Free-Range Kids, Good, Bad, or I don't Know?

Back when I was kid, free-range kids was not that unusual. I walked a mile or more every day to and and from school. That wasn't unusual. So I guess I was a free-range kid. I enjoyed it. We didn't have cell phones. So when we were free ranging, we were really on our own - no reaching out and touching us.

Given all the news of sexual predators, I think free-ranging might have gone the way of the Dodo. Have we overreacted? So what are your thoughts?


http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/the-murky-law-on-free-range-kids/ar-AAb9m6M?ocid=U220DHP

 

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To me where you live plays an important part of having free range children. How much gang activity, crimes and other criminal goings on in or around where you live would be something to watch for before letting your children become free rangers. Traffic has allot to do and if children must cross many streets that are filled with fast moving vehicles I'd think that also would something to consider. One big thing is the ages of children who want to be free range types and their abilities to perceive any problems that they might encounter and what they should do if they are in fact involved with something that could harm them.

Many times today I see children who are with other children free ranging it as it were. So that today is very important to build trust with other children they know and to stick together to protect each other in case of any problems that might develop.

 

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My first instinct is no. Kids should not be allowed to free range. We hear all these missing kids stories which wasn't the case back when I was a kid, it makes parents nervous, perhaps even a bit paranoid. Granted, the location makes a difference. I have lived most of my life in large suburban areas. I didn't live in areas I considered "unsafe". But I didn't feel comfortable letting my kids free range beyond my immediate neighbors.

 

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I think the fear of sexual predators is blown out of proportion. Then again I might be a bit more paranoid if I had kids or I lived in the US since your version of news is a constant barrage of 'fear this, that and your neighbour just to be safe'.

 

Well it is out of proportion until your kid shows up missing.

 

In the US sexual predators are required to report their residences and that material is freely available on the internet. I was amazed at how many sexual predators exist within any community. I was shocked.

 

People say that free-range kids are better, or that monitored kids are better, but frankly, they all taste the same with A1 steak sauce.

 

I think free-range is better. In Japan it's common to see free-range kids walking home unsupervised. Japan's an extremely safe country. There's no way I'd let any young child under my care regularly walk alone in a city in the USA, Australia, Canada or England. No way.

 

When I was young, which was before liberalism opened the closet, that had contained all the threats children now face, free range was how children grew up. I used to walk with my friend to the local school, to see our brothers, when we were 4; before we were old enough to go to school. As long as you made it home for lunch, mother would not know how far we roamed as we explored the neighborhood and beyond during the school day.

It is natural for pups and kittens to explore on their own, with parents allowing freedom as long as you were home for meals as a check in time. Back then, there was not the same level of perverted threats, we have today, because liberalism did not yet have all the closet groups as voting blocks. They were less protected and kept a distance from the children. Criminals are more likely to vote democrat due to their soft stand on crime and perversion. The modern children suffer for this.

After the liberals broke up the family, by souring the females against marriage and children, there used to be what were called latch key kids. These were children, who were not only free ranging, but they had to take care of themselves after school; prepare meals, because their single mother or both parents were now working. When liberals helped to split the family, you now need double the living quarters; dad and mom/children, causing demand for housing to go up. This made rent and mortgages go up so even mother had to work, in many two parent homes. The latch key children were not a big deal, either, except people felt sorry for those kids losing childhood, by having to become older sooner. It was not about threat but rather pity for the children's loss of innocents. There was no punishment for the mother, nor did these kids get taken away. Liberal pervert groups are protected and even liberals now sense the threat their own base has on the children. Government is trying to help.

 

I don't disagree. However, given most parents no longer allow their children to walk around town unsupervised, any child that is allowed to do so would be one of the only (if not the only) child walking unsupervised and therefore make a prime target for some opportunistic paedophile. While the chances are still low, they're not as low as 1 in 10 million given this scenario. In Japan, yeah, sure. Not in the USA, AU, ENG or CA.

 

If the threats were worse in days gone by, why are parents and culture more paranoid today? There was less paranoia about children being more independent, back then, because culture was more masculine. The men back then had to join the service, and most of the men fought for the good guys in WWII and the Korean War. The baby boomers, who were the children of those times, became the love generation, due to the quality of the parents of those days. They were used to the sacrifice. The hippies were free ranging to the point of leaving the cultural world for new territories of living.

I remember as a young teen of about 13, hitchhiking to the mountains to go climbing, which was a four hour drive. I would get picked up by people of all ages, including little old ladies. It was safe on both ends and people helped each other. It did not even dawn on me there was any risk.

