Things that would be completely un-PC today

[sunshinehighway]

Oh, I've got a teacher one. I had a teacher in elementary school who brought in a musket and shot a big wad of paper in the classroom. It hit the chalkboard. Nope, he didn't send a letter home or tell parents so they could decide if their little darlings should particpate.
He was a Revolutionary War buff.
Oh and this was in MA.

 

[JaxDad]

We had spankings at school. I had quite a few in seventh grade. Those for minor offenses were carried out by the teacher right in front of class, and those for more serious offenses were carried out by the vice principal in his office, and he definitely hit harder.

My high school football coaches had us watch the film from the previous game at the beginning of practice on Monday. We all sat on benches with our helmets on, and when we screwed up on the film, we'd get whacked in the helmet with a broomstick! It was kind of funny, because you would know when it was coming. ("Oh crap! The defensive end pushed me all over on this next play...")

ETA: I was thinking more about those high school football game film sessions...One of my fellow teammates getting whacked on his helmet back in the day is now a NFL head coach. I doubt he whacks his players with a broomstick...

 

[mamacatnv]

When I was in Elementary school (early-mid 70's) I attended school in N. Calif and my school had a heavy Hispanic population. For Cinco De Mayo one year, my class sang something, we wore long red skirts and pheasant style white blouses. I was one of only a handful of white kids so our teachers made black braids out of yarn and attached them to our heads.

 

[cijay]

I just thought of something that happened when I was teaching in Turkey. We were studying China and they dressed the kids in silk pyjamas, gave them cone hats with black yarn braids, painted fu man chu moustaches on them and painted their eyes to look like they were slanted. LOL

 

[lizabu]

We had spankings at school. I had quite a few in seventh grade. Those for minor offenses were carried out by the teacher right in front of class, and those for more serious offenses were carried out by the vice principal in his office, and he definitely hit harder.

My high school football coaches had us watch the film from the previous game at the beginning of practice on Monday. We all sat on benches with our helmets on, and when we screwed up on the film, we'd get whacked in the helmet with a broomstick! It was kind of funny, because you would know when it was coming. ("Oh crap! The defensive end pushed me all over on this next play...")

You just reminded me of the strap. The office had big glass windows and when a kid got the strap they did it in full view of anyone passing by. The kid had to hold out their hand and got a swat across the palm of the hand. Could you imagine how people would freak out if someone did that now? It was pretty common for other people's parents to swat your bum if they caught you doing something bad when I was growing up too.

 

[Lilacs4Me]

My kindergarten teacher, on a kid's birthday, would have us all sit in a circle on the floor while she sat on a chair, and the birthday child would come up and bend over her lap to get "birthday spankings". She had this wooden paddle that she would use and we would count aloud: 1...2...3...4...5(...6) as she (hopefully!) pretended to whack the kid on the rear end. Then they would stand in front of the class and we sang happy birthday and they got to pick a treat (mostly candy!) from the treasure chest. I was terrified for my birthday to come, LOL, and that year was the only time in my life that I was happy my birthday is at the very end of the school year in May. The kids seemed to all love the attention, and obviously, she wasn't hitting hard by any means, but I was still scared!!

 

[NotUrsula]

No clue what "bumps" are, but for us it was a playground ritual that if it was your birthday, people would try to spank you, one swat for every year of your age. It was common for several people to hold you down so that someone with a really hard slap could do it.

As to my non-PC thing, DH & I always talk about how if "Close Encounters" were made today, there is no way that the Richard Dreyfus character would be the lead -- he ABANDONS his children to go on his quest to find the aliens, and apparently doesn't think twice about leaving with them. No way that a parent who leaves behind children to go off on such a quest would be spun as a hero today. Same for "An Unmarried Woman"; the lead would be condemned for her cavalier treatment of her daughter. Back then we didn't worry about bad parenting examples in movies that were not made for children.

 

[laurafergie]

Teachers could spank. When I was in elementary school, this one boy got spanked EVERY DAY. Now I think he might have had ADHD.

My high school distance track coach would drive along side of us and throw things at us if we lagged behind.

We were allowed to leave high school campus for lunch and most of the time, we even came back!

When I was young, my Dad had just come back from Vietnam (3 tours) and had guns hidden all over the house. My brother and I were taught to take ALL of them apart, clean them and shoot. We never thought about showing them to friends or shooting anyone.

 

[minkydog]

Well, I was thinking more along the lines of some Disney movies. Until Tiana, all the Disney leading ladies sat around waiting for their Prince to show up and carry them off into the sunset. None of them had any meaningful work--just cleaning stuff (and some didn't even do that much) and talking to their little animal friends. Snow White lives with 7 little men and treats them with some condescension, patting them and kissing them on the head like they were children. In Peter Pan you have the whole Injuns & Tiger Lily story that would NEVER be recorded today. Same with Lady & the Tramp's slant-eyed Siamese cats playing the piano with chopsticks and singing "We are Si-a-me-ese, if you ple-ease...meow". And don't even get started on "Song of the South". That movie script would never even make it to the table today.

