubborn Mattie Ross over his knee and spanks her, then decides a switch would work better. I liked this scene, all in all and liked the film as a whole. It was duly reported that Miss Steinfeld wore padding and didn't feel a thing. But at least we can actually see him spanking her.

Now on to a television show. I have to admit that I have never watched "Weeds". It's not the kind of thing I would watch. But in the scene in question, Nancy (played by Mary Louise Parker) is taken over the knee of (I guess) a guy she's doing business with and has her dress pulled up for good measure. Now, Miss Parker is no ingenue. I first saw her over 20 years ago in "Fried Green Tomatoes" so it does my heart good to see an older lady in this position. Probably the nicest, most well-filmed spanking I've seen in many years, even if I don't like the show.

Next, a movie I know very little about. Jessica Alba has her bare bottom whipped with a belt by Casey Affleck in "The Killer Inside Me". Of course, all this whipping leads to sex. But we never actually see what's supposed to be happening. Rumor has it that a body double may have been used for the scene. Not a very good scene in my opinion. When I watch a spanking scene, I want to see the spanking, thank you.

Last, and probably least, the much maligned "A Dangerous Method" (2011). In this film from director David Cronenberg, the relationship between Sigmund Frued (Viggo Mortensen) and Carl Jung (the yummy Michael Fassbender) is explored via the study of one of Jung's patients, a woman named Sabine (played by Keira Knightley). Sabine is a nymphomaniac and also has issues stemming from beatings administered by her cruel father. Again, the spanker is Michael Fassbender. But unlike "Fish Tank", where the spanking of a bratty girl makes the scene enjoyable, there's no real build up here. Also the spanking is rather stylized. In another scene, she's tied to a bed while Fassbender uses a belt on her backside. However, we never actually see the blows land on her bottom (the same problem I had with the previous film) and there are also Ms. Knightley's ambivalent comments about filming the scenes.

All in all, not too bad for modern movies. I don't think Hollywood will ever again give us a spanking scene as delicious as the one in "Blue Hawaii", where the whole thing is seen and no tricks were pulled. I think modern actresses are less likely to agree to a scene like that (at least not without a lot of restrictions). Most have the same attitude as the very uptight Keira Knightley: I'll do it for art's sake, but it better not be real. This is a shame. I also think that most leading men would be hesitant to do a scene like that because it might reflect badly on them. When "True Grit" was released, I remember seeing interviews with Matt Damon where he makes sure to mention that he doesn't spank his kids, lest anyone think otherwise and his stock in Hollywood plummets. By the way, I deliberately left out the one-smacker in "The Descendants", in which Damon's pal, George Clooney, smacks the bottom of his teenage daughter once for taking badly about her mother while she lays in a coma. Like a lot of modern scenes, you don't actually see his hand connect with her bottom. It's like modern directors think we won't notice that we've been ripped off. I was especially disappointed in Cronenberg for the completely faked scenes in "A Dangerous Method". I always thought him a tough and uncompromising filmmaker. A guy who can film a scene like the tragic ending in "The Fly" is too scared to show an actual spanking in one of his films. Maybe he has mellowed with age. At any rate, modern tastes will dictate what kinds of movies will get made. So even when Hollywood does give us a spanking scene, expect it to be within the context of modern times--either darkly vicious, leeringly sexual, or completely fake.

They Made Me A Spanko

The photo that sits atop this entry is real. It has not been Photoshopped or doctored in any way. How do I know this with such certainty? I was present when it was taken. The man holding the paddle was my Biology teacher, Mr. Stevenor. The boy he's paddling is named Mark (I had behind the wheel with him the previous year). This is a real paddling. It was photographed surreptitiously by a kid in my class who happened to be on the yearbook staff. The photo was taken without a flash, probably using high speed film. This grainy photo actually did appear in the yearbook in 1977. Let me set the stage for you. Mr. Stevenor was a rather old-fashioned guy as you can no doubt guess from his greased back hair. Not many teachers paddled at PHS, but he did. The paddle he's using is actually a hall pass, which you had to have in your possession (be carrying) if you were out of your room for any reason (except when you had a call slip to go see the dean). No, Mr. S. never paddled me. He didn't paddle girls. He gave girls detention. I use this photo to illustrate a point--corporal punishment was still prevalent in the 70's. People can say it was dying out and falling into disuse if they want to, but anyone who says that wasn't there. Granted, here in Illinois, there weren't many high schools that paddled. If you look at the photo closely, you can see that Mark is bigger than the teacher. And that's the problem. By the time a kid reaches high school age, they are less likely to just go submissively to their punishment. Most, if not all, resent being treated this way when they want to be treated like young adults. The sin that young Mark committed is lost to my memory. But his protest isn't. He was decidedly against being paddled. He didn't want to be treated like a child. Mr. Stevenor's reply? "Act your age and not your shoe size, young man, and you won't get paddled."

Now I touched on this in yesterday's entry, but I have given it more thought. Maybe, just maybe, all of the spanking I witnessed growing up did something to me. Maybe it was environment and not genetics that made me a spanko. I always said it was genetics because my twin was one, too. But maybe both of us got our minds warped by the constant, steady stream of corporal punishment in our lives. Except for a handful of times when I thought the spanking was either undeserved or overdone, I have no bitterness about the way I was treated. There were kids who were treated far worse than I was at home. You knew who the abused kids were. They were the ones who came to school with black eyes and fat lips. The kids who wore long sleeves even in warm weather to hide whatever was being done to them. I don't class a spanking given as discipline as abuse. Abuse happens when the line gets crossed. My father used to say that God gave kids nice padded bottoms for a reason--so that when you needed to make a point, you had a place to make it. I knew kids, even in high school, who could have stood a little bit of no-nonsense discipline. Take this scene from "Class Of 1999":

For people who haven't seen this film, it's sort of got a cult following. The film is set in the not-too-distant future, where teenage gangs have terrorized and taken over the schools in large, urban cities. One school decides to hire robots to handle the kids. The History teacher, Mr. Hardin, is a former military robot. One day, a fight breaks out in his class between two rival gang members. Mr. Hardin has a number of options available to him and they flash on the screen as he's deciding what to do. He decides to use corporal punishment. He hauls the boys apart (and I'm very sure these punks are stunned that this little old man has the strength to do that) and pulls them to the front of the class. Once there, he sits on his desk and takes each boy across his knee for a hard spanking, delivered as only a robot can. My sister and I were both impressed with this scene. Now, I'm quite sure those boys thought themselves big men. I'm sure they spent a lot of time bragging about the fights they'd been in and the old people they had mugged. This was a demonstration for the rest of the class. Those boys didn't look so big in that moment when they were squirming under the hand of the new teacher. When he's done with the punishments, Mr. Hardin straightens his tie and asks "Anyone else?" He gets the response he wanted---each desk is placed back in a neat row and the students sit up straight in rapt attention. When I was in school, the teachers who weren't afraid to show the kids that they were in charge and that they meant business were the ones who won our cooperation and respect. There were probably a few exceptions to this, but I'm saying generally speaking corporal punishment got results.
I guess I took it for granted that if I decided to break the rules I would find myself face down getting my bottom spanked. This was both at home and at school. I was a very respectful child, respectful to authority and quite happy to let the adults be in charge. I had enough insight to know that my friend, Robyn (whom I discussed yesterday) was a spoiled brat. A teenage boy had finally had the courage to do what her father didn't and discipline her. It probably wasn't his place, but someone had to do it. I could picture her at home, begging her dad to fire the guy. But he didn't.

