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How Children Lost the Right to Roam in Just 4 Generations

freerangekids.com

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Re: How Children Lost the Right to Roam in Just 4 Generations

#21

Post by [deleted] »

jboggan wrote: post #9
simonsarris wrote: post #7

I suspect this is not just an American or British or solely cultural thing but also a number-of-children thing. This seems like it would also be the natural response to having fewer children. If you have 3-10 kids, you can "afford" to let them off the leash so to speak, if only psychologically. Your kids going missing or getting hurt is an eventuality anyway, maybe. If you have 1 or 2 kids, you are investing a lot mo…

Only child, grew up in the 90's in a neighborhood of one and two child families. We were all wild roamers, generally disappearing on weekends and summer days from sun up to sun down. Usually at someone else's house or in the creeks and woods between people's houses.

[deleted]

Re: How Children Lost the Right to Roam in Just 4 Generations

#22

Post by m_mueller »

FrancoDiaz wrote: post #10

I have a 4 year old, in my mid 40s, and think about this a lot for some reason. In the 70s during the summer, when I was around 7, we would wake up, eat breakfast, go out and about wherever we wanted, come back for lunch, out again, come back for dinner, and then out again past dark to play flashlight tag. I think I would be charged with child endangerment these days if my kid (3 years in the future) was doing stuff…

As a Swiss with a small child, this is the main reason why I couldn't move to the US or UK. Your 70ies examples are still common enough in Switzerland. 6 year olds are sent to Kindergarden on their own (after a bit of training with their parents). Put the visibility triangle on and off you go. Parents are discouraged by the school authorities to bring by car. Today looking back at this I can see the value. Maybe it has to do with Switzerland being small enough for horrible child abduction stories to be very rare, and if they happen outside Switzerland we tend to think as something that happens to other people - as nationalistic as that sounds, but that's just how most people's minds work, for better or worse, in this instance probably for the better.

Re: How Children Lost the Right to Roam in Just 4 Generations

#23

Post by pshposh »

ahoy wrote: post #11
valuearb wrote: post #5

When I was 6 or 7 years old, during the summers every morning my mom would give me $1.25, and I would get on my bike and ride to the public pool with my friends that was about 5 miles away in the center of our small town. We'd swim all day and go to the Burgerville for lunch where I could get a wonderfully tasty cheeseburger with fries and coke for my $1.25. Finally I had to be home by dinner. If we didn't go swimmin…

I had a similar experience in the rural south in the 90s, for what it's worth. I was largely given free reign to tromp around the (expansive) woods, had a bb gun that I liked to tote around, and at one point had a motorcycle - a ratty little 50cc honda dirtbike that I repeatedly wrecked into ditches and briar patches. Point is, at least for "country" millennials, I think plenty of roaming did happen.

At least for me this happened in suburbia too in the 90s. (Minus the motorcycle)

edit: $1.25 at Burgerville is bonkers to me. We just had $0.29/$0.39 burger/cheeseburger Tuesday deal at McDonalds. Those days are gone...

Re: How Children Lost the Right to Roam in Just 4 Generations

#25

Post by cowardlydragon »

valuearb wrote: post #5

When I was 6 or 7 years old, during the summers every morning my mom would give me $1.25, and I would get on my bike and ride to the public pool with my friends that was about 5 miles away in the center of our small town. We'd swim all day and go to the Burgerville for lunch where I could get a wonderfully tasty cheeseburger with fries and coke for my $1.25. Finally I had to be home by dinner. If we didn't go swimmin…

It must be the turrists.

Re: How Children Lost the Right to Roam in Just 4 Generations

#26

Post by acchow »

valuearb wrote: post #5

When I was 6 or 7 years old, during the summers every morning my mom would give me $1.25, and I would get on my bike and ride to the public pool with my friends that was about 5 miles away in the center of our small town. We'd swim all day and go to the Burgerville for lunch where I could get a wonderfully tasty cheeseburger with fries and coke for my $1.25. Finally I had to be home by dinner. If we didn't go swimmin…

Oh, the sweet taste of freedom...

Re: How Children Lost the Right to Roam in Just 4 Generations

#27

Post by acchow »

cowardlydragon wrote: post #25
valuearb wrote: post #5

When I was 6 or 7 years old, during the summers every morning my mom would give me $1.25, and I would get on my bike and ride to the public pool with my friends that was about 5 miles away in the center of our small town. We'd swim all day and go to the Burgerville for lunch where I could get a wonderfully tasty cheeseburger with fries and coke for my $1.25. Finally I had to be home by dinner. If we didn't go swimmin…

It must be the turrists.

Ugh, I hate tourists too.

Re: How Children Lost the Right to Roam in Just 4 Generations

#28

Post by BarkMore »

When I was 15 years old in the 1970s, I went a 100 mile backpacking trip with five youth between 15 and 16 years old. We thought it was normal at the time. When I told my younger colleagues at work about this trip, they were shocked that our parents sent us off without adult supervision. There was also some concern that we went on this trip without a mobile phone!

Re: How Children Lost the Right to Roam in Just 4 Generations

#29

Post by paulddraper »

simonsarris wrote: post #7

I suspect this is not just an American or British or solely cultural thing but also a number-of-children thing. This seems like it would also be the natural response to having fewer children. If you have 3-10 kids, you can "afford" to let them off the leash so to speak, if only psychologically. Your kids going missing or getting hurt is an eventuality anyway, maybe. If you have 1 or 2 kids, you are investing a lot mo…

This is correct, sort of. I think it has less to do with investment per child and more to do with experience.

My wife is the oldest of ten, and her mother had twelve siblings. After a certain number, you realize that getting lost is recoverable, broken bones won't kill you, and all-in-all kids are made out of very sturdy stuff.

Re: How Children Lost the Right to Roam in Just 4 Generations

#30

Post by stuckagain »

guimarin wrote: post #14

I think there are a lot more roads/freeways now than back then as other commenters have pointed out. We've built our cities for cars, not for people. One possible side-effect of self driving cars, is it may make it safer for kids to wander again. I know I'd love to just attach a GPS tracker to my now 1yr old daughter in 5 years, and let her go where she pleases here in SF.

Indeed, one does not simply double the population without limiting the distance people can walk. It's a simple matter of geometry. The number of households in the USA has doubled in the last 40 years. The number of major roads has radically increased. Most (85%) live in urban areas so there is only somewhere to walk in the woods if you live on the edge of the sprawl.
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