Mass caning for refusing scrambled eggs
Here’s a sneak insight into life in South
Africa during the 1959, where no kind of dissent was tolerated.
Seventy-six senior boys were caned at a
boarding school because they said their breakfast choice was ‘too monotonous.’
As
published in the Press, Canterbury, New Zealand, 20 July 1959
Picture credit: Generated by
Artificial Intelligence (A.I.)
Traditional
School Discipline
Traditionalschooldiscipline@gmail.com
This is a fascinating story. I read something similar about infamous British caning headmaster Anthony Chenevix-Trench, when he was a prefect at a British public school. That he organised severe canings for a bunch of 13-year-olds. For refusing to eat shepherd's pie. But, I think the big punishments were because of the refusal being disrespectful to the kitchen staff. Not just for refusing.
ReplyDeleteAnd I think this South Africa incident is similar. The boys weren't punished for refusing to eat scrambled eggs. They were punished for what was basically a school rebellion. (Walking out of school and refusing to attend lessons.)
Durban High School still exists and is still very successful. It also still has a boarding house. Its Wikipedia page has a huge list of great sportsmen who first played there. Although it's not a private school, it seems very similar to how John van der Ruit talks about his schooldays in the "Spud" books (and movies).
Joseph Mercurio's investigation of school caning was at a very similar school (a traditional British-style school with a small boarding house, not a private school) in New Zealand in the late 20th century.
One of the videos on the corpun.com website is a 21st century "house caning day" at an originally British private school in southern Africa. It's nice that the student population now seems to be extremely diverse (people of European background and people of African background), and everyone gets caned the same. (For anyone interested in that aspect, the Spud books and movies are super interesting too.)