Maybe it's because I'm 51 now and feeling a bit old that I've been doing a lot of reminiscing. All that walking down Memory Lane has also caused me to think long and hard about where my spanking kink might come from. I spent a number of years shrugging off the question and saying "Who cares?" when I bothered to answer it at all. Now though, I really do wonder. I wonder if I spend several weekends a year at parties getting spanked, strapped, paddled and caned because I saw and experienced so much of that firsthand? When I got older, I tried to get my boyfriends to spank me, with no real success. I didn't spend much time thinking about sex. But I spent A LOT of time thinking about spanking. I knew I was different. I knew I was weird. I think, in some instances, kids can be much more perceptive than adults. I'm sure they sensed that there was something not quite right about me. My mother used to warn me that I was far too bright for my own good. I had a keen mind and I was always thinking. And when I wasn't thinking, I was writing. I have been writing my thoughts down, in one form or another, since I was old enough to hold a pencil and form words. And I've been doing it pretty much nonstop. I wrote diaries, in which I tried to sort out my feelings (when I was old enough to self-analyze). I wrote stories when I was much younger in which the girl (sometimes a boy) would get spanked. I wasn't sophisticated enough to know that my burgeoning feelings were sexual. I just knew I got a thrill out of spanking and, in those days, it was usually someone else's more than my own. I began to read books that contained spankings (like "A High Wind In Jamaica" or "To Kill A Mockingbird"). I read a lot of Dickens, in which boys got the cane, usually unfairly. And I read and fell in love with Twain's "Tom Sawyer" and the lovable rascal who was the hero of the story. So even at a young age my spanking kink informed the choices I made on what to read, what to write and also how to behave. So if you were to ask me right this very minute if environment or genetics made me a spanko, I guess I would have to say it was definitely environment in my case. I'm pretty sure all of my relatives are fairly vanilla. But it's not something I'm going to ask them. Frankly, it's none of my business. I've had a hard enough time unravelling my own kink, let alone someone else's.

So I apologize if the last half dozen entries have missed the mark. I've spent an awful lot of time thinking about the past and it's sort of rubbing off on my blog entries. With no play dates or parties on the horizon, this is what I've been left with. Hopefully, that will soon change.

