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SeniorEnglish
Joined: 18 Jun 2006
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 Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 3:06 am Post subject: |
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| I remember when I was a college student. I heard of many kinds of group punishment. Such as, excessive water drinking, eating things that would make a billy goat puke, and being forced to stay awake for days on end by blaring show tunes. On occasion, the random person died during these punishments. |
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TheUrbanMyth
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Location: Retired
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 3:18 am Post subject: Re: Korean sadism against children-"it's just our way&a |
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| Novernae wrote: |
| Qinella wrote: |
| Deep knee bends? What does that mean? |
Deep knee bends are squats where you bend your knees all the way and stand back up. They are horrible for the knees and have terrible long-term consequences. I'm all for punishment, even group punishment and the odd mild physical punishment (yes I will spank my kids), but no punishment should have long term physical (or negative emotional) effects. |
No they aren't. I have done squats for many years ATF and worked my way up to over 400 lbs on the squat bar. And my knees are just fine. Partial knee bends are worse, because the braking action places the force on the kneecap and surrounding tendons. Deep knee bends (once you go past parallel position where the thighs are parallel to the floor) shift that stress on the muscles of the quadriceps and hamstrings. And not just me. Powerlifters, Olympic lifters and bodybuilders all do movements that involve deep knee bends in their training and relatively few develop knee problems. In China, it's commom for farmers to squat to have a chat and smoke, when taking a break and the incident of knee injury is no higher there. Granted you may have to develop flexibility first, but that is quite easy to do.
Your idea about deep knee bends is a common misconception but it is wrong. That said I do agree about what you said about punishment. |
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captain planet
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 3:37 am Post subject: |
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| you know, i've heard both sides of the issue. people with knee problems saying they went away when they stopped trying to go too deep with the knee bends, and people who say the same as you. |
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alabamaman
Joined: 25 Apr 2006
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 3:44 am Post subject: Re: Korean sadism against children-"it's just our way&a |
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| R. S. Refugee wrote: |
So, I'm finishing my last week of a summer camp. I live in a room on the same floor with the middle school children.
Just a couple of minutes ago (10:30PM), the Korean TAs (all college students) have just finished leading the middle school children in 20 minutes or so of non-voluntary chanting and deep knee bends. The girls are joined together by putting their arms around each other's shoulders have been compelled to do deep knee bends for some fairly long period of time.
I get the impression that group punishment and preventive punishment are perhaps cultural norms among Koreans.
As I was standing there outside my door watching this bizarre form of child abuse with a rather jaundiced expression, one of the Korean TAs came over to me and I asked how much longer this was going to go on. She indicated that she knew I didn't like to see such treatment of school girls (or boys for that matter) and so explained to me that "this is just our way, and we can move you to another room if this bothers you."
So, I wonder if these fine folks have ever heard about the Geneva Conventions and prohibitions against group punishment.
Comments? |
I wasn't privy to the child abuse you claimed happened. This is South Korea, and they have their way of dishing out behavior correcting techniques if you call it. You have a couple of choices;
1) Stop the child abuse immediately
2) Move to another room
3) Find another job where child abuse doesn't take place
That's my take on the matter.
Last edited by alabamaman on Tue Aug 15, 2006 3:52 am; edited 7 times in total |
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laogaiguk
Joined: 06 Dec 2005
Location: somewhere in Korea
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 3:45 am Post subject: |
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| captain planet wrote: |
| you know, i've heard both sides of the issue. people with knee problems saying they went away when they stopped trying to go too deep with the knee bends, and people who say the same as you. |
Could they have been doing them wrong?
I don't do them because I don't know about their effects when I can do other things. I am not in a race with anyone to squat the most or even care because I don't want my legs to get too big 
But still, they may have been doing them wrong. |
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Homer
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 4:04 am Post subject: |
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Squats have long term physical effects and leave emotional scars??
How far have we gone in the PC world folks...  |
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Novernae
Joined: 02 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 4:17 am Post subject: |
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| Homer wrote: |
Squats have long term physical effects and leave emotional scars??
