The quiet disappearance of the free-range childhood • Hacker News Board

Re: The quiet disappearance of the free-range childhood

#91

Post by coldtea » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 5:01 PM UTC

trallnag wrote: post #10

roxolotl wrote: post #3

I’m reasonably convinced this explains basically everything currently attributed to social media, for children at least, and likely can also help explain some concern around birth rates and child rearing costs. Starting with the satanic panic the US has slowly closed down children’s lives because of concern that terrible things will happen to children if not continually under supervision. And the true is that yes som…

Does the term "satanic panic" also apply to the EU restricting internet access for the youth?

No, that's plain old security state motivation hidden behind plain old moral panic justifications nobody buys.

Re: The quiet disappearance of the free-range childhood

#92

Post by Barrin92 » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 5:02 PM UTC

DaedalusII wrote: post #78

america is more dangerous than many 3rd world and developing countries on the street once my friend get arrested in LA by police when he jogging. they say they arrest him for his own safety because he shouldnt be out jogging in "this neighborhood" turns out people in america get murdered and attacked in the street all the time for... no reason. yes literally, no motive.

>america is more dangerous than many 3rd world

it isn't. Crime is highly concentrated and the vast majority of, at least median affluent America, is about as safe as it gets. Same goes for any big cities, usually you can count risky streets on one hand, where 90% of the violence happens.

Not to mention, developing countries are if anything the only places where kids still run around and play on the street. I've spend a fair amount of time in Latin American countries with much higher violent crime rates than most of the world and you don't see much helicopter parenting

if anything in the first world this style of parenting is a result of excess safety, not lack of it. The world has seen a secular decline in violent crime over the last few decades, and yet this paranoia is distinctly new.

Re: The quiet disappearance of the free-range childhood

#93

Post by deepsun » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 5:02 PM UTC

GerryAdamsSF wrote: post #55

sfifs wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russia is fairly mono cultural too. Is it safe?

Yes. Russia is inarguably safer in terms of street crime than the USA. Philadelphia in 2025 had a higher murder rate than Belfast during the height of a civil war. https://www.numbeo.com/crime/compare_countries_result.jsp?co... Crime in the USA is also extremely regional and local in pattern.

Oh no, no way. Child violence on the streets and in school is WAY higher, it's ingrained in culture. It's also pretty rare if a Russian kid would tell his parents about it (only if property damage is involved).

I don't know how your link gathers data (website only shows one dude, software engineer, not a professional survey statistician), but from personal experience I can surely say it's rankings are BS.

The closest in US are the "bad towns" like East Palo Alto or some neighborhoods of Oakland, with their respect for ex-cons and prison slang.

Re: The quiet disappearance of the free-range childhood

#94

Post by coldtea » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 5:02 PM UTC

mynegation wrote: post #43

delichon wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why you have an emergency backup child for redundancy in case of failure of the main child.

The only people who find this joke funny don’t have any children.

Or people who have a sense of black humor. Never heard dads make dark puns and jokes of similar nature?

Re: The quiet disappearance of the free-range childhood

#95

Post by xyzelement » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 5:06 PM UTC

MichaelRo wrote: post #52

kannanvijayan wrote: post #37

I have a 10 year old boy and I'm facing these issues right now. I'm also in Canada so culturally adjacent to the US and similar enough with regards to this topic. I don't see child welfare agencies personally as a particular threat when it comes to this topic. Maybe they ARE more likely to get involved in cases of more free range parenting where before they weren't, but it doesn't register as a real worry. The major…

>> But there are no other kids out there. I'm sending him out into streets empty of kids. This. It's a number's "game". My father, born in rural Romania, had 8 siblings, one of them died of an accident in his childhood (yeah, during "free range stuff"). I was born in a town and have 2 brothers. Live in a city and have one kid. I can't send my kid out carelessly because I don't have a backup.

One of the many reasons you should have more kids.

