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Safetyism killed playtime

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Re: Safetyism killed playtime

#91

Post by amerkhalid »

kspacewalk2 wrote: post #55
donatj wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lowering the speed limit isn't going to get the guy in the glass packed souped up Honda who blows through the stop sign in front of my house multiple times a day to actually slow down. That's that dudes whole deal. It's just going to give highly attentive people tickets that want to get to work at a reasonable speed like 30.

Speed limit signs are almost useless, especially if not enforced (preferably by speed cameras, preferably without announcing their location with signs). The correct solution to get that guy to stop is to make the street less deadly by design. It should be narrowed, made more winding and have visual 'clutter' added like trees, flower planters, etc. It should be intensely uncomfortable to speed more than 5-ish mph, and…

In our neighborhood, some streets have speeding problem. Some neighbors asked city to install speed bumps but the city refuses to do so those because then emergency vehicles will be slowed down too.

Re: Safetyism killed playtime

#92

Post by seanmcdirmid »

giantg2 wrote: post #89
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China has 10x the road traffic fatalities per capita than we do. People ask if China is safe, and...they never really look at traffic fatalities numbers which are way more significant than getting stabbed to death by some guy at a drum tower. Beijing is the only place I saw someone die before (bicycle ran a red light, taxi was speeding through the intersection at a yellow light, its weird how everything goes at slow…

Pedestrian fatalities in the US involve alcohol about 50% of the time by at least one party. 38% of pedestrians killed have BACs over .08.

I wonder if they have tracked fentanyl yet? It seems like the numbers would evolve just substituting one substance for another.

Re: Safetyism killed playtime

#93

Post by Clubber »

zer00eyz wrote: post #51
miah_ wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a only child, and was a free-range/latch-key kid in the 80's. I'm thankful for my neighborhood friends, they were a excellent safety substitute for my non-existent siblings.

I too am a only child, and was a free-range/latch-key kid in the 80's. We lived on a somewhat quiet dead end street. The neighbor kids were fun but we got into all sorts of nonsense... I have a very distinct memory of my parents taking me to go furniture shopping at about the age of 8 or 9. It was a fate worse than death. Do you have any idea how boring furniture is to a small child. I remember coming home, rounding…

>I missed the roman candle fight, I missed the dry pine going up like a torch. I missed the fire department (small town they all came it was an even) and the police.

Sadly, today, those kids would probably have been rounded up, arrested and charged with felony arson, perhaps as an adult in many states.

I remember lighting off fireworks with a neighbor and his older brother. One errantly went into the woods across the street. A few minutes later, we saw smoke. We all went over and stomped it out. Fun times.

Re: Safetyism killed playtime

#94

Post by donatj »

lostlogin wrote: post #85
donatj wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lowering the speed limit isn't going to get the guy in the glass packed souped up Honda who blows through the stop sign in front of my house multiple times a day to actually slow down. That's that dudes whole deal. It's just going to give highly attentive people tickets that want to get to work at a reasonable speed like 30.

> at a reasonable speed like 30. Hitting a kid at 30 is going to cause some harm. I don’t think that 30 is a good compromise. They are rare where I live but street layouts which promote better driving would help. They have low/no kerbs and wind through planting etc to keep speed down. However this messes up a commute to work, so unfortunately it’s not a perfect solution.

If that's the goal is to cause no harm, we can't have cars. Hitting someone with a 5000lb chunk of metal at any speed is going to cause harm.

The solution here is just to not hit them to begin with.

I think it's 30mph is a reasonable speed for not hitting people.

Re: Safetyism killed playtime

#95

Post by cooper_ganglia »

alephnerd wrote: post #35

Getting a massive "Old man yells at sky" vibe in this thread (and HN in general). Safety laws are written in blood. Whenever a new regulation is passed, it is often in reaction to some horrendous accident. A lot of the comments below are of Boomers who played with unsafe toys or took risks, but they also had some limited supervision from at least one parent. In 2023, both parents are working, so supervision is much m…

I can guarantee you I'm not 30 years older than you because I'm not even 30 years old, but I definitely think the downvotes couldn't possibly be more correct, lol.

"SafEtY LAWS arE wrITtEn iN BloOd" honestly made me laugh out loud because of how incredibly predictable and rote it is, but the rest of the comment was pretty funny, too. It reads like a recipe on how to construct a maximally neurotic society. I don't think being hyper-aware of potential boo boos makes for a mentally healthy individual.

Drink from the hose, play in the street, climb 80 feet up in tree, I don't care, just try not to die. I did all of this when I was a kid and more; I never broke a bone, and I never died. Sometimes I got my ass kicked or I got some some cuts, bruises, and scars, but I'm alive and I've got stories, and that's what counts. Depriving a child of that seems literally cruel to me.

