What's mild? What's severe?

I went to several schools in England when CP was common. Just as the rain fell and we got wet, so from time to time some of us were slippered or caned. We accepted that it was inevitable and not always fair. I never received or heard of anyone getting more than six strokes of the cane and never on the bare, but punishment could be painful. The books and comics we read reflected this situation somewhat.

For me, when stories include punishments of extreme severity, I don't believe or enjoy them and stop reading.

Polarized, extreme opinions (saint or sinner, no in-between) is one of the hallmarks of a workplace sociopath, according to psychopathy experts. Not that any additional confirmation was needed, based on the sickening things you described. A teacher like her is one of the worst fears for a parent, that shit like that is happening at school and we don't find out until it's too late.

A teacher like her is one of the worst fears for a parent, that shit like that is happening at school and we don't find out until it's too late.

Nobody could do anything because her husband protected her, personally, I didn't see how anyone could stand to be married to her. He was on the school board for several terms, so she was pretty much untouchable. Once he left the school board, she was history, and children everywhere rejoiced.

but the same district that gave me her, also gave me a physics teacher who was an Air Force double ace, to whom physics wasn't an abstraction, it governed his professional life. And an English teacher who used her free period to teach another class the "Canterbury Tales", and commanded so much respect, she never had to raise her voice. So not only did I have the dregs, I also got to experience be witness to the best of the best.

This reminds of one of the truest pair of lines ever written in a song:
When we grew up and went to school there were certain teachers who would hurt the children any way they could. By pouring their derision upon anything we did; exposing every weakness however carefully hidden by the kids.

Today a lot of people think that teachers like that would be fired after the first day on the job, but back in the day there were ones that lasted for decades. Year after year doing more harm with their voices than any paddling or caning ever could.

Another good line from a song is:
When I was young and they packed me off to school and taught me how not to play the game, I didn't mind if they groomed me for success, or if they said that I was a fool.

But that was how it was. At least now most people don't believe that teachers should remind students to stay in their place....

That second one's an old favourite of mine too - spoke volumes about my own schooling in the 60's. It goes on:
So I left there in the morning with their God tucked underneath my arm, their half-assed smiles and the book of rules. And I asked this God a question and, by way of firm reply, he said, "I'm not the kind you have to wind up on Sundays." So to my old headmaster and to anyone who cares, before I'm through I'd like to say my prayers:
I don't believe you! You had the whole damn thing all wrong! He's not the kind you have to wind up on Sundays.

The author Flogmaster rates his own stories (on his site) depending on how severe they are (from mild to edgy with serious, intense and severe in between) and the vast majority of the time I tend to agree with his rating so I think it's possible to judge how severe a spanking story is even if that remains mostly subjective in the end. For me the degree of severity of a spanking in a story depend on several criteria :

- The description of the spanker(s). Not necessary at all but I always imagine the spanking to be more severe when the spanker is said to be very strong / fit or when he / she is a sadist etc.

- The description of the implement(s) used. Again not really necessary but a good description of the implement used really goes a long way to make me believe that the spanking is severe (this is especially important for implements that are often judged milder such as slippers or spoons). It can be a precise description (a 3/4" thick and 12" long bath brush made from hard maple for example) or simply the name of the instrument when it's a famous one (Spencer paddle, Whangee cane, Mason Pearson hairbrush, Lochgelly tawse etc.). Saying something like how the instrument has been proven really effective in the past is also a very good way for me to imagine the spanking to be severe (especially when the number of strokes administered increase compared to what is usually given).

- The description of the spanking. This is extremely important for me to judge the severity of a spanking. What I like to know the most is the number of strokes when possible (either an exact number or an approximation considering the length of the spanking and the time between each stroke for example), how hard they are given and the state of the bottom of the spankee at some point once the spanking is finished (how it evolve during the spanking is also appreciated obviously).

- The spankee's reaction to the spanking. Not as important for me as the description of the spanking but still very important. I mostly like to know how the spankee is feeling and how much he / she is suffering.

