Friday 12 April 2013

"Let's Learn About...Torture" 1976

This textbook was taught in Scarfolk schools in 1976. Here's an excerpt from the introduction:

"Experts agree that information and its communication will be very important in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Information will become a commodity, sold only to the highest bidders, so it is crucial that students learn how to acquire information as quickly as possible if they want to survive.

Some information can be found in library books, but oftentimes, the most valuable information is buried inside another person's mind. It is up to pupils to mine that information, much like a prospector searches for coal. Sometimes he will use dynamite, other times a powerful drill is more appropriate. There are many ways that a person's mind may be mined.


Here are just a few techniques that you can try on your classmates:

--Scream at them in a high-pitched, helium-inhaled voice without pause for 47 hours.


--Beat the soles of their feet with an effigy of Jesus made out of frozen, compacted ladybirds.


--Pass a pair of stockings dipped in marmalade through their entire body from anus to mouth and then refuse to let them win a game of Monopoly.


--Bake them at gas mark 4 (350 degrees F) for 45 minutes or until the top becomes a rich, golden brown.


--Staple or glue them to a panicking, claustrophobic ostrich..."



5 comments:

  1. The year of my birth.....the ultimate torture.

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  2. Three of the members of the electronic group Throbbing Gristle lived in Scarfolk around 1974-'76 and I believe worked with the educational advisory board. They were very popular with the local Rotary Club, doing various functions, dinner dances etc.

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  3. The chapter on the Milgram Experiments was delightful.

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  4. Would this "F. Walsingham" be a descendant of the famous, or rather infamous, Sir Francis Walsingham, torturer and assassin to Henry VIII and Elizabeth I?

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  5. I like it when people spot the references :)
    Walsingham only worked under Liz I, though. He was only 15 when Hank 8 died.

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