🚀 go-pugleaf

[From Tim Carey (990505.0620)]


>[from Mary Powers 990504]


Hi Mary,

Thanks for the post, I like your explanation ......

I think the point is that
>however necessary and   positive constraints are in order to function in
>society and in relationships with other people, there is always a downside.

I really wish I could express myself more clearly. The only problem I have
had all along with the idea that coercion involves a big person doing
something to a littler person is that it seems to discount the role that the
littler person may be playing. In our country, for example, physical
restraint and corporal punishment are not permissable in schools except for
rare exceptions. The most severe thing someone can do to a kid over here is
to suspend or expel them from school. For some kids this is exactly what
they want. To describe a suspension procedure, therefore, as "coercive"
seems odd to me.

Similarly I am currently working with a 9 year old boy who was able to
describe to me how he could make his soccer coach send him on laps around
the oval. This little guy really liked running and he didn't like the drills
that he had to do at soccer training. He also liked the game that the team
would play at the end of training. He was able to describe the way he could
get himself sent to do laps so he would miss out on the drills section of
training and be back in time for the game.

It seems to me at times that the coercion debate has missed the point that
we are _all_ control systems regardless of how big or little we are.

Cheers,

Tim