I am writing in light of the Sam Uffindell affair (Politics, August 27). For a while during the 1950s, I also attended King’s College.
One day when I was a fourth-former, I was summoned to the art studio. There, a group of my cohorts were gathered to “discipline” a third former who was regarded as “bumptious”.
I had not had enough contact with him to know exactly what he had done to cause offence. I’m not sure if I knew at the time that he was partially deaf. Maybe he did not always answer when spoken to.
Anyway, a cane was passed around, and by the time it came to my turn each of the group had caned him once. I dropped it and left the room.
There was no way I was going to cane him, but maybe leaving and not speaking out was just protecting myself, rather than him.
Maybe if I had spoken out it would have contributed to change