 

[NCDisneyMom]

We didn't get spanked in school, but my 3rd grade teacher would kiss students (on the cheek) for punishment. And believe me, nobody wanted to get kissed from her! I can't imagine the uproar from parents if a teacher were to try that these days.

 

[Luv2Run]

I spent half of my childhood in Southern California, and the other half in rural Washington State, and I experienced quite a few things that probably wouldn't fly today. I just Googled my old neighborhood in CA, and my walk to/from elementary school was 2.5 miles each way. For grades 2-4, I walked by myself since my older brother was in middle school by then. I can't imagine a little girl who resembles Carol Anne from "Poltergeist" walking 2.5 miles to/from school every day in Southern California, but I did it. No way would I let my daughter do that. I now understand why my parents moved our family literally across the street from our school once I reached grade 5 and my little brother started kindergarten.

In WA, we had a lot of farm kids, so it was the norm to see jacked up trucks with gun racks in our school parking lot. Gun violence wasn't a 'thing' in our schools. We had on-duty policemen on campus at all times, but that was more of an officer-presence sort of thing. Our duty policeman was named Officer Mike, and he also ran the D.A.R.E. program. Our truancy officer, Kim, was scarier than Officer Mike.

 

[Minion89]

Oh, I've got a teacher one. I had a teacher in elementary school who brought in a musket and shot a big wad of paper in the classroom. It hit the chalkboard. Nope, he didn't send a letter home or tell parents so they could decide if their little darlings should particpate.
He was a Revolutionary War buff.
Oh and this was in MA.

I had a History teacher just like this. He was a big war buff and participated in re-enactments. You quickly learned to never fall asleep in his class though. If he noticed someone was asleep, he would start talking about a battle with gunfire so he could yell “BANG” and slam his fist on the chalkboard. Woke the student right up A few times he also had us line up and do marching drills around the school. We got lots of weird looks, but it was fun. This probably would not be allowed in school today though.

 

[Christine]

My kindergarten teacher, on a kid's birthday, would have us all sit in a circle on the floor while she sat on a chair, and the birthday child would come up and bend over her lap to get "birthday spankings". She had this wooden paddle that she would use and we would count aloud: 1...2...3...4...5(...6) as she (hopefully!) pretended to whack the kid on the rear end. Then they would stand in front of the class and we sang happy birthday and they got to pick a treat (mostly candy!) from the treasure chest. I was terrified for my birthday to come, LOL, and that year was the only time in my life that I was happy my birthday is at the very end of the school year in May. The kids seemed to all love the attention, and obviously, she wasn't hitting hard by any means, but I was still scared!!

Oh we did something like this in Kindergarten. We would all stand in a line and sort of form a "tunnel" with our legs. The *lucky* birthday kid would get to crawl through and we would all get to swat them. It seem liked great fun but I was really glad I had a December 30 birthday and was always on break!

 

[Christine]

I was in high school in the late 70s/early 80s. We had a designated, outdoor smoking area for the high schoolers that was all okay.

 

[bcla]

Maybe not a PC issue, but I remember stuff that I saw that was really dangerous. There was a former student who came back to visit after graduating from the Ringling Bros Clown College. He didn't learn this particular skill as part of the curriculum, but someone there taught him how to breathe fire. He proceeded to demonstrate that a few times, including at one event. Something tells me that he would have been prevented from doing that now.

Also - former students had almost free rein to come back on campus - especially if one was a favorite student of a teacher. These days my old HS has a secured entrance and visitors can't enter without an appointment. Students have to show ID when entering.

 

[DVC-Don]

Up to the fourth grade the teachers would read a verse from the bible at the start of the day.

 

[Minion89]

I went away to a summer camp/retreat when I was younger (I don't remember the exact age but I would guess I was 10 or 11). One of the activities we had to participate in was a simulation of the Underground Railroad. We were divided into groups and visited cabins along the trail where the counselors acted out different scenarios from the railroad. After visiting the cabins, we had to line up for a night hike in the woods. Since we were supposed to be a group of escaping slaves, the counselors told us we would all be dead if any of us made a noise. Once we got back to camp, we were free. The camp did not ask parents to give permission for their children to do this either.

 

[anniemae]

I was in high school in the late 70s/early 80s. We had a designated, outdoor smoking area for the high schoolers that was all okay.

we also had an outside smoking area in our high school.

 

[robinb]

I was tied to my chair when I was in 2nd grade because I wouldn't stay in it. Good times. Not.

Personally, I'm not getting any nostalgic "warm fuzzies" from anyone's un-PC posts. I'm happy there have been changes in our culture and IMO those changes are primarily for the best.

 

[E&Cmom]

Was the bumps giving punches? I remember you'd get one punch for how many years old you were. Wonder how that one started?

Not punches. You would get held by your arm and legs and lifted up and down in the air once for each birthday. Those who were really mean would kick 0r smack you each time or let your bum hit the ground.