I went to an English boarding school in the 70's when it was still part of the system that produced officers for the British Empire.
Basically, they put you through hell, both institutionally and Lord Of The Flies. Bullying was normal, and vicious, and inescapable (no going home to get away from them). You dealt with it or you persuades your parents to let you leave, or you suicided. In my school of ~400 pupils we had at least one suicide a year, often more.
The thinking was that if you survived all this then you would be sufficiently tough (mentally and physically) to be sent to some colonial outpost far away from everyone and everything that you knew, with no help nearby, and not lose your shit.
It kinda worked as intended for most people - ex-classmates I've met since are confident and charming. But for those like me, who didn't get on with the system so well, it was years of clinical depression and therapy to heal from it.
There's a name for it now: Boarding School Syndrome [0]. It manifests in adulthood as a range of symptoms, but emotional detachment is probably the most prominent. It's not healthy, and realising that almost all of Britain's most prominent politicians suffer from it (and every single British prime minister since Thatcher went to boarding school), it becomes obvious why Britain is such a mess now.
"They fuck with your mind forever, then send you out to run the country" is how Robyn Hitchcock put it. Or something like that; I'm quoting from memory.
Edit - never mind, I found it:
He was the product of a proper, British, all-male boarding school. "An interesting form of emotional atrophy," he says today [1993]. "They cripple your mind, and then they send you out to run the country."
and every single British prime minister since Thatcher went to boarding school
Hmm, it doesn't invalidate your overall point but I would guess John Major, Gordon Brown, Teresa May and Liz Truss were probably not at boarding school.
They weren’t, and in the cases of May and Major, it undid them, as plenty of their ministers and MPs did, and it’s hard for someone who hasn’t been through that particular wringer to understand and therefore work with the mindset. Also, people who went through it will invariably look down at people who did not, as those who did not have no idea what it is to suffer, to stand utterly alone — always — and therefore their judgment cannot be trusted, as it is clouded by softness and emotion.
Also you can spot another boarding-school kid almost immediately. I usually know if someone else was sent to boarding school within 5 minutes of meeting them.
Captain Grimes says in Evelyn Waugh's first novel, Decline and Fall, that they put you through perfect hell during a period of your life that is bound to be perfect hell anyway, then watch out for you for the rest of your life.
> (and every single British prime minister since Thatcher went to boarding school)
I don’t think Major,May or Truss did - state grammar schools and private schools yes, but I don’t believe they were boarding schools - but I may have missed something.
Basically, they put you through hell, both institutionally and Lord Of The Flies. Bullying was normal, and vicious, and inescapable (no going home to get away from them). You dealt with it or you persuades your parents to let you leave, or you suicided. In my school of ~400 pupils we had at least one suicide a year, often more.
The thinking was that if you survived all this then you would be sufficiently tough (mentally and physically) to be sent to some colonial outpost far away from everyone and everything that you knew, with no help nearby, and not lose your shit.
It kinda worked as intended for most people - ex-classmates I've met since are confident and charming. But for those like me, who didn't get on with the system so well, it was years of clinical depression and therapy to heal from it.
There's a name for it now: Boarding School Syndrome [0]. It manifests in adulthood as a range of symptoms, but emotional detachment is probably the most prominent. It's not healthy, and realising that almost all of Britain's most prominent politicians suffer from it (and every single British prime minister since Thatcher went to boarding school), it becomes obvious why Britain is such a mess now.
[0] https://caldaclinic.com/boarding-school-syndrome-the-childho...