Spanking, Spanking Everywhere

If you were in grade or middle school in the 60's and 70's, then the chances are good that you probably had a face-to-face encounter with the Board Of Education. I know I did, about a dozen times. And, as I said before, I was a good kid. I knew of kids who were paddled every week for one thing or another. But I wasn't like I was now. I was a very meek child and afraid of discipline. I saw my friend, Julie, go happy-go-lucky to get paddled and come back with a grin on her face. Once, when we were over at her house on a lazy Saturday (getting into her older sister, Kathy's records) doing each other's hair, I asked her point-blank how she could just go get paddled and act like it didn't bother her. She told me "You can't let 'em see they hurt you. If you show 'em even a little fear, they will go worse on you. They're like dogs." She was right. Now that I think back on it, I saw some very sadistic teachers in my time. I saw sadistic discipline measures turn devil-may-care pranksters into seething, angry young men who hated authority. So I determined from that day on that if I was ever paddled at school again (and I was) I wasn't going to give them the satisfaction of knowing it hurt. This conversation happened in fifth grade, when we were bussed to a different school. Busing was very popular in those days. The population of Peoria was growing and there simply wasn't enough room for everyone. Besides, for some odd reason, my school didn't have a fifth grade. I hated this new school with a passion. It was a newer building, right next door to the fire station where my uncle was a fireman. If you went past the Library, the smell of tar would gag you. To this day, I can't smell roofing tar without getting a hitch in my stomach. The warden of this prison was named Mr. Slater. The times were changing, but he didn't. He was probably only in his 40's when I had him as principal, but he was as old-fashioned as they came. He addressed us on the first day of school; ostensibly to welcome us new kids, but also to warn us. He made it known what kind of behavior he expected from every student in the school. Students were to address teachers, lunch room ladies and the janitor as "sir" or "ma'am". Failure to do so would earn you a paddling. So would sliding down the banister on the stairs leading to the upperclassman's' playground. Yes, the playgrounds were divided. There was a breezeway between the buildings where kids would meet to smoke and play cards. But you didn't want to get caught doing either. In fact, I was convinced before the end of that assembly that ANYTHING could get you paddled in that school. Of course, I didn't have to wait long before I put his words to the test. About three weeks after school started, we had a bad rainstorm and our bus got bogged down in the mud. A man from the Superintendent Of Schools came in an official-looking car to tell us that another bus was coming to take us to school. I guess the bus that was in the mud was waiting for a tow. The man warned us all to file off the bus in an orderly fashion. When it came my turn to get off, the girl behind me gave me a shove that sent me sprawling down the steps and face first into the mud. My favorite dress (green with little yellow flowers) was soaked through to my undershirt. I also managed to drop my books and most of my homework in the mud. I heard laughter and I felt my neck get hot. My sister, Carol, came and helped me up. The girl who had pushed me just laughed "Have a nice trip. See you next fall". I wanted to kill her. I was only ten years old but I wanted to kill her. The man from the Superintendent's office asked me if I was alright. Of course I wasn't alright. I was soaking wet and my homework was ruined. He volunteered to take me home to change, but I didn't want to. It would dry once I got to school. But, while I outwardly seemed to take this in stride, inwardly, I was plotting my revenge. That morning at recess, my teacher (a very nice lady with a newborn at home) kept me inside. She knew I would probably go gunning for the girl who had pushed me. Schools did not have a Zero Tolerance Policy when it came to bullying in those days. They expected kids to fight their own battles. Just make sure you do it off school property. My teacher and I spent quite a bit of time in the restroom using the shaved soap to get the mud off my dress. A teacher couldn't do that nowadays. She would not be allowed to touch me or my clothes. But times were different then. Luckily, the mud washed out of my favorite dress. I was still plotting my revenge when we had a chance meeting on the playground a few days later. A couple of her friends were with her, still laughing about my "trip" and making oinking sounds (because pigs belong in the mud). I was only human and could only take so much. I jumped on her and started to swing my fist at her face. Of course, a circle formed around us with kids yelling "Fight! Fight!" She was getting he worst of it when I felt a strong hand pull me away from her. It was Mr. Miller, a sixth grade teacher who was doing playground duty that day. He was blond and somewhat handsome. And his paddle had holes drilled in it. "Is that any way for a young lady to act?" he asked me. "She pushed me off he bus Monday," I told him. "I don't care what she did," he said. "You know the rule about fighting." Yes, I knew the rule about fighting. I knew all the rules because they were all written down for us. I also knew the unwritten ones. Taking me by the back of my jacket, he hauled me away. I knew where we were going. He was taking me to see Mr. Slater. Unlike most principals in those days, Mr. Slater didn't leave the physical discipline to an assistant. He preferred to meet it out himself. He had an ash paddle that was stained red mahogany, which he called the Red Snapper. I was about to meet the Red Snapper up close and personal. I hadn't had my growth spurt yet, so I was still small and terribly skinny. I'm sure I was nothing to pull around in those days, at least for a grown man. When we got to the office, Mr. Slater's secretary, Mrs. Hawk was there. Her name fit her in every way. Mr. Miller explained that I had been caught fighting on the playground and we needed to see Mr. Slater as soon as possible. He was in his office, she said, eating his lunch. But she went in and I could hear a muffled conversation through the door. In a moment, I was ushered in by Mrs. Hawk. When I got inside, I saw Mr. Slater. He had a sandwich and a Thermos of coffee in front of him. The Red Snapper was already on his desk. It looked as big as me. He had me sit down and tell him what had happened. I spilled out the story about how this girl had pushed me in the mud on purpose and was still laughing over it. Mr. Slater wanted to know why I hadn't told him about this when it happened. The way he had heard it, it was an accident. I told him I didn't tell him because I didn't really want the girl to get in trouble. "I don't abide fighting," he said. "No matter what the reason." I looked at my feet glumly and muttered "Yes, sir." Then he announced that he was paddling me. Not because he wanted to, he assured me. But because the rules called for it. "Bend over," he told me. I knew he meant over his desk. I can still smell the coffee from his Thermos as I bent over. I see looking back that the three swats I got that day were delivered with a lightened hand. He could have gone much, much harder on me. Four months later, he would. By February, we were all aching for Easter break. The routine of school had gone on since Christmas with no let up. We were all getting a little restless. Toward the end of the month, we had an unseasonably warm day. If I remember correctly, it was probably in the high 60's. Mischief was definitely in the air that day. Call it Spring Fever for lack of a better word. But something got into me that day that I still have a hard time believing. At morning recess, me and Carol and Julie and our friend, Sally (whose mom dated my uncle, the fireman) decided we had to do something to break up the monotony. Julie suggested pulling the fire alarm. It would be a great way of getting outside and getting some fresh air. I was against it. The penalty would be too severe if we were caught and, because my uncle was a fireman and worked right next door, the odds of pulling this off without getting caught were slim. Sally volunteered to pull the alarm, something that raised her esteem in my eyes. Julie wanted to because if it came time to divide and conquer, she knew she could take the punishment Mr. Slater would surely dish out. But Sally insisted. No one would suspect her. Julie, meanwhile, would be one of the first kids suspected. She had a good point. So it was agreed that Sally would pull the fire alarm. She had Mr. Melvin (a fact I didn't envy her for) and wasn't in my class. Later that day, we were sitting having a reading lesson when the alarm went off. My teacher kept everyone calm as she knew this wasn't a drill. We all walked single file down the hallway and to our assigned area. I saw Sally standing there innocently with her class. Mr. Melvin was an older, Southern man who Brylcremed his hair and carried a fearsome paddle called Billy Boy. Everyone, even the bravest kid in the school, was afraid of him. Within minutes, I could hear the fire engines roaring down the road to the school. I saw my uncle as soon as the truck came to a stop. It didn't take them long to figure out that this was a false alarm. Mr. Slater vowed to get to the bottom of this. The next day, my uncle came to the school in his official uniform and lectured the entire school on pulling the fire alarm when there wasn't a fire. My uncle had lost his daughter in a fire five years earlier (his reason for choosing that profession) and he took fire safety very seriously. He didn't suspect his nieces had anything to do with it. Mr. Slater wanted a list of all the students who had been out of their classes when the alarm went off. It didn't matter for what reason or how long they were gone. It took a few days, but Mr. Slater finally received a list from the different teachers. The names of 14 students were on it. Some of the students were honor students. Some were playing hooky. All were rounded up and brought in to be questioned on what they were doing out of class and if they happened to see anyone hanging around any of the four alarms the school had. When it came Sally's turn, she cracked under pressure. She gave Mr. Slater the name of every kid who had been in on it. Carol, Julie and I were pulled from our rooms and brought in. I knew the jig was up. "We're gonna get it," Carol said flatly. We all put our best innocent looks on our faces, but Mr. Slater waved his hand and said "Don't bother. Your cohort has given you up." I didn't know what a cohort was but if he was talking about Sally, then she was a dirty squealer. She no longer deserved our loyalty. We threw her under the proverbial bus. "It was all her idea," Julie said. "Yeah, we wanted t' do something, but not that!" "You volunteered t' do it!" Sally shot back. Mr. Slater put his fingers in his mouth a whistled, one of those long, piercing whistles you hear at sporting events or when someone is called a dog. The Red Snapper got exercised on the bottoms of four ten-year-olds that day. To the day he died, my uncle never knew that we were involved in that famous false alarm.

