High School Initiation

Yip "initiate" away. Nothing takes the smirk away link having to eat some awful green concoction :D

Shame were you initiated?
 
Just a couple of thoughts to add:

I think several people in the thread have quite different ideas of what initiation involves to what I do.

Also, I think most people who haven't been to boarding school don't understand what a boarding school environment is like.

In light of the different starting points, I think people are struggling to reach the same conclusions.
 
http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=13&art_id=vn20090603055847443C200423

School in shock after 11 students arrested

By Angelique Serrao

For three months, one woman was adamant that something be done about the boys who assaulted and traumatised her son during an initiation ceremony.

On Tuesday as police swooped on Parktown Boys' High Pene Kimber, mother of a former Grade 11 pupil saw action being taken for the first time.

Police arrested 11 matric boys at the school on charges of assault with the intent to do grievous bodily harm. Initially, three teachers were also due to be arrested, but at the last moment the warrants were not executed.

'I knew it would be unpleasant'
Police arrived at the school on Tuesday morning after senior prosecutor John Metswanere issued warrants of arrest for 12 boys and three teachers on Monday.

The arrests were made after Kimber laid charges in February after her son was subjected to an initiation ceremony that left him bruised and bleeding.

None of the other Grade 11 boys subjected to the same initiation ceremony were prepared to make statements against the matric boys.

Once the arrests were made, Kimber said it wasn't pleasant facing the boys' parents, but she wanted to stick by the charges as she felt that the initiation ceremonies at the school needed to come to an end. "I knew it would be unpleasant, but I was prepared for it," said Kimber. "I'm not backing down from this."

When police arrived at the school yesterday morning, they went straight to principal Tom Clark's office. The boys were called to the office and Kimber's son was asked to identify the boys who allegedly assaulted him.

The parents of the matrics arrived at the school and accompanied the police van that took their sons, most of whom are minors, to the Hillbrow police station.

One of the boys was apparently at a dentist and was not arrested.

Kimber said the parents of the boys were very upset and did not want their sons to get into the police van, demanding a warrant from the investigating officer.

Kimber heard that one of the matrics already had a suspended sentence for armed robbery.

At the police station, parents stood outside calling lawyers to help bail out their sons and talking among each other.

When Kimber and her son left the station, after making a statement identifying the matric boys, some parents took photos of both her and her car.

By early yesterday evening, the 11 pupils were still at the police station. Captain Bhekizizwe Mavundla said they were to be released later in the evening.

"They will be released on a warning because they were acting within the school's policies and tradition," said Mavundla.

He said the pupils would appear in the Hillbrow Magistrate's Court on Friday morning. He confirmed that the matrics were all aged 17 and 18.

In February, Kimber spoke out about the initiation her son went through at the school's hostel, Druce Hall. The Grade 11 boys in the hostel were lined up naked in the middle of the night by 11 matrics.

They were made to put Deep Heat on their genitals and got smacked on their backsides with cricket bats, hockey sticks and golf clubs by each of the matrics. Then the head boy whipped the boys with a cricket bat until he drew blood.

Kimber was horrified when she saw her son's bruises at the weekend and spoke out about what happened. She consequently received threatening calls and laid a charge of assault and harassment.

When The Star broke the story in February, hundreds of parents came forward, telling similar stories of the initiation tradition.

It was the first time in many years that these events came out in public, as the boys were always told to keep what happened among themselves.

One teacher, Bryan Hillock, was suspended from the school hostel for a few weeks after the incident. The head boy was also suspended and his title removed after another incident of assault took place at the school a month after the initiation.

Attempts to speak to the principal and school governing body chairperson at Parktown Boys were unsuccessful.
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Well done Mrs Kimber. This has to stop.
 
Natas said:
When I went to Highschool I was in a boarding school. The whole of the standard 6 year was initiation. Standard 6's were treated like slaves. Each one was assigned to a matric and basically you were their maid. You had to make up his bed in the mornings and sometimes carry his books from the boarding house to school. Other than that, any other matric could demand anything of you. There was the physical beating side of things as well. Its generally fine, but you always get one dude that takes the **** overboard. Beating guys with a cricket bat and trying to break the bat. picking people up over your head and throwing them to the ground. There is a fine line, and some okes just cant see it.
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I went to a similar type of school and 90% of the matrics were fine, the rest of them took it overboard. Too much so in some cases and there are a few people who have never recovered from the ordeal...
 
Initiation is great. It's just an archaic form of TV. It ensures that the majority of the population will always follow the herd and, in actual fact, be the herd. Get a job that pays the bills, drown yourself in debt with a mortage for a house you can't afford, a car you can't afford and a lifestyle you can't afford. Coz every1 duz it. By all means, continue. The industry of the world depends on these people.
 
No one dared try initiation on me... and was way too busy to do crap like that on others anyway..
I have never been one to amuse small things with small minds... need we say more?
I think its a stupid act... and sometimes leads to others been scared... if its fun.. it has to be both ways... :)
 
I was initiated when I first started working in the trade many years back, was my first job as an apprentice. I was tied upside down to a crane and sprayed down with a hosepipe. Was harmless and fun. These kids assult with intent to do bodily harm and thats crossing the line and its disgusting that schools haven't clamped down on this sort of thing by now.
 
timgaul said:
Initiation fosters a sort of unity, a "band of brothers" if you will. You go through it together and feel a sense of achievement coming out the other end. If you choose not to do it you may be victimised by your peers later on, which could be a worse fate.
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Nah, it's just a way for older kids to pick on younger kids. It has no point.
Kids stay in school for 5 years in SA, in other countries Sr and Jr High are seperate so its even less.
They split up after those few years and usually never see each other again.
Initiation in university is the biggest load of bull
and happens mostly in SA. My folks attended University in Europe and that
was unheard of, same for friends and family members who attend or have graduated from European universities.
 
The bullied kids should file charges (or their parents on their behalf) - whatever the law is regarding minors. Then the teachers in the way would be obstructing justice and could be charged too as accomplices or for obstructing the course of a police investigation.
 
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