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Kids need freedom, too

persuasion.community

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Re: Kids need freedom, too

#321

Post by textgel »

watwut wrote: post #134
react_burger38 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well actually… Thomas Sowell (who is black) talks about how he felt safe going around on his own in Harlem in the 40s and 50s, and never heard a gunshot. So there actually was a fair amount of social trust / actual safety in black communities even then. With the obvious caveat of course that interracial violence was still a risk. But at least within black communities then, yes there was more social trust.

I dont think it is reasonable to take history of one place as told by literally one person and extrapolate from it whole nation.

You have failed to provide an alternate source.

Re: Kids need freedom, too

#322

Post by widforss »

CalRobert wrote: post #154

It's great to allow your kids to take risks, and we do this with our own as much as we can (they're 1 and 3, so "within reason" is still doing some heavy lifting. I pick ticks off of them now and then and patch up their share of bruises). But fundamentally, what I want most is to be somewhere my kids can ride bikes or walk alone to school, to friends, to the shop, etc. from the age of 7 or so. As best I can tell that…

I'm Swedish, but lived in New Orleans for 6 months in 2001, when I was 5 years old. I used to walk to kindergarten together with my siblings, 3 and 5 years older. Was that another time, or was that too much freedom for the US to handle even then?

Re: Kids need freedom, too

#323

Post by AstralStorm »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #236
mips_avatar wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think each near collision with a car radicalizes cyclists a bit. While cycling you build up experiences where cars prioritize speed over your safety. Most “annoying cyclists” I’ve met I feel like are arguing for the right things but they have a lot of bitterness.

There's some minority of people who are just jerks on the road. Drivers that don't account for other road users. Cyclists who blow through intersections forcing cars and pedestrians to take evasive action. Pedestrians that expect wheeled vehicles to defy the laws of physics on their behalf. Beyond this minority damn near every road user (regardless of car vs bike vs pedestrian) behaves perfectly reasonably if you und…

The laws and unwritten rules exist for both your and other's protection on the road.

So, that "just this once" blowing an intersection or red light might be this time that a huge crash happens or someone is killed. Not worth the few minutes saved.

And if repeated, it's unforgivable.

Re: Kids need freedom, too

#324

Post by mseidl »

wheels wrote: post #273
CalRobert wrote: post #154

It's great to allow your kids to take risks, and we do this with our own as much as we can (they're 1 and 3, so "within reason" is still doing some heavy lifting. I pick ticks off of them now and then and patch up their share of bruises). But fundamentally, what I want most is to be somewhere my kids can ride bikes or walk alone to school, to friends, to the shop, etc. from the age of 7 or so. As best I can tell that…

> the Netherlands, parts of Denmark, or perhaps Japan I think it's far more common than that -- actually, guessing wildly, I suspect most children around the world get themselves to school and that the US is the outlier. In Germany, where I live, and where my oldest will be starting school in two months, it's common and encouraged for kids to walk to school in their first year (age 6). Admittedly, ours is only a quar…

https://youtu.be/L7-k6nK1VUw

She has a great video. I'm a German also. I did live in the US too. I'd hate to have to raise a kid there.

Re: Kids need freedom, too

#325

Post by mmsimanga »

ajuc wrote: post #317
CalRobert wrote: post #154

It's great to allow your kids to take risks, and we do this with our own as much as we can (they're 1 and 3, so "within reason" is still doing some heavy lifting. I pick ticks off of them now and then and patch up their share of bruises). But fundamentally, what I want most is to be somewhere my kids can ride bikes or walk alone to school, to friends, to the shop, etc. from the age of 7 or so. As best I can tell that…

> But fundamentally, what I want most is to be somewhere my kids can ride bikes or walk alone to school, to friends, to the shop, etc. from the age of 7 or so. As best I can tell that pretty much means the Netherlands, parts of Denmark, or perhaps Japan (more for transit than cycling). Why these countries in particular? You can do this in pretty much any EU country and many non-EU European countries. I walked back 4k…

Sounds pretty much like my upbringing in Africa. Bus drivers had authority and if they spied you being naughty through their review mirror they could kick you off the bus resulting in a few kilometre of walk home. It was common to get off the bus in solidarity with your friend who was being kicked off and walk home with him. Sometimes it was just more fun and quicker to walk than wait for the bus much like you.

