Secondary school in the 90s - how much rudeness to teachers was there?

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I was just watching the Netflix series Adolescence with my secondary aged kids and asked them if the depiction of behaviour at the school was like their school. They said it was. In one scene a boy shouts “shut up miss” at a teacher who tells him to get back into class, she does nothing and walks on. In other scenes the kids are just all shouting and messing about in class to the poking the teacher can’t be hear. My kids say that is normal both from the student and the teacher who ignored it.

I went to a very average state comp in the 90s and there were many kids who didn’t work, messed about etc but I don’t remember rudeness to teachers. I don’t even really temper kids disrupting lessons except with a couple of really useless teachers. Am I just blocking out memories of rudeness and very disruptive behaviour or was it not common in the 90s? I don’t remember my school ever giving detentions, let alone isolations, as they weren't needed, a good shout was as bad as punishment got, but at my kids’ school they are using detentions and isolations in large quantities each day.

I went to high school in the 90’s,we were scared of the teachers,we got disciplined,we respected the teachers,there was no softly softly approach,that’s the problem with schools today.

^^This — I was at a girls’ religious comprehensive in the 90s, a big school with a big intake. I didn’t see much bad behaviour towards teachers, but I was in the top set with largely compliant, well-parented kids; and the worst the girls in my set did was a bit of pranking — more Mallory Towers practical jokes on the teachers than real rudeness. But I know there was rudeness, shouting, swearing, tipping desks over, storming out of classrooms and other bad behaviour from some pupils because we would hear about it (and occasionally see it) from students in other streams.

But even that wasn’t remotely like Adolescence. When I started secondary school, for example, we had to stop speaking and stand up if any other adult entered the room, and couldn’t sit down again or speak until given permission to by a teacher! Gradually all of that faded away, so it wasn’t the case even by the time my sister started at the school five years later.

My DD is currently at a girls’ day independent, because as a school governor I’ve heard of appalling situations for teenage girls in mixed schools. I’m hoping this means she has a decent experience of school life. (The school is very supportive in pastoral terms, very hot on bullying and the girls are happy and I just want DD to have good school years where she feels safe and happy.)

A friend of mine works at a very big mixed comp in a very challenging area, and was absolutely amazed when she asked what the girls at DD’s school do during lessons, and DD said they were all just quiet while they got on with their work. (Friend also said her school has just given up setting any homework because no pupils actually do it; and that it’s normal for police and/or ambulance to be at the school at least three times a week after student brawls. ☹️)

V similar to my experience - St Julie’s maybe? @Bbq1

I went to school in a deeply deprived working class coastal town and never saw any behaviour like this in the 80s. Even the roughest boys were terrified of teachers (and with good cause, as they would think nothing of doling out a hiding to anyone who played up). Behaviour outside of school was atrocious - lots of violence and petty criminals - I have no doubt that many of my classmates went on to become hardened criminals. But in school the teachers absolutely ruled.

By contrast my DC go to an outstanding-ranked school in what is, by many measures, one of the most affluent boroughs in the UK. The classroom behaviour seen in Adolescence is absolutely par for the course among a not insubstantial minority of pupils and teachers are powerless to act - partially because it is the only school in the area (rural) and as a result it is extremely hard to permanently exclude children. Teachers are also genuinely frightened of some parents - with good cause.

@AirwaterfireItwasn't actually St Julie's. I won't name the school though as I don't feel comfortable doing that.