The masculine culture of that time did not protect criminal the same way we do today. There was no such thing as criminal rights with a firm sense of right and wrong; citizen policing. This allowed the parents and children to feel safer. Criminal rights was a liberal invention, where the victim has less rights than the criminal; more resources go to the criminal. This change was connected to feminism, because acceptance of the dual standard, first required protecting criminals. They needed to con men to accept guilt for things they did not do, personally, before the thieves could steal.

The parents of today would never be able to spawn a love generation, due to the paranoia and tolerance for criminals. Parents who have trust in their children, like those in this discussion, appear like an odd duck to this generation. They have become victimized by a dual standard that will protect murderers.

As far as some Priests molesting boys, this was homosexual behavior, with the church being tolerant of gays even before it was popular. This behavior is not called gay behavior, even though it was 95% male and male. This is because of the dual standard that creates uncertainty as to what is righteous or criminal.

 

The reaction to the recent public admissions (still partial and grudging) of the true frequency of sexual abuse of children, has been to sequester children from the experiences, opportunities, physical capabilities, social competencies, and societal connections that are among the important defenses against such abuse, and confine them in comparative isolation among the relatives and family members and child-specialized adults who are and have been always the most frequent perpetrators of crimes against children. By far.

And then connect them to the internet.

One of the key defenses against child abuse is an adult outside the family that the child knows and trusts, for example - the reaction to fear of strangers has been to isolate children from non-family adults.

One difficulty with free-ranging one's kids now is that everybody else and their kids is indoors watching a screen of some kind most of the time - the casual eyes-on protection that was there in the old days (and is not remembered now, because it was not noticed then by the ones remembering now) cannot be relied upon. But that is self-reinforcing - a general cultural change would help with that.

Isolation from experience, physical activity, and social range, brings serious risks with it. The returns to coddling and restriction are not only diminishing, but at some point negative. By the look of things, and kids these days, that point has been long passed.

Another factor: The range necessary for a child to feel free and have adventures is not all that big. Ever go back to someplace you used to play, and notice how small that world looks now? It was big then.

As with all your numbers, facts, and claims, that is false. Priestly molestation of girls was common whenever and wherever priests had access to girls - such as among those joining to be nuns.

 

My pinion:
Children need unsupervised free time to develop into independent free thinking human beings.

 

I am a 65 year old female raised (formative years) in Windsor, Ontario, Canada. I recall at age 6 walking with sis in hand (4.5 yrs) home through the park from the playground. It was normal for children to roam freely.
En route a car stopped the passenger door opened and a man reached across with candy filled hand and beckoned us to come into the car.
No one taught us about "stranger danger" in those days but I was gifted with sound intuition which I trusted and acted upon even at age 6. My internal alarms went off and I told my sis to start screaming as I yanked her hand and pulled her behind me screaming and running to the nearest house.
There have always been predator paedophiles throughout history and there always will be. This is not a current dilemma. Are there more now? Well, the population is larger so the percentage of predators per capita increased.
I do not see the wisdom in preventing (psychologically crippling) children to roam freely, to play in the park or to go for a walk.
It is incumbent upon the adults to imbue the children with common sense practices such as:
-BE ALERT to your surroundings at all times - not paranoid - ALERT.
-PAY ATTENTION - AWARENESS IS THE KEY!
-DEVELOP and ACT ON YOUR INTUITION!! Above all this is the SAVING FACTOR. TRUST intuition - not words.
-Teach children that ADULTS ARE NOT ALWAYS RIGHT!! Blind obedience causes vulnerability.
-Teach them to say NO! When they sense something is not quite right and do whatever is necessary to create distance.
-TEACH them to TRUST THE POLICE and run to the nearest cop.
SAD FACT:
Too many selfish men consider their sexual needs to supercede the needs and rights of others. This is not going to change. Rather than imprison your children teach them how to coexist safely in a world filled with bad men (and women).
Best to be armed with a sound sense of security and common sense.

 

Paedophiles are not necessarily homosexuals. Paedophiles prefer SEX WITH CHILDREN male or female. It has nothing to do with homosexuality, though granted, some priests were (are) homosexual, if they were not paedophiles they DID NOT have sex with children.

 

Thanks Belus. There are so many people who choose to remain ignorant even in this era of incredible far-ranging informational access. Thought there was a need to explain the differences 'tween the 2.
The false notion that homosexuals are paedophiles is so totally ridiculous and erroneous. I did not take offense but thank you.