The attitude toward spanking grown boys has always fascinated me. In the popular culture of the mid 20th century the rural poor are often shown spanking grown sons; I'm guessing they actually did. In the comic strip Li'l Abner, for example, big strapping (and hot!) Abner gets spanked (off camera) by his diminuitive aunt many times, and the authors obviously think it's hilarious. And Jethro on the Beverly Hillbillies was often told to "fetch me a hickory stick"!
I'd love to hear more examples if anyone has any...
Turquine, the comic L'il Abner was inked and captioned by a now-deceased artist who was also a political activist of the Republican stripe - Al Capp.
ReplyDeleteCapp, not surprisingly, was a proponent of keeping the paddle active in education, when there were strong forces socially to abandon corporal punishment in education. Google him and find an amazing person behind the funnies.