Since Andy’s post brought it up, a reader reminded me the other day of the conversation we had in here in May of ‘04 about various punishments including Singapore practice of caning criminals and the British Navy’s tradition of serving only bread and water as punishment (See here and here and just scroll around for stuff about Kipling and whatnot). Anyway, part of the discussion was this email from my still very much missed Dad which still seems a bit timely. He wrote:

Derbyshire quotes an informed emailer, stating that being put on bread and water is still an approved punishment in the British navy and is still inflicted. Can you imagine the uproar in the U.S. if we put enemy terrorists on bread and water (let alone our own servicement)? And yet we don’t regard the British as savages. Traditions can – and should – take a long time to die. (Until the mid-nineteenth century, the Dutch navy still inflicted keelhauling as a punishment at sea, and I believe the British still practiced drawing and quartering until Napoleonic times. As you know, it entailed disembowelment in addition to the other non-nice things. I am not recommending these things, just pointing out that we live in a cruel and sometimes barbaric world. I do favor flogging as a substitute for jail time, as it seems to be effective in Singapore and I would prefer to be flogged than spend two years in jail.)