I had nuns for 7 years of primary school and to this day the sight of a nun gives me a warm and comforting feeling. When I meet one on teh street I always greet her with the traditonal Polish "Szczęść Boże!" I admite the Good Ladies of the Cloth who have dedicated their lives to Christ.
Just goes to show how childhood experiecnes can affect one in later life.
"the traditonal Polish "Szczęść Boże!" maybe I would of had a better experience with Polish nuns, at least they would have understood what they were saying before I got hit by them.
Yes, Pol3, everybody has different expériences ;). My father raised in religious boarding schools experienced (sexual) abuse from priests so needless to say as soon as he could leave said "education", he stayed all the rest of his life as far away as he could from anybody/thing related to religion and saved us (my brothers and I) from such socalled "education". We were raised away from the Church and all of us have turned out fine, decent and respectable citizens (higher education, no trouble with police/justice, no abortion, no sleeping around, no alcohol/drug dependence, even no ... homosexuality ;)). No need of religion to raise kids properly and make them decent citizens. My case is not exceptional ;).
"No need of religion to raise kids properly" I agree Inpolska, My wife who has never had religion Is one of the kindest caring selfless people I have ever met, she puts me to shame, the gates of heaven would surely open for her, If not i am happy to spend eternity in purgatory with her.
@Dolno: absolutely! Without bragging, I have much more morals and values than a lot of "hollier than thou" people I can come across. Being kind, tolerant, respectable and whatever else positive can be achieved without any religion as they are universal values and have been around since the beginning of mankind. To me, pure common sense: not to steal, not to kill, not to hurt others....
Maybe Anglo-Celtic nuns are diffenret. In the States getting one knuckles rapped with a ruler was a bit painful but was usually well deserved and no-one I know harboured any resentment over it. And when parents found out, tehya didn't call the cops but addiitonally punished the kid at homeabotu it. My late dad occasionally gave me a few whakcs "with a belt "where the sun doesn't shine" when I deserved it. So what! I think we have raised a coupla generations of sissified, mamby-pamby spoilt brats. A routine, wqell-intentioned spanking has become "CHILD ABUSE". Boo-hoo, sob-sob, let's squeal to the mods, police, child services...
Spare the rod and spoil the child - is well-known adage. Sure, there are violent, drunken dads who don't spank but brutally beat up wives and kids, and that IS a police matter.
", I have much more morals and values than a lot of "hollier than thou" people I can come across" I have no reason to disagree, looks like you can add understanding and forgiveness to the list, thanks for talking to me,
@Dolno: I forget and forgive (too) quickly ;). Unfortunately, I am too nice (and too lenient) and am often hurt as a consequence because a lot of people take kindness for weakness... It is often so in Poland. Life is crual ;)
Pol The edge of the ruler, stick and belt were just the norm and no problem, spending six months with my left hand tied behind my back (I am left handed something to do with the devil), whole day locked in dark cupboard because of my lack of English learning, and other nasty things (Poked with a pin if too slow in corridor) was my problem
" people take kindness for weakness.." not all of us, stay the way you are. Poland can be tough I agree,
@Pol3 and Dolno: this is pure child abuse and parents accepting their kids to be abused should be dealt with by law together with the "teachers". I did teach in a (public) high school in Georgia, in which at the time (now I don't know) "bad" kids were hit with a .. paddle by the principal. I never sent any of my students to principal's office to be hit and they all behaved in my class. The kids called him "Gestapo". Violence only brings more violence. If a kid is treated like sh##t, they'll react accordingly and vice versa.
" parents accepting their kids to be abused should be dealt with" I never told my mom about the left hand thing the nuns told me that I was in the wrong so I thought mum would be angry with me, it is only recently I discussed all this with her , she said she would have done something if she had known.
Pol and I are from the old days when a good kicking was good for you, things are different today, although I think it's gone too far in the opposite direction, and many youngsters of today are too soft and precious to be of much use.
the worst I have seen is on CBS Reality where in the US, some "normal" middle class parents send their kids to special "prison camps" where kids are dressed with prison clothes and lead prison life, are barked at, humiliated.... for several weeks during summer vacation and parents pay for this BS. And you see the resut in the society!!!! Fortunately, in Erurope, we are not that crazy and we don't need the "American way" ;)
Pure common sense that if treated badly, may be a child, an adult or an animal, they will all react badly.
