Bring back corporal punishment

THE EDITOR, Madam:

Alluding to our Honourable Prime Minister’s proclamation that crime in Jamaica is at a crisis level and must be dealt with, with extraordinary measures such as the states of public emergency, it is my very firm belief that the decadence of society, with emphasis on schoolchildren, has warranted corporal punishment to be brought back to schools.

I want anyone to justify suitable responses to a boy fighting with a security guard, a student draping a teacher, or a student returning with relatives to finish a war that started in the classroom. Should we use dialogue or mediation to address these matters? Or should we call in the police?

People have claimed that the police should get involved when teachers or parents are unable to control students. But let’s face it, this is not pragmatic in Jamaica, with the police already stretched for resources to the point where they can barely attend to serious criminal matters. Speaking of criminal matters, I hope we realise that a significant number of crimes that are being committed are done by children who should have been in school!

If the police are being equipped with more artillery to deal with ­criminals then why are schools being stripped of corporal punishment? Aren’t we dealing with a similar upsurge of decadence in schools?

DO NOT BOW

Let us not bow to what is trending in the ­international sphere. Let us address our own societal ­problems. Furthermore, am I the only one that has now seen the impertinence that has manifested itself in the countries that have abandoned corporal punishment?

I am a young man under 30 and I am frustrated at the society that now is and is to come. I am also disappointed with the legislators who have continually played politics by trying to appease the crowd or go along with what is trending.

LUCAN BANTON