"3. And this reader shared some modern context: "Tennessee still has corporal punishment, at least as of a decade ago. A friend's teenage daughter had to get paddled for something extremely minor (her cellphone was in her backpack and not her locker). There is something seriously gross and perverted about a grown man making a young girl bend over his desk to paddle her butt." - blueshark77"
""If it were an important paper, your teacher might require it to be typed. So you'd draft the whole thing longhand, then sit down at your parents' typewriter (or a library one, if your parents didn't have a typewriter) and painstakingly type the whole thing out. I still remember the distinct smell my parents' IBM electric typewriter made when it was turned on." -Axj66"
Life in the 1980s included many commonplace practices and technologies that seem surprising today. Schools in many places legally disciplined students with paddling; as of 2024 corporal punishment remains legal in Tennessee and 16 other U.S. states. Students often drafted essays longhand and then typed final copies on family or library typewriters, noting the distinct smell of electric IBM machines. Phone culture included paid 976 hotlines that charged by the minute for weather, horoscopes, fan lines, or adult content. Movie theaters commonly used flat seating without stadium-style elevation, which could obstruct views for shorter patrons or children.
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