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How getting richer made teenagers less free

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Re: How getting richer made teenagers less free

#201

Post by medvezhenok »

joncrane wrote: post #169
ileonichwiesz wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Your peers are now way more aware of child abuse, kidnappings, murders, than your parents were. They’re technically more aware of those risks, sure, but any of those crimes are less likely than ever before. This increase in awareness and anxiety isn’t based in data, it’s based on sensational lies and myths. Those lies cause strong feelings and get eyeballs and clicks, and so they spread really well through our frac…

To be fair, one of the reasons for the decrease in crime may be the steps taken by average people to minimize it, due to anxiety.

Yeah, I wonder if you plotted crime rate vs time spent outside or something like that (car accident rates are usually reported as an average of an accident / # of miles, since how much you drive changes your likelihood of being in an accident)

Re: How getting richer made teenagers less free

#202

Post by quesera »

dlisboa wrote: post #120
cpursley wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This idea that parents who let their kids play without 3 layers of bubble wrap and parental hovercraft mode don’t also talk with their kids and aren’t present is not just insulting, it’s far from true. Over coddling causes more problems than it prevents, it’s especially obvious when you compare the maturity levels, mental health situation and general early adulthood outcomes for non-Anglo kids in other developed nati…

There's just no discussion that modern parents are more personally involved in their kids development than parents in the 70s/80s. That's just a fact, not an insult. I never said you can't raise kids without all the overprotection and also be present. The issue of over parenting seems to be a developed nation issue, I agree. I'm not in one and here kids don't do mountains of activities, but violence rates are very si…

You're making a different argument, throughout these threads.

The article is about the US. You say you are "not in [a developed nation like the US]", but instead somewhere that "violence rates are very significant".

That is just not the US. Headlines are scary, but the statistics don't support the fear. The worries you describe are absolutely irrational for 99+% of US parents.

I don't know where you are and I don't know the statistics for your area -- things might be worse there! But your comments sound like irrational US parent fears, without including that context.

Re: How getting richer made teenagers less free

#203

Post by medvezhenok »

cpursley wrote: post #141
dlisboa wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's just no discussion that modern parents are more personally involved in their kids development than parents in the 70s/80s. That's just a fact, not an insult. I never said you can't raise kids without all the overprotection and also be present. The issue of over parenting seems to be a developed nation issue, I agree. I'm not in one and here kids don't do mountains of activities, but violence rates are very si…

No, it’s specifically an Anglo country phenomenon. It’s not really an issue in places like Denmark, France, Spain, Russia, China, Chile. There’s several books on the topic if you are open to recommendations.

I'm curious about book recommendations on this (as someone raising kids in the US but originally from Russia)

Re: How getting richer made teenagers less free

#204

Post by mothballed »

Thorrez wrote: post #199
mothballed wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wrote a long winded thing about my personal experience but deleted it because it was too personal and too depressing to think about. The summary is that the risk of a CPS investigation of a kid playing or walking independently is probably 10-100x that of suffering a car accident. And the average car accident is way less traumatic than being ripped away from your family, tossed in a foster home, and feeling like you…

That's terrible. What's the solution though? Stop letting kids play outside? I think the solution should be to reform CPS so it's not so traumatizing, and have more governmental awareness campaigns of the benefits of kids playing outside. I see government billboards all the time about anti-smoking, eating healthy, prediabetes screening. There can similarly be billboards promoting kids playing outside.

1) Childhood independence protection

2) At the bare minimum, victims of CPS reports should be able to face their accuser. Currently laws anonymize reporters, this is not compatible with an open and balanced justice system. Also, needs to be heavy penalties and liabilities for abusing CPS reporting -- asymmetrical risks would end up with just getting the same result over and over again.

3) Cultural change. People that curtail child independence of others' children should be shamed, publicly. People that let their kids have independence, left the hell alone.

Re: How getting richer made teenagers less free

#205

Post by mlsu »

TrackerFF wrote: post #15

I grew up in the late 80s/early 90s, and came from a rural place with a lot of poverty and at best working class people. We'd be outside all day long - being inside was considered a privilege. Weekdays and weekends. Decades later, most of my peers have middle-class jobs. Their kids are barely outside. Their parents are involved with them from morning to evening, or chauffeuring them between sports and other extracurr…

Kids are in this weird position where they are placed on a pedestal (they’re sooo important! My little future leader!) but yet they have no real agency in their lives and are very restricted from making decisions, even ludicrously simple ones like can I take a walk outside by myself for half an hour.

