The article is divided into two sections. The first part presents data from a poll of Recife Law School students on the question of corporal punishment for graffitiers, prompted by the appearance of graffiti on the walls of the School building in 1994. On that occasion, 21,5% of the students were shown to be in favor of corporal punishment. Repeated in the following years, the survey showed a steady decline in that figure as memories of the event faded away. The second part of the article reflects on the relationship between the proximity of violent events and the acceptance of measures incurring violations of human rights, and also ponders the resurgence of a type of punishment that seemed no longer to have any legitimacy in the modern polis.
Torture; Corporal punishment; Human rights; Violence
