Growing up in Germany my Opa would give me a five Mark coin and send me to fetch him beer. Those were different times.
A 4-year-old can run errands alone and not just on reality TV
391–400 of 552 posts
Re: A 4-year-old can run errands alone and not just on reality TV
#392Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Would you send your 5 year old self down the streets of San Francisco or Seattle?" Yes. We live in San Francisco, and our kids went to a daycare in the Civic Center. We walked [with the kids] by many homeless people every weekday for years. Our interactions with them were almost universally positive; they'd clear the sidewalk to let kids through, try to keep kids from seeing drug use, chat and share candy, etc. On c…
You're assuming that crime is reported with the same reliability.
This is fear mongering, and works in both directions. You're assuming that older crime stats were reported with more reliability.
Re: A 4-year-old can run errands alone and not just on reality TV
#393Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does the remark about immigrants make sense? The typical immigrant can't be more concerned about fitting in that the typical native. Because the typical native's behavior determines what "fitting in" means.
There is a saying in Ireland called "More Irish than the Irish" and refers to immigrants and non-locals who take up all of the local culture to extreme (compared to the average) levels. Immigrants are statistically the most law abiding and often times, even conservative, members of a a community and it probably is one measure of long-term survival (esp. in the U.S. while living under the microscope of a work visa) so…
> who take up all of the local culture to extreme (compared to the average) levels.
What does this mean? My dumb brain goes straight to “even more alcoholism and fighting” but that might just be on account of being Irish diaspora myself.
Re: A 4-year-old can run errands alone and not just on reality TV
#394Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It's pretty stable, though, and the rise isn't actually that large (just about at 2008 levels, and far below 2004 levels): I walked through Cap Hill and DT Seattle to catch a bus at 2am back in 2003. No worries at all. A lot of crime isn't reported now days, e.g. my mothers truck just got stolen and she is not going to report it because the police are likely not going to even bother talking to her about it. I've ha…
How is your mother going to make an insurance claim for a stolen car without a police report? Or is she just going to eat the loss?
> How is your mother going to make an insurance claim for a stolen car without a police report? Or is she just going to eat the loss?
It is a 1992 ford ranger, in theory worth a fair bit in the current used truck market, but insurance will value it at next to nothing, so I presume she'll eat the loss.
Re: A 4-year-old can run errands alone and not just on reality TV
#395Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have a strong suspicion that "Cindy and Fred" are in fact minorities and this is just plain vanilla southern racism at play. This is the state terrorizing minority communities to remind them who is in charge. That's usually what is going on when you see gross miscarriages of justice like this in the south.
southern racism in maryland?
Florida. There are two cases being discussed in this thread and at least one post explicitly conflates them. "Cindy and Fred" are in Florida. The other story is a different couple in a similar though different situation. They are actually named, and live in Maryland.
Re: A 4-year-old can run errands alone and not just on reality TV
#396Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Would you send your 5 year old self down the streets of San Francisco or Seattle?" Yes. We live in San Francisco, and our kids went to a daycare in the Civic Center. We walked [with the kids] by many homeless people every weekday for years. Our interactions with them were almost universally positive; they'd clear the sidewalk to let kids through, try to keep kids from seeing drug use, chat and share candy, etc. On c…
As a parent, I wouldn't do this in busy areas. I've seen people get hit from drivers running stop signs and red lights. I have to look at drivers turning right on red to make sure they see me, not sure that all children are tall enough to do this. Too much of a risk. It doesn't take too much searching to find examples of horrible accidents: https://www.kron4.com/news/bay-area/kids-hit-by-car-while-wa...
Right on red has massively increased pedestrian fatalities. The “research” claiming to show it was safe was so shoddy it’s fair to just call it fraudulent.
Re: A 4-year-old can run errands alone and not just on reality TV
#397Not in the US they can't. "officials placed two brothers into foster care after one, 11, was found playing basketball alone in his own yard." He'd gotten home early from school and his parents came 90 minutes later. He was in his own yard. The family lost their children to foster care. Ironically in foster care ACTUAL abuse rates are pretty darn high! "When Cindy and Fred arrived home they were arrested for child neg…
more context on the situation: https://web.archive.org/web/20150526230348/http://www.washin... (the actual washington post site keeps giving me an error)
This is confusing, because you are linking here to a story about a couple in Maryland. "Cindy and Fred", as quoted in the post you replied to, are in Florida.
Re: A 4-year-old can run errands alone and not just on reality TV
#398Earlier quoted context omitted.
This. The cities are actually safer . The chief difference is that the segment of the media dedicated to keeping people fearful, particularly of their neighbors, is enormous now. It was always the case that media liked stories of conflict, but this was moderated by a sense of propriety and responsibility to the community. Now, certain voices have enormous megaphones and no restraints and the paranoia and anger they a…
Safer than what? Suburbs with nice sidewalks and tree lined streets and friendly neighbors who know each other? Safer than rural areas where everyone knows everyone and there’s enough law enforcement to work on a 1:1 basis? I’m sorry but this just seems like an absolute nonsense claim.
Have you lived in rural areas? Despite the romanticism portrayed in the media around rural live, it's absolutely not like that. It can take an hour for police to show up when you call them, if they show up at all. Most of the people in your area are probably on, or cooking meth. Crime is just as bad, and often more violent than it is in the city. Sure, people aren't stealing your bikes, but they are stealing parts from your car. They're stealing your air conditioners. They're breaking into places and ripping the wiring out.
In general, I worry more about crime when I'm in the country, than when I'm in a city.
Re: A 4-year-old can run errands alone and not just on reality TV
#399As a parent, none of the risks are as profound as that of some other member of the public calling the police to inform on your “dangerous parenting”. I’ve deliberately chosen to live in a walkable part of the Bay Area in the hopes that my kids can be more independent when they get older, but I’m more worried about the social pushback than I am about their safety.
Yep. I used to be park of a park advisory council in Chicago. At one meeting, police were there to field questions about park safety. One of the attendees mentioned their concern for the times they saw "unsupervised 10-year-olds" playing in the neighborhood park. The cop encouraged the person to call 911 when they observed that happening! In Chicago, it's pretty much illegal to be a kid without an adult present in mo…
> The cop encouraged the person to call 911 when they observed that happening
The optimist in me thinks that's just the cops way of dissuading the crazy person from getting personally involved, encouraging them to instead call the adults.
Re: A 4-year-old can run errands alone and not just on reality TV
#400Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think I've ever seen someone be hit by a car. The only people I know who have been hit were riding bicycles in traffic. But I would make sure my kids know not to just trust the lights. > It doesn't take too much searching to find examples of horrible accidents: It doesn't take too much searching to find examples of being hit by lightning or winning the lottery. Anecdotes are meaningless in that context.
Motor-vehicle crashes account for 20%[1] of child and adolescent deaths in the US. I'm not nearly as terrified of strangers or homeless drug users as the legion of SUV drivers scrolling on their cell phones. Distracted drivers are several orders of magnitude more dangerous and several orders of magnitude more common. [1] from 2016 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6637963/
>Motor-vehicle crashes account for 20%[1] of child and adolescent deaths in the US.
Yep, 20% of something that almost never happens. .025% of adolescents die each year, .005% of them due to motor vehicle crashes. Further, the paper suggests most of adolescent vehicle deaths happen as passengers and/or drivers.