I have just realized that I have been off topic , I was talking about my childhood in a catholic school in England, I sometimes wonder what life would have been like in a Polish school, sadly I will never know.
"are barked at," ha ha that was dad I effectively grew up in a Polish II corps training camp, looking back today it was great he taught me right from wrong and how to take care of business if needs be. I can still polish a pair of shoes to a mirror finish.
@Dolno: the said camps are really run like prisons. Parents send their kids (minimum age 8 or 9) to show them what could happen to them if they did something wrong. Poor kids! Well, so ..... American!
America is just plain weird. Look at all those anti-vaxxers in California and how these supposedly educated middle class parents actually believe that vaccines are bad. Unfortunately, the anti-vax movement has been taken up in Poland by Kukiz'15, who want to make vaccinations optional and not mandatory.
@Delph: I am not aware of it but a lot ot them are so freaky .... I know that often in Germany and in Switzerland they don't want to vaccinate their kids. Kukiz? Against vaccinations? Thanks to vaccinations, a lot of people could have been saved over the years. I suppose in order to enter schools in Poland, kids need to have all kinds of vaccinations and it is fortunate.
Not sure about California some strange arty farty people there for sure, but I lived a while in america and regularly got invited to peoples homes, high school football games etc , the families seemed to put their kids first, youngsters were always polite they would call their elders sir, mam, never once did i come across "Camps" apart from established military schools.
Gotta say if Poland goes the way of the rest of Europe I'm off to Texas, plenty of good gods people there.
I just recalled the sole year I spent in a public school* (grade 5 - no room at the parochial school that year), our shop (manual training) teacher had what he called his "board of education" (paddle) and used it as needed. And no hysterical PC creeps raised a rumpus calling him a saddist or child abuser (as today's mamby-pambies might do). Nobody was scarred for life and everyone just moved forward in that pre-PC-creep era.
*Attention tag team and other Brits: this is a municipal (not state) school open to all free of charge. Parochial schools charged tuition fees and yet most Polish, Italian, Irish, South German/Austrian and other immigrants preferred to pay to give their kids a good Catholic education.
Look at all those anti-vaxxers in California and how these supposedly educated middle class parents actually believe that vaccines are bad.
Total nutters.
Unfortunately, the anti-vax movement has been taken up in Poland by Kukiz'15, who want to make vaccinations optional and not mandatory.
Since all the fuss caused by the discredited former doctor Andrew Wakefield and the extreme columnist Melanie Phillips in the UK several children who were denied the vaccine by their parents have died of things like measles. It's also a risk to anyone with a compromised immune system that an infected and sick child might come into contact with in the doctor's waiting room.
Medical experts are themselves divided. Vaccines are based on the last flu wave and in the meantime they often mutate so the last season's vaccine will not work. Some claim those pushing vaccines are in cahoots with big pharmaceutical concerns. The point is that today most everything has a seocnd (or third, fourth, fifth, etc.) level and it's not always immediately apparent who is pulling the strings. More often than not in today's hyper-commercialised world the bottom line is: €€€, zł zł zł, $ $ $.
Nobody is 'pushing' vaccination. It is perhaps the most significant step in healthcare ever.
€€€, zł zł zł, $ $ $
More about saving lives.
In the (rather silly) discussion about Poland v. west, it's reassuring that some of the silliness that came from homeschooling cranks in America about not vaccinating children against diseases hasn't caught hold in Poland.
uh yeh they are, Jon. I know this as I have just been thro it all. An HPV vaccination was practically forced onto my daughter at school (she was 13 at the time), even tho we had not given permission for her to have it. Personally I don't think schools are a place for mass experimentation of dodgy vaccines, but hey maybe that's just me.
Where I live, the hospital staff at our local hospital were given the option, "get a flu shot OR be terminated". My question was, what do the health care people know about these vaccines that they were refusing to get one besides the fact that all
vaccines contain mercury. How can any government force foreign material into your body ? It's just the start with the mandatory chip coming next.
