Dogtooth and Hamilton discourse on student interaction over a questionable turkey supper

A friend of Dogtooth mentioned recently that she had received a severe dressing-down for tardiness from her rowing cox, accompanied by the prospect of 'being sent on a run', should it happen again. The age difference between Dogtooth's friend and the cox cannot be more than a few years. Dogtooth fumed at the absurdity of the situation. A rowing team or any other kind of team moves forward from the presumption of a mutual interest in the success of that enterprise. Infantile threats made to twentysomething women are not only inappropriate, they are completely unnecessary. Dogtooth might react badly if someone accidentally kicked him in the shins; he does not, however, threaten that person with press-ups. The pathetic image of some scrawny little shit in lycra, red-faced and puffing, and screaming uncontrollably at a group of indifferent students is altogether more than Dogtooth can bear.
At the time, Hamilton was finding his usual eloquence impeded by a crimson bolus of red cabbage and cranberry sauce, but he nevertheless correctly identified the category error.
The relationship, for example, between employee and employer, mused Hamilton, differs markedly from that of a five-year-old boy and his PE teacher in the sense that it is no longer dependent on respect. It is a free and mutual exchange of services for money from which either party can retreat at any time (subject, of course, to their contractual agreement). That someone should feel subordinated to his employer in any way, other than in terms of employment hierarchy, is quite unnecessary.