Needless to say, we never tried a thing like that again. I had a couple of surface bruises from that paddling. They didn't need permission from your parents in those days so my parents never knew we were involved either. The school didn't see fit to send a letter home telling our parents what dangerous waters we were treading. Of course, we made up with Sally. We couldn't stay mad at her for long. We all skated together on Saturday nights and our parents played bridge together and sometimes went to the movies. Julie's older sister, Kathy, was often put in charge of us at these times. One of those Saturday skating nights provided me with enough spanking fantasy memories to last a very long time. The roller rink where we skated was called Fernwood (long before "Fernwood Tonight" was on TV) and the man who owned it, Mr. Arnold, had a daughter, Robyn, who was my age. To put it mildly, Robyn was a brat. She wasn't someone I would call a friend, but we talked on the phone about boys. She went to a different school. She had an annoying habit of listening in on her older brother's phone conversations. Anyway, Mr. Arnold employed several young men whose job was to get people who were either creating a disturbance on the floor or skating too fast off the floor. They were recognizable by the whistles they wore around their necks. If they blew the whistle and pointed at you, you were to leave the floor immediately. One of those boys was a teenager named Malcolm who we all had a crush on. He worked after school at the gas station a few blocks from my house (where I later would buy cigarettes). I guess he was about 16 or 17. No older because he was still in high school. He had brown hair, which he wore much too long and had the beginnings of a scraggly beard. He was stocky and self-conscious about how tall he was (well over six feet and still growing). Robyn was his nemesis. Week after week, she would do bratty things just to get him to blow his whistle on her. Since her father owned the establishment, there wasn't much he could do if she decided to ignore him. One Saturday, it all came to a head. I remember it like it was yesterday. I had gone to the snack bar to get an ice cream bar when I heard a commotion. Malcolm (or Mal as we called him) was blowing his whistle furiously. There was Robyn and a boy laying out on the floor and people trying to skate around them. They had apparently run into each other and Mal had decided she was at fault. But she wouldn't leave the floor. She skated off while Mal tended to the boy she had run into. Once he made sure the kid was OK, he went after Robyn. He was a first class skater and caught her easily. He took her by the arm and led her, protesting all the way that it was an accident, to where there were some rows of benches where people sat to change into their skates or to take a breather. He led her to a bench and picked her up, skates and all. He put her over his knee and spanked her until she was hoarse from screaming. No one stopped him. Needless to say, my crush on Mal blew into full-blown puppy love after that. For the next week until we went skating again, it was all we talked about. I can still picture her skates (with the pink and white tassels on the ties) going over her head as he picked her up and dropped her over his knees. I said "uh oh" and Carol nodded. He spanked her like no one else ever had or probably ever did again. Before that night, she'd had the run of the place. A few weeks later, I lost a ball bearing out of one of my skates and hit the floor hard, skinning my knee. Mal came over and helped me tenderly off the floor as I bawled. He sat with me while the girl from the snack bar put tincture of Merthiolate and a bandage on the skinned knee. Anyone who has ever had the misfortune to have to endure having that evil red medicine applied to an open wound knows how bad it stings. I cried and cried and Mal sat next to me, patting my shoulder. He helped me out of my skates and took the skate that had thrown the ball bearing to be fixed. When he suggested that I not skate the rest of the night, I protested, but remembered the position Robyn had been in a few weeks earlier. She now acted as if she didn't know him and ignored him whenever possible.

This just serves as another example of how spanking was everywhere in those days, even at the skating rink. My older brother had a friend, Brandon, who was a couple of years older than he was, who was always bringing over comic books. These comic books almost always had spanking in them. I was so fascinated that I always opened them up and looked at the spanking images. He also liked to leave a pile of plastic dog poop lying around where it was likely to be seen. One day my grandmother was over and he put it on top of our Quazar TV, where she noticed it while she and my mother were watching "Lawrence Welk". I'm sure Brandon was a spanko. When he was in eighth grade, he was dating a girl named Lori, the prettiest girl in the class. On her birthday, he grabbed her on the playground and administered a birthday spanking to her while all the kids stood in a circle around them. He turned her over his knee and counted out 14 spanks then kissed her. When I was about 12, Brandon spanked me on my birthday. However, he wasn't fast enough to get Carol. She ran and locked herself in our room. He approached me and told me had something for me. I thought he meant a present. I was dressed up in a dress because it was a combination Christmas/birthday party. There was eggnog and champagne and all kinds of food. How Brandon got invited when he wasn't even my friend is beyond me. Anyway, I had on a long dress (in which I felt very grown up) and I remember when he grabbed me to spank me, he told me the dress was coming up. I was laughing, not so much because I enjoyed being spanked, but because I thought he wouldn't do it. But he was enough of a prankster that I should have known there was nothing he wouldn't do if he said he was going to. All of the adults were in the kitchen and they were laughing loudly enough that my cries weren't going to be heard. He pulled me to the couch and planted me over his knee. Even though I was young and certainly naive, I had the feeling this was something he had wanted to do for a long time. He reached for the hem of my maxi dress (the one I felt so grown up in) and pulled it up, exposing my panties. This was what I objected to more than the spanking, the indignity of having my panties exposed. He spanked me twelve times (really hard) and then gave me a hard pinch and then stood me up. I slapped his face and told him I would tell my father what he did. He threatened to spank me again and not gently as he had just done. I knew he meant it. Like I said, that guy HAS to be a spanko. I would love to meet up with him now.

Anyway, I'm sure the Blog Police will have something to say to me for this entry. Or maybe they have suddenly gotten a life and have better things to do.

Taken To Task

Yesterday's entry, in which I described a number of paddlings I received in school, has caused a bit of a stir. When I got up this morning, I had no less than five private messages on Fetlife taking me to task for posting "inappropriate" material on the Internet. These verbal spankers accused me of encouraging pedophiles and demanded that I stick to consensual spanking topics. They said, in fact, that my last several entries were inappropriate, including the musical one from last week, in which I related a spanking I witnessed while my friend and I were watching her brother's garage band rehearse. To them I say this: In my opinion, there's nothing inappropriate in what I posted. Spanking has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. I posted no photos of underage children nor did I bring anything sexual into the mix. I even put a disclaimer at the very top warning that anyone who might be upset or disturbed by the subject matter could skip to something else. The fact that they read on despite fair warning tells me a lot about them. These aren't people I consider friends at all. They were just people who feel that, because this blog is linked on my Fetlife profile, I might bring the whole thing down with one post. Well, this is MY blog. I will post anything I want on it. Another writer brought up the totally inappropriate aspect of humiliation when I chose to discuss the caning scene in "If..." at length. Since these folks have nothing better to do than act as the Blog Police, I'm going to totally put them in a frenzy.