I don’t have kids yet but I am thinking a lot about this, and I can only conclude that kids should be treated much more like adults. They should have jobs and real responsibilities, and also should face the same pressure that adults do.

Nobody expects me to be a CEO someday. If I want to, I have to push myself.

Re: How getting richer made teenagers less free

#206

Post by insane_dreamer »

slifin wrote: post #49
reedf1 wrote: post #10

> Around 35% of American families have been investigated by CPS What?? > Fully 50% of Black voters in our poll agreed that allowing a 10-year-old to play unsupervised at a park for a few hours was grounds for a CPS call. 33% of white voters and 37% of Hispanic voters said the same. I am speechless. Has so much changed in the 20 odd years since I was a kid? I was playing outside unsupervised from maybe age 9. What hon…

Cars, I nearly got run over as a kid a few times Now as an adult I'd be worried about cycling around with cars that would hit me in the chest and not the legs on impact Also cars make it very easy for a stranger to pull up and kidnap, parents subconsciously know that and factor it into their decisions There was also youth clubs where I grew up and a BMX track and no phones so play was mostly happening outside Society…

cars were just as plentiful in the 70s and 80s as now and yet parents weren't nearly as worried about it as they are now

and kids were much more on bikes then than now -- which is a rare sight unless it's parents with their little kids on a Sunday ride in the park

Re: How getting richer made teenagers less free

#207

Post by komali2 »

integralid wrote: post #63
gherkinnn wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there was any truth do this then Russia (arguably a "hard place" for most of its history) would be brimming with strong men (it is always "men" in these discussions) who then create which good times exactly?

>it is always "men" in these discussions This obviously means "human" in this context. But of course this saying is just a meme at best, it doesn't work like that in reality. In fact, good times make strong men just like good childhood makes strong adults.

> This obviously means "human" in this context.

I disagree, people who say this often are "great men of history" types that genuinely ascribe much of the significant events in human history to the activities of men alone.

Re: How getting richer made teenagers less free

#208

Post by n4r9 »

insane_dreamer wrote: post #206
slifin wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cars, I nearly got run over as a kid a few times Now as an adult I'd be worried about cycling around with cars that would hit me in the chest and not the legs on impact Also cars make it very easy for a stranger to pull up and kidnap, parents subconsciously know that and factor it into their decisions There was also youth clubs where I grew up and a BMX track and no phones so play was mostly happening outside Society…

cars were just as plentiful in the 70s and 80s as now and yet parents weren't nearly as worried about it as they are now and kids were much more on bikes then than now -- which is a rare sight unless it's parents with their little kids on a Sunday ride in the park

It's not just how many cars there are, but how big they are, how aggressively they're driven, and how much infrastructure there is for bikes alongside.

Re: How getting richer made teenagers less free

#209

Post by komali2 »

louthy wrote: post #88
arethuza wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Overcoming hardships may leave people more resilient, but it may also leave them physical and/or psychological wrecks.

As someone who has had some serious hardship and is certainly more resilient because of it, I can also confirm the mental scarring that comes as ‘part of the package’. I think to an extent the mental impact of it is a necessary evil. The future resilience manifests as a drive to not find yourself in the same (or an equally difficult) position again — because it’s so emotionally devastating — so you fight harder to no…

But how do you account for things like cycles of violence and PTSD? I have veteran friends that, sure, could handle being shot at better than me, but on the other hand I can go to a fireworks show without worrying about having a public breakdown. Or I got friends that suffer for lack of the structure the military provided and just veg out now, picking fights at the bar for a little excitement.

Hell I guess you can describe them as "hard men" but I wouldn't want to be that way and it doesn't seem to make you more successful in modern society.

Re: How getting richer made teenagers less free

#210

Post by komali2 »

cons0le wrote: post #66
nrhrjrjrjtntbt wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

sidewalk ended apparently. i am imagining some super hostile urban planning. like did a cyclist cheat with the planner's spouse? is there not another route?

It's impossible for people to get how bad it is until they see it. My old house had a grocery store 1.2 miles away. To walk there, you have to cross a 6 lane highway. Entire neighborhoods here have no sidewalks. And the roads are so torn up they're unusable. My friend had to get rid of his road bike and get a fat tire suspension bike. None of the intersections have any lights or visibility. And you can't run off the…

> People aren't good at visualizing what being in a car all the time is taking from them.

I really wish someone would do a study somehow on what kind of psychological effects are caused by being angry at everyone in your city for an hour twice a day (sitting in traffic).

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