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Making It Legal to Play Outside: “Reasonable Childhood Independence” Bills

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Re: Making It Legal to Play Outside: “Reasonable Childhood Independence” Bills

#321

Post by lmz »

Barrin92 wrote: post #230
didip wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Car-centric culture and gun-centric culture is making our society to be like this. Also, most states defund mental health institutions. Finally, the 24/7 news cycle covers a lot of crazy behaviors, encouraging copycats to one-up the crime even more. Is it a surprise if Americans are more paranoid than ever?

Sort of? I've been at an Israeli wedding once and we literally had to shelter for fifteen minutes because some Gaza rocket was flying over the venue, people just shrugged it off. There's people in the thread here saying American roads in suburbs are too unsafe, I don't think these folks have seen traffic in Jakarta, and yet kids still walk to school there. Most people on earth would kill for American suburb levels of…

> I don't think these folks have seen traffic in Jakarta, and yet kids still walk to school there.

You can't compare the two. Traffic in Jakarta is often barely moving while the suburbs have the opposite problem.

Re: Making It Legal to Play Outside: “Reasonable Childhood Independence” Bills

#322

Post by MomoXenosaga »

danjoredd wrote: post #100
kwhitefoot wrote: post #26

The US seems to be the only country that has this problem. Children here (Norway) walk to school on their own at the age of five or six, some of them take buses. "Ashley Smith, a foster dad, testified about being investigated for neglect because one afternoon his daughter, 8, was doing her homework on the front lawn. A passerby reported an “unsupervised” child (not knowing Ashley was actually inside). The upshot: “We…

Its been a genuine problem. I have heard people actually say that if a kid is playing outside by themselves, then the parent should be charged with child neglect because the kid could get hurt. Any time a kid gets hurt on YouTube the comments are filled with people blaming the parent for not being outside with them. Thing is, playing outside by yourself gives you a strong sense of independence. The kid might get hurt…

That is all well and good for rich people with big backyards or nanny's but how about the rest of the country?

Re: Making It Legal to Play Outside: “Reasonable Childhood Independence” Bills

#323

Post by cmurf »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #318
makeitdouble wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a general rule, parents seem to be blamed for anything happening to a kid under any specific setting. Kids playing outside is one of them, kids talking to strangers, kids browsing the internet will also be seen the same...and then kids using voice chat in online games, kids talking to strangers in VR, kids just playing in VR, kids watching youtube etc. It seem well accepted that pervert/criminal will go after kids…

>I think there is a real issue on what people perceive as society's role and what parent's role is. Not only that, but you a society has become obsessed with risk mitigation over the last several decades. The problem is that people are poorly equipped to estimate risk with very low occurrences against low or unclear cost. You see it in all facets of society with a platitude of better safe than sorry. It shows up in i…

Meanwhile actual trauma, by way of active shooter drills that are not announced in advance, run rampant and unchecked.

https://twitter.com/donnaprovencher/status/16281278397477724...

Obsession with risk mitigation is too diplomatic for what's going on here.

Re: Making It Legal to Play Outside: “Reasonable Childhood Independence” Bills

#324

Post by voidfunc »

uulu wrote: post #306
andrepd wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, a reasonable risk is tolerable. But, for instance, car-centric infrastructure has *intensely* exacerbated those risks: space is completely surrendered to cars, sidewalks are non-existent, crosswalks go across 8 lanes of 60+mph traffic. All of this, plus terrible public transport, makes it impossible to travel anyway except by car. This leads to lack of independence for children, and sedentarism.

> crosswalks go across 8 lanes of 60+mph traffic Do such crosswalks really exist? Seriously. AFAIK, 60+mph speed is allowed usually (if not exclusively) on Controlled-access highways where pedestrians are not allowed at all. I highly doubt such crosswalks exist at all.

In what world do you live where people actually follow speed limits?

Re: Making It Legal to Play Outside: “Reasonable Childhood Independence” Bills

#327

Post by nmfisher »

popcalc wrote: post #34
pilarphosol wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US is a low trust society, because of all the poverty. You really notice the difference if you travel to Europe. It turns out that having half of the population be economically unsafe makes everyone and everything unsafe.

Hungary is extremely low trust and extremely poor, yet no one fears public transit nor letting their kids wander about.

Why do you say Hungary is low trust?

Re: Making It Legal to Play Outside: “Reasonable Childhood Independence” Bills

#328

Post by chasd00 »

xyzelement wrote: post #153
andrepd wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Car-centric infrastructure and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race.

I am really surprised every time I see this vehement hatred of cars. I lived in NYC my whole life and didn't have a car, but now we got kids so we happily moved for the house-and-car-in-the-burbs life and it's absolutely better. People make this choice for a reason. Just curious, do you have a family and do you shlep them by bus everywhere?

I feel the same, lived in a large city when single just to be part of all the hustle and bustle. I liked it but I mean eventually all the bars/restaurants/music venues start becoming the same. Got married and started a family, eventually moved out to the suburbs. It’s MUCH better for families. Good public schools nearby, lots more parks and stuff geared for kids. Very safe, like leave your doors unlocked overnight safe. Yeah I have to drive more but I don’t mind, the benefits definitely outweigh the drawbacks.

Re: Making It Legal to Play Outside: “Reasonable Childhood Independence” Bills

#329

Post by civilized »

granshaw wrote: post #164
VoodooJuJu wrote: post #160

For some deep history on this particular cultural expression, I highly recommend reading Albion's Seed . This cultural folkway of extreme supervision traces its roots all the way back to the Puritans' child-rearing folkway: "breaking the will." It's no coincidence that the most egregious of these family harassment cases take place in Puritan colonies. I emphasize once more, for a very interesting and useful backgroun…

But it wasn't like this before tho... ~20-30 years ago it was perfectly normal for American kids to be all over outdoors playing by themselves... what caused the regression?

Yeah, I'm willing to believe that New England always has the highest level of busybodies, but the problem is that the overall level of busybodies has increased nationwide.

Re: Making It Legal to Play Outside: “Reasonable Childhood Independence” Bills

#330

Post by jliptzin »

kwhitefoot wrote: post #26

The US seems to be the only country that has this problem. Children here (Norway) walk to school on their own at the age of five or six, some of them take buses. "Ashley Smith, a foster dad, testified about being investigated for neglect because one afternoon his daughter, 8, was doing her homework on the front lawn. A passerby reported an “unsupervised” child (not knowing Ashley was actually inside). The upshot: “We…

The US has a lot of problems a lot of other countries don’t have.
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