> digital space is the only place left where children can grow up without us
What an observation. I agree with this.
Where do the children play?
21–30 of 264 posts
Re: Where do the children play?
#22As a parent, I relate to all this. Great piece. When the kids were babies we had the standard debate of move to the countryside for fresh air and gambolling in the fields etc. But so glad we stayed in London, the kids have so much freedom with public transport they can organise their own meet ups and activities and go running around all over town without any parental assistance or intervention at all. Whereas elsewhe…
I can relate. Nice article. We had that same debate and ended up moving to the countryside. Surprisingly, it worked out well. + real forests. With today’s e-bikes, even hills or longer distances aren’t really a blocker for kids anymore. In the end, it feels like the bigger factor is how you organize daily life, not whether you’re in a city or in a rural area.
Whitewashing motorcycles as e-bikes scares me more than anything else for the next generation.
Re: Where do the children play?
#23a bit off but it sometimes feels like a self-reinforcing loop in Western societies:
We have fewer children because we optimize so hard for money, stability, and personal security. But because we have fewer children, each child becomes “economically and emotionally precious.”
And the more precious they become, the more afraid we are to let them take risks, explore freely, or just do their own thing.
The end result is kids who grow up with less independence, less trust in the world around them, and fewer peers out on the streets to learn from. In a way, our desire for security creates the insecurity we’re trying to avoid — and the cycle keeps feeding itself.
Re: Where do the children play?
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
I can relate. Nice article. We had that same debate and ended up moving to the countryside. Surprisingly, it worked out well. + real forests. With today’s e-bikes, even hills or longer distances aren’t really a blocker for kids anymore. In the end, it feels like the bigger factor is how you organize daily life, not whether you’re in a city or in a rural area.
Whitewashing motorcycles as e-bikes scares me more than anything else for the next generation.
Limited to 25 kph they seem fine (if only just, and a helmet is a good idea at that speed) but violations and disabled limiters are common
Re: Where do the children play?
#25In the US cars jockey for space with guns to claim the title of leading cause of dead kids. But we often forget that cars kill kids at an astonishing rate -even though kids stopped playing outside-. In that light, the bloodbath that is American suburbia becomes much more clear. When pedestrian deaths go up even as miles walked (in aggregate) goes down, the situation is even more dire than it seems. My kids play outsi…
This is an aside. Yesterday I was in a shopping centre (ie a mall) and a bunch of kids ran through the food court, maybe 10 of them all around the 9-12
A grumpy lady shouted at them "kids you shouldnt be running!"
I turned to whom I was eating with and our discussion could be summarised as "kids should be running. The problem isn't they're running, the problem isn't even directly where they're running. Where they're running is a symptom of them having no where else to run"
Re: Where do the children play?
#26I think that something else changed and should be added to the analysis: the number of children. There are less of them so there are less chances to reach a critical mass that lets kids play together every day. When I was little it was common to have between 10 to 30 of us within the fence of our city building. Parents and grandparents were looking at us from the windows but they were probably hearing us scream and play, a sign that all was good, and we were left alone to do what we liked to do. Where do you find 10 kids together now, if not at a school or in another organized context (organized by adults) ?
Re: Where do the children play?
#27I think that something else changed and should be added to the analysis: the number of children. There are less of them so there are less chances to reach a critical mass that lets kids play together every day. When I was little it was common to have between 10 to 30 of us within the fence of our city building. Parents and grandparents were looking at us from the windows but they were probably hearing us scream and p…
> Where do you find 10 kids together now
Walk to the park at the corner, have your child shout a few times, they’ll all pop their heads out of the door at the sound of others playing, desperate to do anything other than sit inside with their parents.
Re: Where do the children play?
#28There were reasons for the contrast with Western world. Safety and risk aversion is a major reason. City living means we don't know what the other person on the road is thinking. This was not the case in small villages or tribal settlements. Everyone knows about every move of the others. The whole community is like a single creature with many arms. The other reason is, prosperity means more affordability to avoid ris…
> City living means we don't know what the other person on the road is thinking.
Usually something like "I hope I'm not late for my job" or "The weather is shit today". Other people aren't that scary.
Re: Where do the children play?
#29> Consider some statistics on the American childhood, drawn from children aged 8-12: 62% have not walked/biked somewhere (a store, park, school) without an adult This is really not representative for other Western countries. Where I'm from, I would say that 75% of 6 year olds walk/bike to school alone, and 100% of older kids do. > In physical space, Western children are almost comically sheltered. I think the author…
I think a lot of this simply depends on the distance between home and school (or other places kids need to go to) – so it's the difference between a compact city and sprawling suburbs.
Where I live (central Europe), the density of public elementary schools in cities is high, so kids walk there alone. The density of secondary schools is lower, so most kids use bicycles or trams / buses.
Interestingly, there are a few private elementary schools (usually english speaking) for children of expats, where cars queue up in the morning, while parents drop off their children. I've never seen this at public schools. I believe this is because there are only a handful of those schools, so they are further apart – and maybe also because the parents (growing up in the US or UK) are already conditioned that this is a normal thing to do.
Re: Where do the children play?
#30As a parent, I relate to all this. Great piece. When the kids were babies we had the standard debate of move to the countryside for fresh air and gambolling in the fields etc. But so glad we stayed in London, the kids have so much freedom with public transport they can organise their own meet ups and activities and go running around all over town without any parental assistance or intervention at all. Whereas elsewhe…
I can relate. Nice article. We had that same debate and ended up moving to the countryside. Surprisingly, it worked out well. + real forests. With today’s e-bikes, even hills or longer distances aren’t really a blocker for kids anymore. In the end, it feels like the bigger factor is how you organize daily life, not whether you’re in a city or in a rural area.
>With today’s e-bikes, even hills or longer distances aren’t really a blocker for kids anymore
Unlike public transport, with an e-bike, the chances of getting a puncture or a malfunctioning battery increase with usage. Plus, there is also the very common bike theft and road accidents if you live in a country where bikes need to go on the road (like the UK)