Dispatches from Britain's culture war. (Society).

THE STRANGE COMBINATION of permissiveness and Draconianism is evident in Britain's present culture war in all matters from crime control to the running of schools. There does, however, seem to be a consistent and strategic objective of destroying the established culture, largely by applying the Aqua Regia of political correctness, and replacing it with an adversary culture combining an elitist nihilism and proletarianisation.

Here are a few notes, taken from reputable British papers and journals. As might be expected in despatches from a war in progress, they are somewhat disconnected. However, general strategic thrusts are obvious.

A fifty,-year-old schoolteacher of thirty-five years' experience was told she could be sent to jail after slapping a ten-year-old boy, described by his mother as "a little monster", after he tried to push, punch and head-butt her. She was given a three-month suspended sentence and ordered to pay costs of 2250 [pounds sterling], the sentencing magistrate eructating that:

 
   You were charged as head in setting an example, but you failed completely 
   the child, the school, your honourable profession and the community ... 
   What you did was a total dereliction of the standards the community expects 
   from people charged with looking after young lives. 

The conviction was quashed on appeal, apparently on a technicality regarding evidence (not on the grounds that the principle behind the sentencing was wrong).

Publicity about outrageous cases appeared to make no difference in preventing further ones. In July 2001, a fifty-one-year-old woman teacher with a blameless record of twenty years' teaching, who prodded a disruptive pupil in the chest while telling him to behave, causing him to burst into tears, was ordered to pay him 100 [pounds sterling] compensation plus 750 [pounds sterling] prosecution costs, ordered to do 140 hours community service, and was suspended and faced the end of her career. She was a supply teacher and her solicitor said that with a conviction on her record she would be unable to gain further teaching work. The conviction was on the uncorroborated word of the child, and its consequences, as a precedent, for discipline in schools were obvious.

A Tory council leader, Michael Brundle, grabbed his fifteen-year-old daughter by the elbows in an argument when she tried to run away from home and he feared her getting involved with drugs. He was arrested and held for assault.