The caning scene in the film, brutal as it is, is just one in a long line of humiliations McDowell suffers in "If..." Earlier in the film, McDowell and his cohorts, Knightley and Wallace, are seen being forced to take cold showers, presumably to curb their "impure thoughts".
I'm posting this picture to tweak the noses of my would-be detractors and also because, let's face it, Malcolm McDowell had a very nice bottom. One writer pointed out to me that "If..." had an X rating when it first came out, a fact I was well aware of. But it wouldn't be X-rated now, not even in England.
Another writer was in a snit because I posted that I thought my art teacher was a pervert. He asked me what right I had to call someone else a pervert when I post pictures of my naked bottom on Fetlife. OK, that's a fair enough question. But it was one I didn't want to get into. I was naive about such things in those days, but I did feel he wanted to make an abject example out of me simply because doing so would give him a thrill. In that, I may have been inappropriate. But I stand by the rest of it. What I post on my blog--whether it be words or images, is my business. Anyone who doesn't like what I post is free to pass me over and read something else. If you are offended because I occasionally discuss M/M scenes, then don't read my blog. Because I'm a female bottom, 97% of what I post will be about females being spanked. Occasionally, though, I do like to discuss males being spanked. No one bats an eye when the Internet is crawling with F/F material, which really doesn't do anything for me (even though I do play with women). Had I any idea what kind of backlash I would get from these posts, I might not have posted them. I realize that discussing childhood spanking and seeing images of M/M spanking aren't every one's cup of tea. Normally, they aren't mine either. But my posts are meant to be for nostalgic purposes only. Never once did I say I think we need a return to those days (a personal opinion I will keep to myself for now) nor do I use my blog as a soapbox to make the Internet world aware of my views. That's not the purpose of my blog. As the header of this blog states, I'm not a fiction writer. I write about my true life experiences and thoughts. Sometimes, I wonder if all the corporal punishment I received and witnessed as a child had anything to do with the fact that I've had a fascination with it all my life. These are just musings, meant to entertain the reader while I try to sort out why I'm the way I am. If pedophiles are reading this blog then they are barking up the wrong tree. I'm sorry a few people got their panties in a bunch over my writing. I guess being lambasted is better than being ignored.

Let me just close by saying that I have a very high moral standard. I would never write something or post a photo I thought was inappropriate. I think I have pretty good judgment and try to exercise it whenever a time comes when I need to. In the meantime, feel free to work yourselves into a lather. It's obvious you have nothing better to do.

The Bad Old Days (School Paddling)

Author's Note: Today's entry discusses the paddling of children in a school setting. If this kind of thing upsets you, please find another entry to read. This is not a discussion on whether spanking children is right or wrong. It's simply my own personal recollections of going to school back in the bad old days.

I attended school from 1965 to 1979. It was a simpler time. Children were influenced by television and movies, not the Internet. Mothers still stayed home with their kids (although mine sold Avon to supplement my dad's income). Milk still came in glass bottles and was still delivered by the milkman. And schoolteachers used the paddle to instill order and discipline in their classrooms. There was one teacher and usually about 30 to 35 students per class. The teacher HAD to be in charge or the kids were going to be. And that was a recipe for disaster. The paddle was a reality in every school kid's life back then. No one was exempt. If I had to guess, I would say I was paddled at least a dozen times in grade school and twice in high school. The paddle was the outward symbol of the teacher's authority; like the cane in England or the belt in Scotland. We knew the teachers to avoid because they paddled hard and without apology. We knew the ones who were wimps, who would scold and lecture and then give you three or four "love taps". And we knew the ones who were sick; who got a demented pleasure from paddling a kid and seeing him (or her) cry. These were the sadistic ones whose paddles had holes drilled in them or had friction tape on them. These were the ones you wanted no part of. They got off on fear. I saw and received my share of all kinds of paddlings over the years. Usually, the kid would be ushered into the hallway for punishment. But sometimes, his (or her) sin was so egregious that only a paddling in front of the whole class would answer. I also participated in several instances where the teacher made the decision to paddle the entire class. The first time this happened was when I was in sixth grade. I had the social studies teacher, Mr. Donelly, for home room. He was a 6'6" strapping Irishman who took no nonsense from any kid. I once saw him haul the biggest boy in class out of his desk by his shirt collar like he was lifting a puppy. Anyway, on this particular day,Mr. Donelly was in a foul mood. One of the boys got it into his head to get back at a girl who had rebuffed his invitation to attend the upcoming Coke Party (what we later called Mixers in high school) with him. He got two of his friends to go in on the plot with him. Needless to say, the resulting chaos did nothing to improve our teacher's mood. He took out his paddle and announced that we were all going to get paddled. Only three boys had actually instigated the riot that later ensued in class but we all laughed, adding to the disorder. So we were all going to get it. All of us who had laughed (myself included) were bent over our desks and given two stinging swats, just enough to remind us not to laugh at another person's expense. The girl who was the target of the prank was allowed to witness everyone's punishment without getting anything herself, she being the inured party, after all. But Mr. Donelly, like many teachers before and after him, saved his special venom for the three boys who had been the ringleaders of the whole affair. He marched them to the front of the room, put each boy over his knee in turn and spanked them with his hard right hand until he received a promise of better behavior in the future. Then he made the red-faced (and red-bottomed) boys face