Perhaps the period of my youth that had the most lasting influence on me covered the ages 10-13, when my parents sent me to board for seven terms in a fee-paying school about 70 miles from where we lived at the time. Recently, I took the time to think about what made those years so memorable.
Many of the factors have nothing to do with the particular school. While our brains learn most quickly at even younger ages, 10-13 may be a sweet spot while we can still absorb things quickly and without inhibition yet we start to have more consciousness of that process. That applies to both academic and social learning.
Then the fact that this was boarding school must have magnified this. To be away from mum and dad, surviving in the wild without a safety net, learning so many new things so quickly under so much pressure yet with such freedom, can only have sharpened all my senses and reflexes.
Many people consider the practice of wealthy parents sending away their kids to be cruel and selfish, and perhaps they are right. It is certainly a peculiar British tradition. Today the UK inherited yet one more prime minister from that tradition, warts and all. I don’t blame my parents – I am sure there was no selfishness involved for them, especially since my mum did not go out to work. I think their motivation was to develop me in the way that they observed the practice of the class they aspired to be part of.
Maybe they were right. Boarding was clearly an accelerant in my maturity. When I see how other kids struggle to leave the nest at 18 I wonder if some earlier preparation might have benefited them, though it is certainly a tough form of love.
But then there are factors specific to Ascham, a middling prep school of the sort immortalised by Evelyn Waugh, a school that was struggling, and indeed closed down shortly after I left. Such an environment could be considered a perfect petri dish for trauma.
The head teacher was closet, and for sure had some sadism in his make up. The head of maths, the teacher who got closest to minor prodigy me and gave me lots of 1-1 coaching, was subsequently jailed for paedophilic abuse. He also led the scout pack, supported by a Scot who cycled to work in a kilt and reputedly loved the cane, perhaps receiving as well as giving. The head of languages was one of the best teachers I ever had and was surely responsible for many cohorts of great linguists, but was clearly closet and tormented by it. The chaplain was as creepy a character as I ever encountered and I would put no abuse beyond him; he had an unhealthy liking for me, though I have no specific memories of abuse. The science teacher shot himself; I guess closet, depressed and sexually repressed. One housemaster was idle, a failed military and sporting man, who taught us the same page of his geography text book five times in the same year, and who imposed canings and cold showers on his flock. There were alcoholics, depressives and weirdoes of every kind. I cannot think of a single teacher at that school who I would class as normal. If I was chairing a recruitment panel today for a boarding prep school, maybe only the linguist would make the cut and many of the others might end up being reported to authorities.
That was the teachers, and it will not come as a surprise to discover the prevailing culture and the behaviours of the pupils. It was survival of the fittest, combined with strong doses of sado-masochism as kids were discovering their bodies in a single-sex environment. Any diversity of any form was ruthlessly exposed and ridiculed. I was victim and perpetrator. I was smart and learned quickly, but was a target for physical weakness and perhaps for intelligence. Last week I read an article in 1843 about the curse of being a prodigy: many of the attributes described fitted my own recollection of how I was.
In summary, Ascham was a trauma factory. I have had a few traumas, some obvious and acknowledged, no doubt others still hidden even to me. Ascham will have been behind many of those.
My purpose in this recollection is not really about my own trauma. It is to suggest that we all have some likelihood of trauma. It is much less than it was. It is worse in certain types of activity, like scouts or religious situations or boarding schools or theatres. It is probably worse in less developed countries where hierarchies and dangerous traditions are stickier and protections weaker. But, essentially, it is everywhere. And accepting that should influence how humanity moves forward.
An example of what I feel is the wrong way was a long article in the Guardian Weekly recently about the boy scouts of the USA. There were stories about three or four abusers and six or eight victims, and of slow and inadequate responses by the scout’s organisation to discipline offenders, recompense victims and institute less risky ways of operation. The tone of the article was shocking, as if the failings uncovered were somehow exceptional and catastrophic.
I find this style of revelation to carry several risks. This sort of abuse is made out as rare when many of us know from experience that it is anything but, so the story immediately loses credibility. The worst aspect is about sympathy for the victims. Having been a victim, and found a way through, there is a small part of me thinking: “get over it”, which is unworthy but real. In reality, it is like 100 NFL stars suffering many concussions. Most will be OK but some will not. Similarly, some victims will not have the capacity to move on. But painting their suffering as exceptional does not help them or their cause.
Then there is the attitude to perpetrators and the institutions. Making this abuse out as highly unusual as well as evil suggests vilifying perpetrators rather than seeking out what made them that way and what therapy might help. If the emphasis is all on blame and retribution, there will be fewer whistle blowers and more cover-ups, with institutions fearful that any admission will lead down a long slope to bankruptcy.
Rather, accepting that this used to be everywhere and is still in many places indicates a different approach. It is clear which sort of environments are most susceptible: single-sex situations with lots of discipline and physical proximity, with a climate of deference and power imbalance or where sex appeal is part of the allure. Let us focus on the present, and make such environments less common and less toxic, without destroying the good that some of them can do by imposing impossible restrictions.
Let us also celebrate the positive aspect of this; that things are getting better. Ascham did not make it to 1980, women now have some power in Hollywood, and sergeant major shaming is being phased out. At the individual level, people can indulge their cravings more easily now thanks to the internet and the reduced role of churches, while understanding clear lines of unacceptability such as underage or power-based exploitation. We are going forwards.
I also wonder whether some sort of amnesty makes sense here, at least for some sins of many years ago, to help institutions come clean and draw a clean slate. Victims still deserve compensation and perpetrators and those covering up need sanctions such as having to reapply for jobs and perhaps therapy. Serious crimes, hypocrisy and excessive cover-ups cannot be excused. And institutions would have a fixed time window to declare all former wrongs (redacted), make amends and have new practices accepted. Miss the window or fail to disclose in full and penalties would be draconian.
I am not trying to gloss over bad behaviour, and I find my own impulse of “get over it” to be shameful. But I do think we would go forward more quickly if we accepted just how widespread abuse was in the past and how pervasive it might still be in some pockets, and accept that the underlying causes can be identified and treated without witch hunts and without destroying institutions doing valuable work. Actually, I even think that all those weirdoes at Ascham did me a lot more good than harm, on balance, and that the potential for that positive balance has only increased because many of the weirdoes would feel much more comfortable in the society of today.
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