Seemed a rather strange exhibit in the porch of a ‘local’ church. I’ll let your mind play with the idea and practice of the use of stocks – and of course the metaphorical association……. at all levels.
——-Stephen———
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Stephen G Hipperson
My photography and other stuff
Good to see you back! Happy New Year 🙂
🙂
Very familiar in many of our old wooden churches in Finland. They were holding “troublemakers” still and also thus they were exposed to parishioners.
Indeed. – Many older folk, although they are not old enough to have witness their use themselves, have a yearning for the return of stocks – they believe their use would cut down on much of the anti-social crime we witness today.
I wonder when they were last used? And how amazing it would have been to see someone locked in them ( or worse, to be locked in them oneself!!!)
Of course, WE wouldn’t be so confined! 😉
Yes, the photo does conjure up some interesting thoughts! I wonder how well they worked to “rehabilitate” the wicked…if, indeed, rehabilitation was among the sought after results.
🙂 – would you want to sit in them more than once? Perhaps there’s value for the wider community, where ‘reckoning’ is seen to be done – and individuals have an opportunity to vent their frustrations on the culprits.
Happy New Year!
🙂 You too!
All the best for a happy and creative 2013 to you and yours!
Marie
You too! 😉
To be honest, it gives me the shivers… a perfect device to create even more frustrated people with a grudge and seething anger, walking bombs looking for a place to go off… especially if they have managed to hide that anger away from even themselves…
Too dramatic? Sorry 😉
Too dramatic? I don’t think so. I guess the priority in those days was ‘justice seen to be done’ – with little room for behaviour management – after all, those were the days when it was possible for to take a long drop on a short rope for relatively minor crimes.
The punishment, for drunkenness ,petty theft, or whatever, was low cost, visible, and participative, in the sense that the public who had to put up with the behaviour could take their own restitution..
Wonderful world… 😦
🙂 – the world is – not sure about some of the people in it though! 😉
I agree 🙂
I haven’t seen stocks on a church before, not even an old church. My immediate thought was, that if they were to be found on churches these days it would be a great reminder that God sets the prisoner free.
or a reminder that religion is a shackle in itself. 😉
But I know many people find solace in being confined so.
The good ole days! Though in fairness they did need less drastic deterrents than corporal and capital punishments for less serious crimes, as prisons (at least in their present form) are a relatively recent concept (Victorian I believe) and public humiliation seemed to fit the bill. I wonder how effective they were in reality?
And of course we had the ‘put them on a boat’ option. 😉
Ha, Stephen, you put them on a boat to the US. I think that’s the transport a great many of us got from there to here. 🙂
Actually, a lot of our petty thieves and undesirables were shipped to Australia.
It was those seeking ‘freedom’ and a new life that made their way to the US
Great shot!!
Thank you!
Sorry my acknowledgement was a bit slow.