the girl and apologize to her. "Now you know how it feels to be humiliated," Mr. Donelly said, short of breath from his exersion's. You can believe that room 6A never had an incident like that one again. At least not that year. The following year, Mr. Addy our Math teacher gave me what probably stands out in my mind as the most vicious paddling I ever received in school. Mr. Addy was a sandy-haired tall and wiry guy who wore what we called John Denver glasses. His favorite show was "Kung Fu" and he took to calling us "Grasshopper" when answering our questions. He was also the coach of the basketball team. I admit he was good at it. He was also a pretty good teacher, but was prone to impatience. He opened each class with the admonition "Close your mouths and open your ears!" The incident I'm about to relate occurred in early October, 1973. I was 12 years old at that time and getting pretty tall. I was still skinny, flat-chested and knock kneed. And I was not good in Math. Everything else I seemed to conquer with no problem but Math (New Math as it was called then) had me stymied. I tried to unravel the mysteries of fractions but to no avail. One day, he handed out a test to us announcing that anyone who didn't pass it would be required to stay after school. Well, I had already stayed after school for him before and all that it entailed was sitting in the gym watching him coach the basketball team. No extra studying going on. I did my best on the test, but missed passing by only two points. Those of us who failed were told in stern tones to report to his class after school. A hand shot up. It was my friend, Julie (the one who had asked all the questions about my friend, Trudy's spanking in one of my previous posts). "What if we don't?" she asked. Mr. Addy, who was light complected, turned red as a blood clot. This was a challenge and he took it as one. "You don't want to find out," he replied. Well, I lived two miles away and the car was at work with my dad so I knew I wasn't going to be walking home. Julie and I both took the bus home that night. We talked on the phone after supper and I asked her what she thought would happen to us. She sighed. "We'll get swats," she said. "Big deal." The next morning, I wore jeans to school. Well, hiphuggers actually (what are referred to as lowriders these days). Julie wore a skirt. That afternoon, when we reported to Math class, we discovered that everyone else had reported to Mr. Addy's detention. We had been the only two who hadn't. He took his paddle from his desk and beckoned us out into the hallway. Tugging at my courage, I went. Julie looked completely unconcerned. She had been paddled by nearly every teacher in the school and none had even been able to draw anything more from her than a deep breath. I admired her courage. When we got to the hallway, I could see that the double doors that led onto the playground were open and he closed them. With a sigh, he turned and faced us. He voiced his disappointment that we had willfully chosen to disregarded his order to stay after school. He asked each of us for an explanation. I replied that I hadn't wanted to walk the two miles home. Julie said she just didn't feel like going. "I'm going to paddle both of you," he said, "as long and as hard as the rules will let me. Open insubordination and rebellion can't and won't be tolerated in my class. I think it's best to nip this in the bud before it goes any further." There was a metal folding chair sitting near the double doors where the hall monitors (eighth graders with the power of life and death over the rest of us) sat between bells. Mr. Addy pulled it next to him and said "You first, Cheryl." I was incredulous. Why did I have to go first? He explained that Julie being there was no surprise. He had expected that. But seeing me there was a disappointment. Because of that, I was going first. He sat down on the folding chair and beckoned me. "Come and lay over my knee" he said. "That's for babies," I argued. "We'll discuss that another time," he said. "Come here and lay over my knee." He had already said he was going to go as hard and as long as the rules would let him. What did I have to lose by resisting? I planted my feet. "No," I said. Let me just say that, after having nearly 40 years to reflect back on my decision, it's one of the few that I truly regret. In those days, teachers had in loco parentis rights. This means that the teacher took the place of the parent while the child was in school. If my father had told me to get over his knee and I had refused, he would have been within his parental rights to put me there himself. And Mr. Addy was also within his rights as my teacher to do the same. "Don't be foolish," he said. "I'm giving you a chance to get through this with your dignity intact." Julie said "Just get it over with." So with as much dignity as I could muster, I went and laid across his knees. They were bony and hurt. I think Julie realized what a poor wardrobe choice she'd made that day. Mr. Addy gave me the absolute limit that day--six swats, all of them hard. But then, as now, I was stoic and took them without too much reaction. Maybe that made him madder? I don't know but when he was done he told me to stand up. My bottom was burning from the little hickory paddle he swung. He motioned Julie forward and she went, acting as unconcerned as possible. He made sure to hold the hem of her skirt down to keep it from riding up. I secretly wished he would hit his hand one time, but it never happened. Julie also got six very hard swats. I'm sure the kids in the classroom were awestruck by the sounds of the swats, which must have sounded like rifle shots. Then we were told to go in and sit down. I didn't want to give him the satisfaction of seeing how hard it was to sit in that wooden desk, but the first time my bottom touched the chair, I winced. No one laughed. They didn't dare. But I learned a valuable lesson that day; one I've never forgotten. The person with the paddle has the power. I never told my parents about the paddling I received. They both would have been furious at me for ditching detention. Thankfully, I didn't get paddled again by Mr. Addy. However, the History teacher, Mr. Gliech, did decide to paddle the whole class one day. It was a very serious matter. Someone had stolen something from his desk and no one would 'fess up. He said "If I paddle everyone I'll be sure to get the person who did it." We each got three swats and there were 33 of us in the class. I could tell he regretted paddling me. I was a good kid and a good student. He knew for sure I hadn't been the one. But having said he would paddle everyone, he had to go through with it.

