Posted on 09/26/2014 8:51:48 AM PDT by WhiskeyX
“I’d ride my bike for miles, even downtown and back..”
yep. See my post 16. Although your post reminds me of perhaps why my parents gave me so much freedom. My mom, twice a week, would get done with school on outskirts of town, and ride the trolley into downtown Minneapolis for her violin lesson. Had to make a transfer. Afterwards, and dark, she would take the bus to where her dad worked, and would drive home with him. She started doing that when she was 3rd or 4th grade, about 1928 I suppose.
And if someone says “well times have changed....”
She had the story of how she and her two older sisters were walking home from school through an old gravel pit. A guy flashed them. They ran as fast as they could back through the woods. When they got home they told my grandparents, who called the police.
They gave a description of the guy and his car. The police were on the lookout already and found him later that day in the area. They brought my mom and aunts in to the lineup (all grade school girls).
He had raped and murdered three girls previously.
If I were her I would immediately start calling CPS and the cops about a woman in the neighborhood who seems to be too interested in children that aren’t hers. Every time that hag walks past the park when kids are there, bam! Call the cops.
““Dallas-area native Kari Anne Roy lives in Austin ...””
Exactly! Even a relatively “free” state like Texas has a $hitthole city in it, which in it’s case is Austin, home of the drunken DA and the State Government!
“Though, I wonder: Do more hospitable neighborhoods even exist anymore?”
Yes, but you won’t find one in a liberal craphole like Austin.
The tiny village closest to me is straight out of 1955. Kids roam all over playing and traffic drives less than 10 mph on main street.
Kids pulling a wagon ( many not old enough to start school ) full of dirty pop bottles they found in the ditch show up at the general store to exchange for candy.
Everyone knows everyone else, and few lock their doors unless going on vacation.
My granddaughter fell off her scooter and broker her leg when she was six. Because it was a spiral break the hospital er doctor had to call CPS by law. They finally tracked her down at my house and wanted to speak to her. I told them okay as long as I was present. I sat quietly and let them ask and her answer about how she broke her leg. When the next question was how do your mom and dad get along? Do they argue? I stood up and told her not to answer and them it is time to go.
They didn’t argue at all and got up and politely left. From the tone of my voice they must’ve knew better. lol
Turn about is fair play and instead of cowering in their homes people need to start fighting back.
Ridiculous crap-grew up on a small family ranch in the total middle of nowhere, hiking all over, winter or summer, every weekend with the rest of the family’s kids, hunting small game with GUNS, cleaning/skinning them with KNIVES, building FIRES when we stopped to roast marshmallows and hot dogs, leaving before dark so our moms could cook our fresh killed MEAT, and we ATE it.
In a city today, all my adult relatives would no doubt have been jailed for child neglect/endangerment-I suppose I would have too, since I brought mine up the same way...
By accident or design, these kids will grow up unable to handle life’s hard times-CPS needs to be defunded and gotten rid of-they have outlived any use they may have had...
THE BSA has been vaginized to an appalling degree.
I push back on them, as the scout leaders when I was a scout in the early 1970’s were mostly World War 2 and Korean War vets and had a totally different mindset.The scouts were to creat Men, Soldiers and Citizens(in that order).
But this comes from BSA National too. It won’t change unless there are more people like me who push back, who attend the committee meetings attend the roundtables and shut these women down and tell them they are creating pussies, not men.
Now that is what I call a fine idea-payback is a bitch...
At six?
I live in a major city, but reading the news, it doesn’t matter much these days where you live.
There are sex offenders out there who focus on children. There’s no chance I would allow a six year old to play 150 yards from home with no supervision.
Even if I was standing on the front porch watching the kid, it would take me time to get there. By then he would be gone.
If we’re talking about kids 10-14 years of age, as long as there are decent older kids participating, sure, let them run around. It’s part of growing up. Six? Nope.
Beat me to it. If only Texas could excise Austin and send it to CA where it belongs.
Until I was 13, I lived in a small town where I knew everybody, their parents and grandparents. Knew the churches they attended, or not, and where they lived. Everybody’s eyes were on you wherever you went. If you got into mischief, your parents would know about it before you got home.
We moved to Birmingham, Alabama when I was 14 in 1969. I still had no fear of going anywhere I pleased, even downtown to record stores and shopping, which was maybe four miles away from home. Even left my bike outside the stores unlocked..............................
Good for you.
My children’s only rules were “be sure you take the dog” while they roamed far and wide. That was to warn of snakes, and feral wildlife. And be home by dark.
Walked 4 miles from a semi-rural location on the edge of a university city to the elementary school in town and back, rain or shine, at the age of 7. Walked, rode a bicycle, picked up groceries, delivered 5 daily newspapers, rode a horse, drove a sulky, camped, hunted, and fished out to a radius of 12 miles from a village with a population of 700 at age 9 and older. Sometimes carried a rifle when doing so, and waved hello to the state police as they drove by. Can’t do that now....
I have my children go outside in groups.
“What will members of the Always On Screens Generation be like when they’re adults?”
Helpless victims...
If you never deal with dangers, threats or reality as a kid you never will be able to as an adult.
I wasn’t roaming around that much.
Some of my comments are related to a woman’s sister I observed. Here was this five year old roaming the neighborhood all day long.
Where do we expect kids to get direction from, if their parents which are home, don’t engage.
BTW: The woman I was dating had been lured inside a neighborhood home by an old guy. He tried to make some moves, but luckily she got away.
A strange woman got control of her 6 year old child because she was not supervising the boy. The stranger brought the child home, but she could have just as easily headed somewhere else with him.
No sympathy for this mother. She needs to learn to keep track of her kids.
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