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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

#271

Post by cthalupa »

jimmaswell wrote: post #179
johngalt wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I ended up with a crushed wrist and internal bruising, and I was lucky I even lived. And I bet you wear a seat belt every day in your car as an adult. Invincibility is one of those myths you want to dispel when kids are young and the stakes aren't as high.

I wore my seat belt every day before that anyway, not even because I had to but because I wanted to. The only thing that really changed after that point was I didn't want to ride bikes anymore. I really can't be the only one who thinks brushes with death are not a good thing to have just because they can teach you a lesson when you're fortunate enough to walk away from them. Would you also say Russian Roulette is a g…

What are the odds of dying due to a mountain biking accident? What are the odds of dying while playing Russian Roulette?

The fact that the chance of a negative outcome exists does not mean that we should avoid the activity. Measure the reward vs. the risk.

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

#272

Post by ktRolster »

baddox wrote: post #243
Kluny wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Media is part of it, but the other part is this, taken from the first comment on the linked article: "I can’t help but notice how many freeways and roads are between Sheffield and Rother Valley. We can’t blame parents alone for the loss of childhood freedom. Since 1919 We have purposely designed our cities to maximize vehicle throughput and require car ownership and the result is an environment that is lethal for 8 y…

I'm curious if that's a sufficient explanation. Do all the parents today (who remember roaming as kids but who wouldn't let their own kids roam now) live somewhere with more dangerous roads than where they grew up? I wonder if my own home town, which I know has not had significant road changes, has experienced the same alleged decline in roaming.

It's not just roaming. If you let your small children play in the front yard alone, neighbors can call CPS.

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

#273

Post by thirdsun »

kriro wrote: post #256

I have thought about this a lot. I pass my elementary school on my way to work each morning. As kids we just walked there it was a 10-15 minute walk. At around the 4th grade we took our bikes. We were accompanied by our parents the first week or so and then just walked in groups. No danger, no incidents, nothing. And this was true for all kids that attended the school. There were maybe 3 out of the 40ish kids in my g…

> These days...there's traffic backing up all around the school, every single kid arrives by car, the thingy where you can lock up your bikes is completely empty.

As a german this seems insane to me. For a long time I actually thought that driving the kids to the school was just something that is misrepresented in american media like films and tv shows.

We went to school on our own, regardless of distance, either by public transport or by walking and biking.

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

#274

Post by drozycki »

rumcajz wrote: post #173
m_mueller wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It probably depends on the location in the US, but every time I go there I find Americans amazingly relaxed when driving. Swiss are probably some of the more careful drivers in continental Europe (which is to say they're slow), but I think it's still way more nervous than in the US. However, one of the issues is probably the sheer size of US roads, it's just much harder to cross I think. And from my own experience, k…

I've also seen lots of hand-made signs like "Attention! Kids! Voluntary 30km/h!" in Switzerland.

Parents put "Drive like your kids live here" signs in some parts of Palo Alto. I think the clever phrasing makes it more likely to be taken seriously by a driver.

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

#275

Post by robochat42 »

I think that this has been largely caused by the media. Every time that a child was attacked or taken in the UK during my childhood, the press would go crazy for weeks. 'Stranger Danger' was a phrase that often came up. The resulting parental hysteria restricted the freedom of children and now it has become normalised. Now it is negligent to allow your kids to roam free and you might get in trouble for it.

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

#276

Post by samsari »

clarkmoody wrote: post #205
erikpukinskis wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We have purposely designed our cities to maximize vehicle throughput and require car ownership This is just one specific example of the broader phenomenon, which is corporations seek to remove all of our abilities to take care of ourselves and our communities, so that they may resell those things to us as products. Requiring cars to move around is just the surface. We go to coffee shops and restaurants to see our f…

> corporations seek to remove all of our abilities to take care of ourselves and our communities Please. It's in a corporation's best interest to give the customer exactly what he wants . We still have "our abilities to take care of ourselves and our communities," but we also have the option of a corporation providing for our every whim.