How far have we gone in the PC world folks... |
What's good/bad for you changes so often. Last time I went to the physio and was in serious athletic training deep knee bends were not good for you. That's what I meant by long term physical effects, namely messed up knees. I never said they left emotional scars.
| TheUrbanMyth wrote: |
No they aren't. I have done squats for many years ATF and worked my way up to over 400 lbs on the squat bar. And my knees are just fine. Partial knee bends are worse, because the braking action places the force on the kneecap and surrounding tendons. Deep knee bends (once you go past parallel position where the thighs are parallel to the floor) shift that stress on the muscles of the quadriceps and hamstrings. And not just me. Powerlifters, Olympic lifters and bodybuilders all do movements that involve deep knee bends in their training and relatively few develop knee problems. In China, it's commom for farmers to squat to have a chat and smoke, when taking a break and the incident of knee injury is no higher there. |
Yeah, but when they squat, they go down and stay down. It's the action of coming up that's supposed to be the problem.
Anyway, thing in the exercise/health world change so fast that nobody can keep up. Op, it's good for you... oh, sorry, that's the worst thing you could do.... oh, no! if you do that you'll die! wait, we were wrong, we meant if you don't do that you'd die... sorry... oh wait, we were wrong, it's bad for you again.... I give up! |
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R. S. Refugee
Joined: 29 Sep 2004
Location: Shangra La, ROK
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 4:20 am Post subject: |
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| laogaiguk wrote: |
| captain planet wrote: |
| you know, i've heard both sides of the issue. people with knee problems saying they went away when they stopped trying to go too deep with the knee bends, and people who say the same as you. |
Could they have been doing them wrong?
I don't do them because I don't know about their effects when I can do other things. I am not in a race with anyone to squat the most or even care because I don't want my legs to get too big
But still, they may have been doing them wrong. |
OK. I'll try to be a little more accurate in my description. I think they were actually partial knee bends, not actually going all the way down to the squat position that we've all seem many Asians resting in. I admit that I really did not want to study this harsh punishment in great detail.
My speculation (without having expertese on the subject) is that the actual potential injury might also result from the weight of having another body on either side who is also being forced to do this punishment and who most likely is unable to do it in perfect synchronization with you.
Regarding corporal punishment in Korea in general, I'll offer the following anecdotes for what they are worth:
1. I used to say to people that we used to have corporal punishment back in the home country also in the 60s, 70s, and earlier, so maybe they're just a little behind in developing a more enlightened ethic. Others who claimed to know much more about corporal punishment in Korean schools than me (it is easy to know more than me about this subject) have said, no, it's different in Korean schools in that they whack them for just about anything. Didn't do your homework? Whack. Didn't do this? Whack. Didn't do that? Whack.
2. I had a friend in a town down on the south coast of Korea who had a Korean wife and two children. He had been in Korea for around 10 years. They took their children, aged ~ 8 and 9 out of school two months earlier than necessary before their planned return to Canada because their teachers were hitting them and there was nothing the parents could do about it.
3. I have another Canadian friend in Gyeongsangnam-do who has a charming young son who is around 18 months old. He has lived many years in Korea, but plans to leave when his son reaches kindergarden age because of the corporal disciplinary regime that he doesn't want his son to have to endure.
4. I taught at a Winter Camp at a uni in Gyeongsangnam-do last winter. My students were uni students and one week of the camp I had an advanced level class that were all boys except for one girl. They were all engineering students. I told them that I had heard about corporal punishment in Korean schools, but that I didn't have a good sense of it. I asked them all if they would tell me about the last time that they were hit by a teacher. None of them seemed shy about doing so. The first boy (who always seemed a litttle spacy to me) told that the last time for him had been in high school and that a teacher had hit him with a fire extinguisher (only a small one, he said) but that it had resulted in brain damage (I'm not sure if he meant temporary or permanent). He was the worst case.