Re: The quiet disappearance of the free-range childhood

#96

Post by bdangubic » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 5:09 PM UTC

spicyusername wrote: post #4

I don't know. Maybe this is going away in some places, maybe I just have my own anecdata, but my kids play outside unsupervised all the time, as do all the kids in my neighborhood. I live in just a regular suburban neighborhood on the outskirts of small Metro. Nothing special about it at all. Every time I see one of these articles I always wonder who they're talking about. I always feel like this is just one of those…

I live in suburb of a metro area, as safe as it gets (my front door is unlocked overnight often and almost never locked during the day, my garage is also frequently open). my 12-year old (5’8” 125lbs) went to walk the dog to the park about 1/2 mile from my house, someone called the police and I had to deal with social services…

Re: The quiet disappearance of the free-range childhood

#97

Post by kjkjadksj » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 5:11 PM UTC

ButlerianJihad wrote: post #29

amazingamazing wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there's really no reason American kids in metro areas like SF, Boston, DC, NYC couldn't take a bus 5 miles away by themselves. when one comes up of an actual reason to why, it contradicts real statistics. the biggest things parents should worry about is their kid being bullied by other kids during school, a supposedly safe place, and other family. strangers just aren't the major source of violence towards children.

Welp this week we in Phoenix are dealing with a report of a 17-year-old high school girl who boarded a light rail train (the one with security cameras and guards) and she was harassed and assaulted by a mob of boys on the train, presumably in front of human onlookers; she disembarked, and was assaulted some more. She is now in a neck brace, and her mother is absolutely distraught, saying this is something she cannot…

This was of course the trains fault

Re: The quiet disappearance of the free-range childhood

#98

Post by borski » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 5:14 PM UTC

tayo42 wrote: post #30

amazingamazing wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> my kids play outside unsupervised all the time, as do all the kids in my neighborhood. I live in just a regular suburban neighborhood Your kids are hardly free-range. Let me guess, there's no way for them to actually meaningfully leave the area (no train, bus, etc)? It's like dumping kids on a 5 acre farm and saying they can do whatever they want. hardly free-range in the way described in the article. Presumably yo…

Plenty of trouble for a 13 year old in Manhattan. Even if it's not dangerous, you can find your own problems easily enough.

You can find your own problems on an abandoned farm too. A kid can always choose to get into trouble, but that’s not what we’re talking about here.

Re: The quiet disappearance of the free-range childhood

#99

Post by buu700 » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 5:22 PM UTC

beej71 wrote: post #70

amazingamazing wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> my kids play outside unsupervised all the time, as do all the kids in my neighborhood. I live in just a regular suburban neighborhood Your kids are hardly free-range. Let me guess, there's no way for them to actually meaningfully leave the area (no train, bus, etc)? It's like dumping kids on a 5 acre farm and saying they can do whatever they want. hardly free-range in the way described in the article. Presumably yo…

I grew up in the 70s in a town of 30,000 and consider that time free-range. There was no public transit, only bicycles.

Manhattan is one thing, but I would never let my kids go to the 70s unsupervised.

Re: The quiet disappearance of the free-range childhood

#100

Post by graemep » Sat, Apr 18, 2026, 5:28 PM UTC

zabzonk wrote: post #49

amazingamazing wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> my kids play outside unsupervised all the time, as do all the kids in my neighborhood. I live in just a regular suburban neighborhood Your kids are hardly free-range. Let me guess, there's no way for them to actually meaningfully leave the area (no train, bus, etc)? It's like dumping kids on a 5 acre farm and saying they can do whatever they want. hardly free-range in the way described in the article. Presumably yo…

> my personal litmus test is if you'd let your 13 year kid explore Manhattan alone during the day My parents let me (14) and my brother (9) explore central Paris on our own when my Dad was working at the Paris air show for the RAF. No problems at all even though this was just after the student protests in the 60s, and so things were a little tense. I think Manhattan would be OK too, though I've only been there as an…

London and the bits of Pars I have seen are pleasant places to work around. London does have its bad areas, as do other cities. Small towns in the UK are fine, as is most public transport. Parents have got more protective but I still see plenty out by themselves where I live.