Baby dies at hands of psychopaths

[Seamus Colemole]

just the once. told teacher to [Poor language removed] off (discovered it hurt and made a tit of myself), lesson learned

It didn't stop you in the first place though did it. Even though there was the punishment in place and you knew that if you told a teacher to [Poor language removed] off you were gonna get caned you still did.

Obviously in your case you acted wrong once, got punished and then the threat of repeat punishment stopped you re-offending. But the issue of caning came up at work and a guy i work with was in favour of caning. Yet he was caned numerous times when he was at school so did it work as a deterrent on him?

Point being that while yes in some cases the threat of punishment is enough to deter people from doing wrong in the first place, i'd say that most of the time people either are not thinking about any punishment when they commit an act (like Didier Drogba on Wednesday), or they just try harder not to get caught.

Thats not to say there should not be any punishment, of course there should be, there has to be.

But would detentions, lines or any alternative punishment you can think of really not work just as well as caning? Make it tough. Make it 3 months of detention for telling your teacher to [Poor language removed] off? Would that really not be as effective as caning at least?

BBC NEWS | Education | Suspension head sees GCSEs rise

No caning there but a zero tolerance approach to bad behavior, maybe that works.

Taking away caning does not have to mean a softly softly approach.

 

[Bluelass]

There is a hard core element in society for whom no punishment will deter them or change their behaviour. There are others however, that will think twice before misbehaving or commiting some sort of offence if there is something in place that will either punish them physically and/or humiliate them in front of their peers. This latter group are those borderline individuals that will respond to harsher punishments because they don't really want to be hurt or humiliated.

It's hard to generalise by assuming that corporal punishment works with everyone (it did with me, I got six whacks as a 9 year old) but children do need to know where the line is and be made aware of the consequences if they cross that line.
The same applies to adults who commit acts of violence or criminal activity - the punishment should be commensurate to the crime.
Sadly, that is rarely the case.

Excellent point re the guy who killed the two children, likewise the driver who killed the family of six a few weeks ago.
We seem to have an 'ah well, it was just an accident' view of carnage on the roads but certainly in the case of the footballer, he was drunk, tired and in a hurry. A cocktail of circumstances that were all avoidable, so in essence, he set out on his journey with the equivalent of a loaded gun in his hand and played russian roulette with the lives of everyone in his path.
So, exactly what is the difference between wandering the streets, rat arsed, in a strop, carrying a pistol and driving 2 tons of heavy metal at 80mph?
Premediated, reckless and dangerous and the consequences are that two adorable children have lost their lives.
Tragic.
I can't begin to imagine the sense of loss that the parents of those two children must be feeling and the pain knowing that it could have been avoided.