But others in the class told of being hit 30 to 50 times on the calves and the back of the thighs with long objects, some cylindrical, some tubes that were other shapes with sharp edges. One boy said he finally fainted after being struck 30 times or so like that.
In all the cases that I remember, the last time was in high school and the most common reason given was not scoring high enough on some test or other. The one girl in the class seems to have had the least severe punishment by far -- that being on the hands with a ruler.
So, does all this seem rather unnecessarily brutal only to us liberals?
Last edited by R. S. Refugee on Tue Aug 15, 2006 4:32 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Homer
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 4:23 am Post subject: |
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| That's what I meant by long term physical effects, namely messed up knees. I never said they left emotional scars. |
Allrighty then.
No worries.  |
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R. S. Refugee
Joined: 29 Sep 2004
Location: Shangra La, ROK
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 4:29 am Post subject: |
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| Homer wrote: |
| Quote: |
| That's what I meant by long term physical effects, namely messed up knees. I never said they left emotional scars. |
Allrighty then.
No worries. |
I'm inclined to believe that being unjustly punished for a "crime" you never committed can indeed leave serious emotional scars.
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Novernae
Joined: 02 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 4:47 am Post subject: |
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| R. S. Refugee wrote: |
I'm inclined to believe that being unjustly punished for a "crime" you never committed can indeed leave serious emotional scars.
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I agree with you to a point. It depends on how severe and harmful the punishment is, and also what the 'crime' is. However, there is something to be said for building group dynamics (good or bad) and being exposed to certain emotions we seem to shelter our kids from in the west. While pain should be avoided, so should lack of discipline and respect. Which is the greater evil? Allowing a child to walk all over their educators so they in turn learn nothing and grow up to be wimpy failures, or exposing them to limited amounts of physical pain that keeps them in line? (notice I say limited.... I'mnot talking of extreme abuse, like some of the examples you mentioned)
Perhaps the emotional scaring you mention in the end becomes more of a benefit to the person... |
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R. S. Refugee
Joined: 29 Sep 2004
Location: Shangra La, ROK
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 5:10 am Post subject: |
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| Novernae wrote: |
... Which is the greater evil? Allowing a child to walk all over their educators so they in turn learn nothing and grow up to be wimpy failures, or exposing them to limited amounts of physical pain that keeps them in line?...
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I don't think I can offer a good intellectual response to this, but will simply say that my personal experience hasn't left me with the feeling that it was just 2 choices:
1. Limited amounts of physical pain that leads to productive attitudes and compliance with the needs of the classroom and to the likely success of the child.
or
2. A child who will walk all over me, learn nothing, and grow up to be a failure.
In all honesty, I am inclined to think of educators who see these as the only choices as being a bit uninspired and unimaginative.
That said, I'm sure that eventually I'll run into some kid who makes me think back on this discussion with a little embarassment. But I see that as being a rare exception rather than a common problem.
The truth is that I like students (middle school aged, in particular) so much and give them so much positive reinforcement that simply withholding that positive reinforcement for a while can, I find, have a tremendously positive impact on compliance with desired classroom norms. Know what I mean? |
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Homer
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 5:33 am Post subject: |
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A crime you never comitted? Oh my...
I'm sorry refugee and I do not mean to make fun of you but it seems that you are being a little melodramatic.
Corporal punishment is not a good thing to be sure. However, what you withnessed could have been PE activities.... |
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captain planet
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 5:51 am Post subject: |
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| i have physical scars from an overzealous cop who felt the need to "punish" me for something that wasn't even a crime. i don't know if there are any emotional scars, but i would love to kill him someday. |
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R. S. Refugee
Joined: 29 Sep 2004
Location: Shangra La, ROK
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 6:07 am Post subject: |
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| Homer wrote: |
A crime you never comitted? Oh my...
I'm sorry refugee and I do not mean to make fun of you but it seems that you are being a little melodramatic. ... |
Quite honestly, you are right, Homer. I was being a little melodramatic due to some issues in my personal experiences that have only a tangential relationship to the topic under discussion. |
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