I'M NOBODY'S WHIPPING BOY!

When I was in elementary and junior high school, I was fortunate to attend a college demonstration or laboratory school at Mississippi Southern College (now the University of Southern Mississippi).  In case you aren't familiar with this type of school (Are there any more laboratory schools?), these were regular schools, usually attached to a college or university with a large, strong education department, with age-appropriate classes (elemetary and secondary)  taught by master teachers who also served as critic or supervising teachers to the college students who  practiced being teachers before graduation. The students enrolled in the George Hurst Demonstration School also served as guinea pigs for innovations in education and educational methods.  As you might guess, we had the best of teachers, the best of student teachers, and the best of education.  I must admit here that by the time I attended a regular high school, I hardly ever opened a text book, except in Algebra and Spanish!

 

Yes, I learned a great deal  as a student there, and even learned how to treat and to encourage students, both of which lasted me during my entire teaching career.  However, the greatest lesson I learned did not seem positive at the time, but became life-changing in the long run.

 

When I was in the fifth grade, I was in Mrs. Ford's class.  She was a very scary lady who had the reputation of being a fabulous teacher.  I learned the next year, after I was promoted to the sixth grade, that she was a wonderful person as well. Eventually, not only did Mrs. Ford teach me, she also taught one of my brothers, and even became close to our mother as her critic teacher when Mother did her practice teaching.  Alas, I was the first of the Bryants to encounter Mrs. Ford.

 

I can remember that Mrs. Ford had two methods of disciplining her students.  One was she would walk to the door (leading to the hall) and flick the classroom light switch on and off until she got our attention.  And she got it!  The other method of discipline was borderline corporal punishment.  Our classroom was very crowded with desks.  Mrs. Ford could not maneuver through the congestion of desks to reach the students in the center of the room.   I sat on the outside perimeter of the desks so that I could have some mobility to the many wonderful books she had on the shelf for us to read.  However, it didn't take me long to realize that I had made a BIG mistake.  If someone in the room was talking or misbehaving, no matter where he or she was seated, Mrs. Ford would point at them with a finger on one hand, and rap the shoulder of the nearest student with a ruler with the other.  Guess who got the licks.  Yep, you guessed it:  those of us sitting on the outside perimeter of the desks.

 

Now, I can assure you that Mrs. Ford never had cause to discipline me personally as I was so terrified of her that I kept a very low profile so that she wouldn't even notice me. I never would have talked or misbehaved or called attention to myself.  Yet, I still got many licks. . .for someone else.

I went home crying, asking my mother what could I do. She suggested that I ask Mrs. Ford if I could move to the middle of the room. That possibility never occurred to me!  With fear and trembling, I asked Mrs. Ford and she allowed it (maybe she thought I couldn't see the board or something, thank goodness)! I can tell you that changed my life as a student, nay as a person! From that time on, I could see the big picture and could adjust to whatever idiosyncratic behavior teachers, as well as others, exhibited to impede my life and learning. I learned not to be a "whipping boy" for anyone, teachers, professors, bosses, anyone, and I began to stand up for myself and to never take another "lick" for someone else.

You are probably asking yourself what is the origin of "whipping boy." Well, let me enlighten you.

 

By the 15th and 16th centuries in England, it was already an established position in the Courts of the Tudors and the Stuarts to have a whipping boy for the purpose of punishing the crown prince for his misdeeds or lackluster schoolwork.  As the school masters and other attendants were commoners or, certainly, less noble than the prince, they could not lay a hand on him.  The "whipping boy" was often a good friend of the prince's who shared his classes and his free-time as well.  The theory was that it hurt the prince to see his friend whipped for something he himself did. Mark Twain's The Prince and the Pauper shows the relationship between the prince and his whipping boy/friend.

The definition today does not exactly have the literal meaning of actually being "whipped" or "licked," as I was in the fifth grade.  It can also mean being a scapegoat. . .being blamed for the misdeeds of others. Nobody really likes that, do they?  Well some don't mind as long as they get what they want in the long run.  If you are ok with taking the blame for others or being a whipping boy, as long as you are rewarded, that's fine.  After all, the princes' whipping boys lived in splendor, ate well, again, had a very important friend (the prince), and often were later given titles and lands by the king for services rendered.  However, I do not have that nature! 

I have spent a lifetime (since the fifth grade) not being anyone's whipping boy.  I'm perfectly capable of taking my own licks or punishment in stride, and believe me I've made some real mistakes. My mother taught me better! Remember the  old saying, "My mama didn't raise any stupid children"?  I have had enough of my own disappointments and problems without taking the blame for someone else.  And my mama and Mrs. Ford did teach me that!