When I got into high school in 1975, I thought I had left the threat of a paddling behind me. It seemed pretty absurd to paddle a high school kid, after all. The kid in the photo is Leonardo Di Caprio suffering the indignity of Catholic school discipline in the 1995 film "The Basketball Diaries". Since I'm not really

a fan of his, seeing him in this position doesn't make me feel sorry for him. The paddling, however, is one of the most unmerciful paddlings I've witnessed onscreen. The priest just rears back and fires away at the upturned bottom of Mr. Di Caprio. When the bell rings, he says with a grin that it was a shame because he was just beginning to enjoy himself. The priest replies "We can do it again tomorrow if you like, Mr. Carroll". Catholic schools weren't the only place where discipline was tough. The high school I went to had a reputation at the time for its excellent academic record. It also boasted a pretty good basketball and football team. My freshman year, because I knew (or thought) I couldn't be paddled, I started to rebel in ways I hadn't before. I amassed a large collection of "pink admits" (unexcused absences) mostly for gypping class. I would go to lunch with my friends and then we just wouldn't go back. One day, in first hour, a page from the Dean of Women's office came in with a call slip (a summons to go to the office). She handed it first to my teacher, Mr. Genge, who then removed his glasses and said "Miss G, it seems you're wanted by the dean." He handed the call slip to me and I saw that the box "immediately" was marked, meaning I had to go right now. I took my purse and my books because presumably I was going to miss the remainder of Mr. Genge's highly entertaining Ancient History class. When I got to the office of Miss Cooper, the dean, I saw that my guidance counselor, Mr. England, was there, too. This puzzled me. "Shut the door, Miss G," Miss Cooper said. "Do you know why I called you in today?" she asked. I shrugged. "Probably because of the pink admits," I replied. "That's right," she replied. "Do you have any idea how many you have?" "A lot?" I guessed. She consulted the folder in front of her. "According to the records, you have 13. An unlucky number for you, it turns out." Then Mr. England did the talking. "Cheryl, you were a good student in middle school. This change is perplexing. I think you might be hanging out with the wrong kids. But we feel you're not a bad kid. You're just easily led. So Miss Cooper and I decided to put our heads together to see if we could come up with something that will block the dam before it bursts. Now I know a certain amount of rebellion is to be expected at this stage in a young person's life. But you aren't a bad kid, as I said. But I feel you're being influenced by bad kids. So I've decided to give you a paddling today to get you, hopefully, back on the right track." My jaw dropped. "I didn't think you paddled kids here," I said. "Ordinarily, we don't," Miss Cooper replied. "We only paddle kids when we think it will be effective." "I'm too old," I said. "Probably," Miss Cooper said. "Mr. England, will you do the honors, please?" "You mean I don't have any say?" I asked. "You don't have to call my parents or anything?" Mr. England shook his head. "Miss Cooper will stay in the room and act as a witness," he said. "I want you to turn around and bend over." Having no choice, I did. I heard the desk drawer open and heard the paddle being extracted. Mr. England, who I always pegged as a nerd and a joke gave me four swats that day while the lesbian Miss Cooper watched. She probably enjoyed looking at my ass while I was bent over. When he was done, he sternly told me to stand up. "I hope you learned something here today," he said. "I better never have to do this again. I hate doing it." The bell rang and I grabbed my books and hustled off to my next class. As awful as that paddling was, my second one, received a year later, was head and shoulders above it in terms of humiliation. As a sophomore, I was buckling down better and getting good grades, but my mouth and my attitude towards authority were sources of chagrin for my teachers. I especially enjoyed engaging in verbal duels with Mr. Hagen, my art teacher. I would guess in 1976 (the year I had him) he was probably in his mid-thirties. His room was located in a part of the building called the annex, a long corridor that linked the old original building with an addition that had been added in the 60's. My locker was all the way up on the third floor of the old building and I was more than halfway to class when I realized that it was Friday Sketch day and I had forgotten to grab my pencils. So it meant going all the way back to my locker to get them. I didn't want to risk showing up to class on time but unprepared. Better to be late and have my supplies with me. By the time I fought the stream of humanity all going the opposite direction from me, I was more than ten minutes late. When I got to class, the door was open and Mr. Hagen had his back to it. A golden opportunity to slide into my desk unnoticed. "Too late, Cheryl," he said without turning around, "I already marked you absent." "I'm here," I said. "You're late," he said turning to face me. "And what's more, you waited until my back was turned to sneak in." "I did not!" I said vehemently. "Your back just happened to be turned." We argued back and forth for a few minutes, my classmates enjoying it immensely, until Mr. Hagen tired of the game. He told me that I could do one of two things as a punishment for being late. I could either clean out his sink or take a paddling in front of the class. Now you might think this would be an easy choice, clean the sink, right? But you haven't seen the sink in Frank Hagen's room. It was an absolute nightmare. We made bets on whether something was living in the drain. It was full of clay and oil stained rags and brushes. And it was smeared with paint. I think there were maggots in there, too. No way was I going anywhere near that sink. He stood there with his arms folded and his mustache twitching. "Make up your mind," he said. "I'll take the paddling," I said in a barely audible whisper. Now I always thought Mr. Hagen was a pervert. But I thought I saw a hint of a smile cross his mustachioed lips when he heard that I would take a paddling. I'm almost certain that's what he was hoping I would say. Now I was not the prettiest girl in that class, but I was far from the ugliest. Of course, I was young, firm and nubile. I was beginning to realize my athletic skills, too. He went to his office (which was next door to the kiln on the other side of the hallway) and returned with a mean looking paddle. I took it to be a fraternity paddle because there were Greek letters on it. There was a table in room where he kept paint jars and extra canvases. He pointed to it. "Bend over," he said. I could feel the eyes of every kid in that class on my back as I bent over the table. This still reigns in my memory as one of the most humiliating moments of my life. He told me if he had his way, he would give me ten swats (presumably one for every minute I was late) but admitted he would lose his job if he did. So he told me he would give me five, but they would be hard. Yeah, right. Let me be the judge of that. It was my first taste of a frat paddle over tight jeans. I love the feeling now. But back then, it was horrible. I heard some students snicker as the paddle connected the first time and I let out a little yelp. His delivery was slow and deliberate, as if he was drawing it out as long as possible. When it was over, he told me to stand up. As I did, every bone in my body ached and it took a lot of effort to keep from crying. "Take your seat," he said. That was my last school paddling. Here's the kinky part. I had a date that night (it was Friday, after all) and I told the boy I went out with that I had been paddled that afternoon. The boy asked if I had any bruises. A couple, I admitted. He asked to see and I took my jeans down and showed him. He was impressed with what I had taken. That guy is a top now. I have chatted with him a few times but he isn't interested in playing with me.

So that's my story. The story of what it was like to go to school back when teachers ruled their students instead of the other way around. I recall those days with a mixture of fondness and loathing. I recall the teachers who spanked me and the ones who should have. I remember the public punishments of many of the kids I had in various classes. I remember just the threat of a paddling kept a lot of kids in line. The paddle was an ever-present part of school life back then. Some teachers kept theirs in a drawer, while others hung theirs on the wall as a warning. I remember big, strong boys reduced to whimpering crybabies over the knee of my big Irish sixth grade teacher. I remember weighing the pros and cons of breaking a school rule and wondering if the paddling I would receive would be worth the temporary feeling of victory. These are things modern students need not concern themselves over. This is a world long gone and it exists now only in memories and movies.

On The Cane And Being Caned

I will freely admit to anyone who asks me that the cane is my all-time favorite spanking implement. I never refer to the cane as a "toy"; to me, it's the genuine article. The photo above shows three of the eight or ten that I own. The one with the crooked handle is a special favorite. The person wielding a cane knows that they hold a tremendously powerful weapon in their hand. They have a psychological advantage before the first stroke lands. The person bent over for it either looks forward to it with eager anticipation or with such dread that the mouth goes dry and the knees shake. Having been born in America and educated here, my experience with the cane was limited to movies mostly. I say "mostly" because I did have a run-in with a cane as a 14-year-old eighth grader. My homeroom teacher taught Science. He was sadistic sort who, once he found a student's weakness, delighted in exploiting it. My friend, Cindy, blushed easily and he never missed an opportunity to torture her publicly. One day, when I was late for school (having overslept) he removed the doorknob from the door and forced me to stand outside knocking until he came to answer it. I knocked for ten minutes, all the while I could hear him inside giving the lesson to his first class. He was ignoring me. So I began to kick the door solidly and shouting "Let me in!" He came to the door angrily, his face as red as a beet. I went to my desk, where another kid was sitting and got my books for History class. "Just a minute!" he thundered as I headed for the door again. "You're late. What's your excuse?" I told him the truth, that I had overslept. He told me to get going.