Re: Safetyism killed playtime

#96

Post by torstenvl »

giantg2 wrote: post #42
ethanbond wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO traffic violations should be punished way, way, way more severely than they are. In the US, licenses do need to be easy to get otherwise you lock people out of society (unfortunately), but they don't need to be easy to keep and you should drive with constant awareness that you will be taken to the cleaners for mishaps. Automated enforcement tech should be widespread and incur license revocations and salary/wealth…

"licenses do need to be easy to get" This is what allows the situation we have. People either don't get caught, or only get caught after injury has occurred. "traffic violations should be punished way, way, way more severely than they are." It depends on the infection. Many are already severe, such as being arrested for racing, going 25+ over the limit, DUI, etc. DUI is a factor in about a 3rd of fatalities and is al…

Going 15mph over is a crime in a lot of states (like NC), which is bonkers.

By contrast, DUI is not nearly severe enough. It should only be a misdemeanor if it's <= .10. Anything over .10 should be a felony.

Re: Safetyism killed playtime

#97

Post by wharvle »

doubled112 wrote: post #20
imp0cat wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, children are suprisingly resilient and will recover quite easily most of the time.

The bounce back game is real as a kid. Maybe it's all about mass. The force on my knees landing at 200lbs is way greater than at 50lbs. But maybe I'm just trying not to feel old.

Mass, height, and the mechanics of momentum (as when, say, tripping) all make a difference. Some of the terms involved have exponents applied. Adults definitely feel a lot more force from mistakes made while moving their bodies than kids do.

Re: Safetyism killed playtime

#98

Post by Sohcahtoa82 »

balthasar wrote: post #33

"Children are far less free than they used to be. While 71% of Boomers and 80% of Gen X recall playing in the street as children, only 27% of children do today." Freedom is being allowed to get run over in the street!

Either you're over-estimating the risk, or you think kids are playing in streets with 45+ mph limits.

Quiet neighborhood roads are fine to play in.

Re: Safetyism killed playtime

#99

Post by cooper_ganglia »

giantg2 wrote: post #74
cooper_ganglia wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

DUIs are not punished nearly severely enough. I used to work with an alcoholic who had been arrested multiple times, for all sorts of things: Fighting, property damage, indecent exposure, racing, going +100 MPH on a suspended license, etc. He was arrested for his 4th DUI and was upset because, according to him, he "got the book thrown at him". His sentence? 6 months in county jail, with 5 days per week of work leave.…

Some states are more strict than other. That seems extremely lenient. They are generally misdemeanors or felonies that would cause many people to lose their jobs. Your part about faking work release is really a separate issue - did you report them? Most states will not issue you a license if you have multiple DUIs. So he should have been on a suspended license, which should have drastically increased the penalty in m…

When he was arrested for his 4th DUI, his license had been suspended. Because of this, his dad bought him a car so he could get around (doesn't make sense to me either, haha). So he had a suspended license, no insurance, he was drunk, and driving 100+ MPH down an empty country road when he was arrested. I know all this because I bought his car from his mom, and I'd drive him to work from the jail on Mondays and Tuesdays and he'd complain about how unfair his life was.

But therein lies the problem. It shouldn't be up to a judge's opinion on how much time someone with a DUI should receive. Just make it a flat 5-year sentence across the board so we don't have to worry about how the judge felt that day.

I don't see the work release issue as a separate issue. People with DUIs should have no single recourse of action to leave state custody until their sentencing is complete. You've proven you're a danger to society, it would be irresponsible to toss you right back in. There should be no work release, no reduced sentence, nothing like that. If you voluntarily risk the lives of others on the road, you give up 5 years of your own life if you're caught. I think that's exceedingly fair.

Re: Safetyism killed playtime

#100

Post by kspacewalk2 »

amerkhalid wrote: post #91
kspacewalk2 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speed limit signs are almost useless, especially if not enforced (preferably by speed cameras, preferably without announcing their location with signs). The correct solution to get that guy to stop is to make the street less deadly by design. It should be narrowed, made more winding and have visual 'clutter' added like trees, flower planters, etc. It should be intensely uncomfortable to speed more than 5-ish mph, and…

In our neighborhood, some streets have speeding problem. Some neighbors asked city to install speed bumps but the city refuses to do so those because then emergency vehicles will be slowed down too.

In our Canadian city, the speed bumps have breaks that allow wide-axle vehicles (buses, emergency vehicles) to pass with minimal braking[0]. Some large passenger vehicles can get through the same way, but for most vehicles it's a speed bump.

The issue with speed bumps is that it's just not a good traffic calming design. Why should a vehicle slow down to, say, 20 kmh at random spots when the limit is 40 kmh? Traffic tables[1] are much better, in that if they're properly installed, you don't need to slow down if you're already going the speed limit. They should be installed at pedestrian crossings to make the crossing level with the sidewalk (cars go up and down) instead of being level with the street (pedestrians go down, then up). The street should be narrowed at pedestrian crossings too, and at all intersections (no parking there anyway).

[0] https://maps.app.goo.gl/sQLFu4zs4AkjNF6r6

[1] https://nacto.org/publication/urban-street-design-guide/stre...

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