No, it's actually in the corporation's best interests to have customers who want whatever is most profitable for the corporation to produce.

In many many cases, it's more cost effective to modify the customer's wishes than it is to change the corporation and what it produces.

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

#277

Post by nhaehnle »

jpatokal wrote: post #215
erikpukinskis wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We have purposely designed our cities to maximize vehicle throughput and require car ownership This is just one specific example of the broader phenomenon, which is corporations seek to remove all of our abilities to take care of ourselves and our communities, so that they may resell those things to us as products. Requiring cars to move around is just the surface. We go to coffee shops and restaurants to see our f…

There is no evil corporation stopping you from dropping out of the rat race and moving to a farm to live life off the grid. What's stopping you from doing this and living the life you appear to desire? There is also no evil corporation ordering people to give up subsistence farming and move to cities. Why do people, all around the world, still do it?

I think there's truth on both sides. I feel this is a good time to link to this article again that I believe was discussed on here some months ago: http://www.meltingasphalt.com/ads-dont-work-that-way/

I find its theory compelling that a lot of advertising works by cultural imprinting: corporations use their power to create a presence in the public sphere which changes the underlying culture of society, and we as individuals have no choice about that.

Obviously individuals can in principle just ignore and go against the prevailing culture (in sufficiently free countries, at least), but even in free countries, that's a lot harder than just going with the flow. That's just how humans are wired, and the likely fact that corporations - i.e, non-human intelligences - have such influence over us by changing the very fabric of society is a cause for concern. Like all influence it can turn out to be good or bad, but ignoring it is not an option.

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

#278

Post by couchand »

baddox wrote: post #246
couchand wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you provide some details? I'm amazed by the idea that there's still a place like this. I'm guessing it's a relatively small town pretty far from any major urban centers?

I'm curious why you're amazed at this notion. Surely the vast majority of towns have not been significantly urbanized or had significant road changes in the last thirty years.

Not in my experience. I've lived in a variety of places in my life, one specific cross-section of America: from farm towns and small-to-medium cities in the midwest to major urban areas including New York, DC, and Chicago. Basically everywhere I've known for more than a few years has had some measure of road building. Perhaps other parts of the US haven't seen the same trend?

I'm not talking about "significant urbanization", but I definitely am talking about suburbanization, which is a pox that affects the whole country, as far as I know.

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

#279

Post by jessriedel »

manmal wrote: post #185
noonespecial wrote: post #122

I was thinking about this the other day. Ironically this is the safest time in all of history to let kids do this. Crime is historically very low and our kids want to carry around magical devices that lets us know where they are at all times and contact them instantly. This should be a golden age, yet we've turned it into jail. What gives everyone? Edit: And by "what gives" I mean literally, I live in the US and have…

Crime is not the problem, traffic is. I grew up in a blind alley, and the whole town was really low in traffic. I started cruising around with my bike together with the neighbors at age 7, and we met a car every 10 minutes, tops. They slowed down to a stop, mostly, when they saw us. Fast forward, we are living in a city of 30k citizens now, though on the outskirts; there is a major road about 200m away, and although…

Yes. Everyone is falling over themselves in this thread to bemoan the sensationalist media and irrational fear of kidnapping, but cars are a dramatic difference in the risks of letting children wander that just didn't exist 100 years ago.

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

#280

Post by dtech »

solipsism wrote: post #265
cel1ne wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see your point, but don't you think it's possible to teach children to cross traffic safely? When I was little, I regularly walked 3 or 4 miles to visit friends. I had to cross at least one "big" road on my way, where I just took extra care, because my parents had reminded me to.

Never has a thread been more full of survivorship bias. If you had juggled chainsaws as a kid and survived it wouldn't be any more relevant.

You're making it sounds like there's a pile of dead kids just growing on the side of the road every day. Lethal traffic incidents among children are non-trivial, but no-where near enough to introduce any kind of "survivorship bias" effect.
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