"They got clean away with it"

Below a reply to a comment on Facebook to how education was different in the 1950's to now.

"I went to catholic schools. K through 12. Physical assaults by teachers not only happened, but were encouraged. We lived in a constant state of terror as a fist or hand could send you literally flying across the classroom for little or no apparent reason. 

A  30 to forty year old man or woman takes a swing at a 8 to 11 year old,...do the math. I saw this often. I experienced it often. Today such teachers would be arrested convicted, and send years in prison. 
However back then they got clean away with it. Then,...just another day at the job. 

There are lawsuits now for sexual assault. 
None I'm aware of for mere physical, and emotional torture done year after year after year.

I often think of these people that made my childhood such a place of darkness. I wish I could speak to them. I doubt they were aware of the primal damage they were doing. 
Assaults, and humiliations they routinely handed out. This likely through decades of their career.

...and they got away with it. 

That's what gets me. They may not have considered what they were doing remotely wrong...just another day on the job. The banality of evil calmly writ across decades.

There was a century long systemic tradition of assault built into that system."