Anyway, my run in with the cane came just after we returned from Christmas break. Mr. J. had taken a trip to Australia and the cane was a souvenir of his visit. It was summer in Australia and he rubbed it in that he had enjoyed 15 days of sunshine and warm weather while we had endured a frigid cold December. We were working on balancing equations and Mr. J. had given us an assignment to do some problems, which he now wrote on the blackboard. He was punctilious and a perfectionist--every 14 year olds' nightmare. He took the cane out of the cabinet where he hung his coat and held it out at its full length for us to see. I looked at Cindy and gulped hard. He laid the cane down on his desk next to the dreaded Magic Wand, the well-used wooden yardstick that he used to clear the halls of stragglers. Our classroom was in the gymnasium, which had two levels; the first was the ground floor and then the second floor, which we called the balcony because it resembled one. Anyone incautious enough to be caught bending over the railing of the balcony when Mr. J. was prowling the hall was likely to feel the Magic Wand across their bottom. A bent over bottom was a target too tempting for him to pass on. Kids who stood around outside his classroom between bells were also likely to feel the Magic Wand and hear the words "If you're not in my class, please make a forward motion." Seeing that cane and the Magic Wand side-by-side gave me the willies in a major way. I was a good kid and a good student. I feared physical discipline. He told us the cane was going to get used on anyone who he called up to work a problem on the blackboard who got it wrong because he would assume that they hadn't completed the assigned homework. A couple of my classmates went back to their desks from the blackboard with stinging legs. I was secretly happy that I had decided to wear tights under my dress that day in order to keep my legs warm. Now they would be my only protection against what I saw as an inevitable occurrence. He called me up, holding the chalk out with a smug grin on his face. I immediately recognized that it was something we hadn't covered yet. "Mr. J., we haven't even studied this yet", I protested. "Give it your best shot," he replied as I took the chalk. I did my best, but I got it wrong. He shook his head to tell me I hadn't got it right and made a turning motion with the cane. "Mr. J. this isn't fair," I said. "Bend over," he said, using the cane to point to his desk. What could I do? I bent over and there immediately followed three stinging slaps with the cane to the backs of my thighs. I returned to my desk with my legs smarting and plotting my revenge for this injustice.

As I said, aside from that one incident, my only other experience with the cane came from British films. I saw movies like "Great Expectations" (which featured a cane called Tickler), "David Copperfield" and especially "If..." I saw the latter film when I was in my 20's. For those who haven't seen the film, it's highly regarded as one of the finest films about life in a British boarding school ever made. It was released in 1968 and catapulted its star, Malcom McDowell, to stardom. McDowell played Mick Travis, a young man who returns to school with a mustache. The hierarchy of the school places the "Whips" at the top and the "Scums" at the bottom. The Whips are cane-wielding senior students and the Scums are the juniors who must either obey them or risk the cane. Mick, meanwhile, is determined to be his own man. He and his two cohorts become the scourge of the house. The head of the house is a senior student named Rowntree. He sees the three as a definite threat to the stability of the house. After one of their capers, he decides enough is enough and has them summoned. The three go rather nonchalantly to the office where three or four Whips, Rowntree heading them up, are gathered. He tells them they must surely know why they were summoned and the three profess ignorance. Rowntree explains that it's because the three off them have become a nuisance. It's not any one thing they've done, it's their general attitude. He tells them they're going to be beaten. The other two are smart enough to realize the hot water they're in and dutifully shake their heads when asked if they have anything to say for themselves. But Travis is different. If he's going to be beaten, then he's going to get his money's worth. He tells Rowntree all the reasons he hates him. Without responding to Travis' nasty comments, he tells them to go to the gymnasium, followed by a terse admonishment to wait outside. The trio marches off, still not overly concerned with what awaits them. Rowntree and the other Whips arrive shortly after and summon the first lad, who's name is Wallace. Travis and the other boy listen as the caning gets underway and, hearinf that he only got four strokes, breathe somewhat a sigh of relief. Wallace comes back in and the next boy is called. Now realizing that they are saving him for last, Travis relishes what he thinks will be a battle of wills between the two of them. Wallace drops his trousers so Travis can see his marks. Then the other boy comes in, having taken his four strokes. He rubs his bottom with a grin on his face. Travis almost doesn't wait to be called and in fact, is opening the door and going in as they call him. There is a large bar in the room. He's directed to remove his coat and lay it over the bar. Then he's told to bend over. He does so, spreading out his arms and appearing to make himself quite comfortable. Rowntree takes a run-up and brings the cane forward with all his might, savoring the satisfying swish as it flies through the air and then the sinister crack as it connects with the seat of McDowell's trousers.

I sincerely hope that he wore some sort of padding for this scene because, twenty-five or not, this had to be painful. Biographies of McDowell tell of how he was either caned or slippered every Monday at his school because he was so wayward and his familiarity with "assuming the position" shows. After taking four incredibly hard strokes with hardly a whimper, he stands up and picks up his jacket. But no, he's told they aren't done with him yet. He now knows he's going to be made a severe example of. The Chinese have a saying: "The nail that sticks out must be hammered down." Not only will he get more strokes than his cohorts, but the entire house is congregated so they can hear the punishment he receives. He puts his coat back over the bar, then nestles himself back in position for the rest of it. In all, he receives ten strokes. When the tenth stroke is delivered, he tells Travis to get up. He stands and we see him from behind, gathering his dignity and standing erect. But when he turns back around, his boyish blue eyes are wet and his face is tear streaked. A look of defiance is still there. He can hardly be blamed for the homicidal fantasies he nurses throughout the remainder of the film. Like Leonardo Di Caprio would do in "The Basketball Diaries", Mick dreams of shooting up the school. Di Caprio's character, Jim Carroll, tells the priest who paddles him (making him assume a humiliating position on all fours) that "in the next life, I'm gonna have the paddle!"

As Travis turns around and faces his tormentor, the look on his face is unmistakable: you may have broken my flesh, but you will never break my spirit".

I remember when I first saw this film how outraged I was by the barbarity of the system; one that gave an elite group of students authority over all the others. It was a system that encouraged abuse of power. There was no Internet in those days but I was able to get my hands on films that weren't being shown on TV because I had worked at the local library once and I was still friends with the guy in the AV department. I'd heard that McDowell took a vicious caning in that scene and I had to see if it was. As someone who has been under the cane (granted, only for play, my run in with Mr. J. aside) I know the damage it can do in the wrong hands. I have been caned before where blood was drawn (though not purposely) and also had them break on me. I've been given upwards of 80 strokes and had to call it a night because of the damage. Those of us who love the cane love it for just that reason. The cane isn't for the squeamish. I still remember the fear and trepidation I felt the first time I was caned. I wanted to experience it. I got six strokes, only two of them were hard. But they were hard enough to put a lump in my throat the size of an onion and make me squeeze back tears.

Do I love the cane? You bet I do. It has a long and elegant history and a well-deserved reputation. The cane has been THE symbol of parochial discipline for 200 years. Ask almost any British rock star or professional athlete over 40 and they probably have a cane story.

So the cane will always have a place in my toybag. And Malcolm McDowell is always have my awe and respect for the thrashing he took (padded though he probably was).