Re: Kids need freedom, too

#326

Post by AstralStorm »

ornornor wrote: post #315
spaetzleesser wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are plenty of stupid cyclists who don’t prioritize their own safety. One of my pet peeves is to have bikes on the road in the dark without lights. Most of these people are adults and they should know that a car driver can’t see them.

Yeah cycling without lights always amazed me. At the same time, idiotic cyclists are only risking their own lives and that’s it. Idiotic drivers are risking other people’s lives but not their own. When there is a crash between and a car and a bike that involves a fatality, 100% of the time that fatality is the cyclist and not the driver.

95% is closer to reality. Sometimes a driver trying to avoid a crash will do something wrong and get injured with no harm to cyclist or pedestrian.

Or will harm someone else than the perpetrator.

Re: Kids need freedom, too

#327

Post by widforss »

widforss wrote: post #322
CalRobert wrote: post #154

It's great to allow your kids to take risks, and we do this with our own as much as we can (they're 1 and 3, so "within reason" is still doing some heavy lifting. I pick ticks off of them now and then and patch up their share of bruises). But fundamentally, what I want most is to be somewhere my kids can ride bikes or walk alone to school, to friends, to the shop, etc. from the age of 7 or so. As best I can tell that…

I'm Swedish, but lived in New Orleans for 6 months in 2001, when I was 5 years old. I used to walk to kindergarten together with my siblings, 3 and 5 years older. Was that another time, or was that too much freedom for the US to handle even then?

I digress, but the reason we lived there for exactly 6 months (on the day) was that we would be ineligible for Swedish child allowance after that.

Re: Kids need freedom, too

#328

Post by vishnugupta »

golemotron wrote: post #243
indymike wrote: post #76

I've got five kids. The more I loosen up and let the kids take risks and learn for mistakes the better. The challenge is when the adults inject a ridiculous level of risk to something that should be a learning experience. For example, allowing police to arrest and charge a child for bad behavior at school (i.e. won't obey the teacher, outbursts - not for actually criminally violent behavior). Another is lifetime acad…

This will sound terrible, but one theory why parents are so risk-averse with their kids is that 1-2 kids per family is the norm today. When it was more like 3-5 it was harder to keep track of all of them and they (the kids) inevitably did risker things. Moreover, the loss of a kid feels far worse if you don't have more.

My parents had/have about 9 siblings each. There is no way in hell my grand parents could have raised those many kids without letting them be free most of the time.

Of course the times were different (between 1930s - 1970s) and in India the definition/threshold of risk is, let's just say, different compared to the west :-)

Re: Kids need freedom, too

#329

Post by AstralStorm »

colinmhayes wrote: post #226
oblio wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure I understand this, why would walkable places be expensive? Walkable places are generally high density which means that buildings are bigger and homes are smaller so prices should be lower.

For the same reason walkable places that currently exist are expensive. People want to live there.

That sounds like a fake supply problem. Potentially people having places to sell or rent blocking high density developments, or lack of infrastructure causing issues.

Good old adage is infrastructure first.

Re: Kids need freedom, too

#330

Post by AstralStorm »

initplus wrote: post #219
jlos wrote: post #6

I think the problem "de-risking" childhood is only an instance of the bigger problem of what Roger Scruton calls "Risk De-aggregation". Risk Deaggregation is taking a single point of risk (and its associated metric), and optimizing to reduce that risk as if it exists in isolation from other risks. I.e. Risk occurs in aggregate, not as individual threats. Risk deaggregation happens everywhere from Climate Change polic…

It's a problem everywhere, from bad KPI's to public policy. We have a bias towards metrics that are easy to measure. It's much easier to measure large effects on a single metric, than small effects distributed over a wide range of metrics. Concentrated effects that affect one individual/org/group are favored over distributed effects that affect everyone. There are so many examples of policies where this thought proce…

Not even easy to measure, just ones that feel like having big impact, unpredictable timing and are not cumulative. That's not a terrible heuristic as black swan events do happen, but then again common risks need to be optimized for too.
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