Not the prince, though. The prince, like the Chinese emperor’s son, was believed to be somewhat heavenly and therefore untouchable. The prince was never to be whipped. So overseers designed an alternative scheme, and that was to whip his companion instead.

In China, we had a similar approach with the sons of emperors. Whenever they did something wrong, their reading or playing companions or sometimes even their teachers were punished in their stead.

Anyways, that’s the idea of the whipping boy, a scapegoat who is sacrificed instead of the real wrongdoer.

Luckily, disciplinary whips and whipping boys are no more. So today, when we talk about someone being the whipping boy, we are speaking metaphorically, or in a figurative sense because no whips or whipping are involved.

Media examples:

1. Cynicism doesn’t come much worse than the chorus of Tory attacks on Home Office staff who are striking to defend their jobs and our public services.

Travellers to Britain are regularly welcomed with long queues at Heathrow Airport under the Conservatives’ austerity regime.

Rows of shut booths give frustrated passengers the impression a country in recession is shut for business.

The chief inspector of borders and immigration, John Vine, blamed too few staff on duty at peak times.

Delays will get worse, not better, when you fly home from your holiday after the Government’s sacked one in five of the public servants.

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