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Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood

afterbabel.com

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Re: Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood

#401
post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you find a source for this claim for European countries? I personally can't but maybe my scholar foo is bad.

For which claim? That people have an impression that things have gotten worse? You look at our recent European elections and how much of the campaigning was on law and order and the perception of the collapse of society.

Now you are moving the goal post. And if you ask me, those are just masks for inner racism about immigrants stealing their jerbs. I live in Europe and I don't see this being a big consideration. So if I'm not hearing it from my fellows then I would need at least a survey to believe this. I've seen those surveys for US.

Re: Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood

#402
post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The manufacturer should be jointly liable for producing a defective vehicle.

I don't think you can legally sell a new small vehicle in the US, so the root cause is legislation that prevents this. I believe that if you could legally produce kei sized vehicles in the US, there would be a massive market for it, especially in urban environments. And I'm sure US manufacturers would be happy to sell them to all comers. Edit: Basically any car from Suzuki would be a hit in the US: https://www.suzuki…

Are small cars in any way illegal or something?

Re: Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood

#403
post #142

“Social scientists have shown — for as long as we have been collecting data — that conservatives have better mental health than liberals, and religious people have better mental health than their secular peers.” My gut tells me social scientists have “shown” no such thing, but am open to hearing the case.

Obviously people who believe people can magically turn water into wine, or that virgins give birth, or that they can walk on water etc. have better "mental health" than those who are skeptical of all of this.

Re: Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood

#404
post #29

The design of the physical environment is in no small part responsible for this. Don't believe me go to Europe and Japan where kids are still allowed to walk and bike to school, to friends places and just in general play and exist outside unattended to a much higher degree than in the US. Because in the US they would be roadkill, and even if they somehow survived outside of a car, car centric design means there's now…

I agree with this for the most part but it doesn't explain everything. The town I grew up in has a lot of areas that are conducive to children roaming; low traffic speeds and volume, separated sidewalks, parks, green spaces. As kids we ran around freely. The traffic volume and patterns haven't really changed at all and as a whole the community drives pretty slowly, nobody seems to be in a hurry. Yet you never see kid…

Roblox and Tik Tok.

Re: Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood

#405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To me that's very rural That's the idea if used in the North American sense. Suburbs are effectively rural areas, except with a higher population density. You will see rows of houses instead of rows of corn, but otherwise no different. > Places with single family homes and parks and playgrounds where I can very easily walk to just about every store or service nearby. What's a town, then?

Suburbs are usually grafted onto towns (and within a few minutes of stores), not in the middle of nowhere. That would just be bizarre.

> Suburbs are usually [...] would just be bizarre.

Usually, yes, but I know of settlements "out in the middle of nowhere" that are nothing but rows of houses. No businesses, schools, or anything of that sort found within the immediate community. One needs to drive through the vast corn fields to another town to access such amenities. It doesn't seem that bizarre.

> (and within a few minutes of stores)

For those at the nearest edge, no doubt. Those at the furthest edge could be quite a distance away. Although, even in a small suburb, often you find the craziest road systems. It might take a half an hour just to drive to a store only a mile away.

Re: Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood

#406
post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, no teenagers or adults die by cars, for they have developed mentally enough for cars not to be a threat to them …Except the 40 000 who do die by car, every single year, in the US alone. Countless more injured and permanently disabled. Meanwhile criminals are indeed a whole different problem. (an imaginary one)

Children, even teenagers, account for a very small portion of pedestrian deaths. Arguably this is because they're kept indoors, but the 20-25 age bracket is the second least likely to die as a pedestrian, despite being young and (stereotypically) dumb and reckless at that age. On the other hand, 25-35 are the most likely to get hit. Some other interesting statistics: 25% of pedestrians killed were drunk, while only 1…

this is victim blaming IMO. people get drunk. people go out at night. people cross streets. if the physical environment doesn't take the above into account, to the point where there are countless needless and preventable deaths, the correct thing to do is to fix the environment, not say people should have been more careful.

Re: Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood

#407

Moral panic, people said the same thing about books, newspapers, radio etc. People like things and get into them, that is normal. Before all this is was just farm work. To quote a meme "The children yearn for the mines"

Literally no one ever said that children weren't socializing because they were spending all day on their books, newspapers, and radios. You're making that up. Horror comic books are a moral panic. Children who don't know anyone but their parents and spend 10 hours a day on their phones is cause for a real panic.

That's farm life for all of history minus the phones

Re: Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood

#408
post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The manufacturer should be jointly liable for producing a defective vehicle.

I don't think you can legally sell a new small vehicle in the US, so the root cause is legislation that prevents this. I believe that if you could legally produce kei sized vehicles in the US, there would be a massive market for it, especially in urban environments. And I'm sure US manufacturers would be happy to sell them to all comers. Edit: Basically any car from Suzuki would be a hit in the US: https://www.suzuki…

The Mazda Miata and most non-muscle car coupes are sized quite reasonably.

Re: Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood

#409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people lobbying their local government for traffic lights is enough to solve a problem it can't be that relevant.

Except it often doesn't work that way. NYC was all ready to implement a congestion fee, with years of buildup and $15B in revenue scheduled for use... and the state governor nixed the entire at the eleventh hour by fiat, because out-of-NYC voters who shouldn't have a say don't like the concept.

This seems like a problem which has absolutely nothing to do with traffic.

If local governments fail at basic duties missing traffic lights are not the thing you should be worrying about.

Re: Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood

#410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And I don't mean the driver was an asshole Well...

> The driver was an asshole for not finding somewhere else to put it. In the former soviet block, you don't "find somewhere else" to park your car. You grab the first spot where you fit because you don't know if there is another free anywhere else. Incidentally, that's why i like 4 meter cars. On streets with parallel parking, they fit in more places than the 4.5 m or more. > Well... Okay he could have been an asshol…

I don't understand how choosing to purchase a vehicle allows you to break the law. This is a place you cannot park that vehicle.
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