There are more than this to judge the severity of a spanking in a story (context for example is very important I believe) but those four criteria were either the most important to me or the most simple to explain.

I'm often surprised that my readers have a different view than I do as to how severe/brutal a spanking in one of my stories was (often they think it was harsher than I had intended it to seem). I think perhaps this is because I don't usually write very stoic spankees, and a spankee wailing in distress probably makes the spanking seem more severe, even if they're "overreacting" (easy for me to say, right?)

it's all in the mind of the beholder. When I was in school, those many years ago, we students, particularly boys, had many a spirited discussion on how hard various teachers paddled. What some thought of as a pretty mild paddling, others thought of as excruciating. What some readers think of as a very severe or painful scene in a story, others may think, meh, that's not too bad.

It's a different medium, but I used to be slightly horrified at comments on spanking videos at Spanking Tube. There was always someone commenting that the spanking should have been much harder--at severe levels that made me cringe. And at least with a spanking story, the person being spanked is fictional and not actually be subjugated to an actual spanking. It seems a more appropriate medium for exploring fantasies that shouldn't necessarily cross over into actual practice.

Reading through a lot of posts here...and struck by the fact, once again, that many members here were apparently never actually spanked as children. So, at the risk of evoking yet another round of shocked eye-rolls, I'll add my two-cents worth.

1) spanking is by specifically designed to cause pain WITHOUT leaving any permanent physical damage. That this happens to be safest when applied to a certain area of the anatomy adds, for some people, a sexual component with which (I'm assuming) most of the readers here are familiar to some extent, and without which one apparently cannot write good stories for this audience, no matter how realistic the spanking described may be. (And honestly, many stories here aren't realistic as punishments, but that's a different conversation).

2) spankings can be measured in severity by the time it takes for the lingering sensations to clear from the afflicted area. Minutes, hours, days - it'll rarely be weeks, but a good bruise takes that long to clear, even after one ceases to feel it. This is different for different people. Pain tolerance is different for different people. But if the spanking reaches a point of doing permanent damage (i.e. drawing blood, which would create a risk of a scar, or breaking bones) then it has left the realm of what a spanking is, what it's intended to be, and has become a brutality, an outrage, an abuse of propriety that any parent with a particle of natural affection could never, never, never even think of doing - would absolutely cringe with horror at the mere thought.

3) The insupportable intensity of pain (that makes someone cry out, etc) only lasts for a few minutes at best, and that is inflicted specifically to provide negative conditioning that works really, REALLY well, especially on children - OK, it worked on me, so I'd have NEVER dreamed of disrespecting a police officer, or a teacher, or any adult that ordered me to do anything - so I'd have never thought of bullying another child, or worse, physically assaulting them. I'm shocked sometimes at children today, but I understand natural cause and effect... (enough said).

What many people here think of as cruel may or may not be. Here's what you don't understand: parents who love their children want the best for those children: they want them to grow up to be sensible, productive members of society, which, skipping all the psychobabble, boils down to this: those children must learn to curb their own selfish interests, and to sacrifice their own interests for the greater good of others. That's ethics in a nutshell: do unto others as you would have them do unto you; or, love thy neighbor as thyself. Parents who love their children will do what they think is necessary to teach their children this one, most important point. Yes, they'll make mistakes. Yes, some children are handled better with different methods. But true abuse will only be present where love is lacking.

I honestly believe that you can measure severity only this way: does the parent love that child? A parent who loves his child would not, could not do real physical damage, though he/she may feel that a very stern punishment is needed. If the parent is in a paroxysm of rage, he oughtn't to stay in the same room with his child. But that doesn't mean that the parent shouldn't feel very unhappy, and let the children know that in most uncertain terms - how else might that child be prepared for real life, where giving free rein to all one's own selfish interests normally puts one in jail?

Last point: I don't believe a parent with true love for her child can take any sexual pleasure in punishing a child. I could be wrong on this, I don't know, and I suppose some people might find it different. But that's my opinion.