Posted on 06/14/2015 7:34:33 AM PDT by rktman
My son, a cop, responded to a 911 report of a teenage boy abusing his younger sister. When he got to the house he found a 16 year old boy and his 14 year old sister. The boy had thrown one French fry at her and hit her in the back of the head, she called 911 and just reported that her brother was attacking her.
My son let her off with a lecture on what 911 was all about.
But why does a kid playing basketball in his own driveway need protection? I just moved and checked the crime statistics in my new neighborhood. It’s practically non-existent. Oddly enough, in black neighborhoods, you’d think it was the 1950s the way kids play baseball in sandlots without any helicoptering parent around. Moderation is called for not government spies or nosy neighbors.
Good for your son! Everyone needs to be lectured on the high priority of 911. I never paid attention to this problem until the police showed up at my door.
Sadly I agree with you. All of us of age 50 plus have glorious tales of a free range, latch key childhood. Consider this though. There was a time in America when deviants were locked up and institutionalized and such behavior was not promoted by our overlords. Not so much in the last 30 years.
” a free range, latch key childhood.”
In my small town neighborhood, nobody even locked their doors. Keys were usually left in the car parked in the driveway. In kindergarten, I took the bus, but after that I preferred to walk the mile to school. Had a great shortcut thru the woods! Took the bus in cruddy weather though. Ranged far and wide. Independence, Ohio during the Fifties.
When you say a young girl would not be safe outside today, you are just feeding into the paranoia. Child abductions are extremely rare and in most cases the abductions are by a family member, as result of a custody battle.
Ohio childhood also. Alas, Ozzie and Harriet are gone.
Just take it and go, the sheriff will get you soon, scumbag!
I grew up in a suburb of Philadelphia where not only the kids but the dogs ran free. Packs of kids and dogs roamed the unfenced yards and playgrounds. We walked to elementary school over a mile away, not a parent in sight.
Your post reminded me of an incident that happened to me when I was in the 5th or 6th grade. My mother had signed me up for a summer Bible study school held in a private home some miles away from our home. After the class was over She would pick me up and for some reason I was always the last one to be picked up. I was supposed to play the with son (my age)of the teacher until picked up. He would invite me to his room to play with his toys. His toys were dolls, the kind a girl would play with. I was expecting toy solders like the standing man, crawling man, kneeling man and such.
I told my mom what was going on and that I did not want to go back ever! And I didn’t. We were living in Hawaii so she signed me up for ukulele lessons. Oh please Help! Is all I could think. I did learn to play a few simple songs, “Oh! Susanna” was one. All I wanted to do was ride my bike and play war with my friends.
I was thinking about this just the other day. Where I live now, we have so many problems with dogs. They are required to be on leash, but people don’t always do that and there are dog fights all the time...usually caused by someone’s off leash dog running up to another dog which is on-leash. It has happened to me, requiring an emergency vet visit with my dog late on a Saturday night. Growing up, the dogs roamed all over the neighborhood and I don’t recall them fighting. We had more trouble with the dogs chasing joggers or cars, but not fighting each other.
Kids often know before the adults. I was involved with amateur theatrics as a kid and my “director” was a drunk. At his home, he would teach me to act and then drive me home - all over the roads, sidewalks and ditches. My mother told me I was making it up! He was too nice to be a drunk.
Sadly, this sad but rather nice man, eventually killed a woman in a drunk driving accident. He died in prison. I still think about him.
I, occasionally, still leave the keys in the car. And my doors are all unlocked. The news always makes it look like it’s murder and mayhem 24/7. It’s not true.
I remember an occasional dog fight, but it was rare. Dog poop was everywhere. It was one of my chores as a kid, to police our yard of litter, which included random poops.
I haven’t left the keys in my car in about 20 years. That time it was stolen out of our driveway. I got it back but is was stripped of everything they could lift, seats, tires and wheels, radio everything. That was a lesson I don’t need to relearn.
In the 70s, we’d leave our windows rolled down in the HS school parking lot and our shot guns on the headache rack and no one thought a thing about it. The guys would have a round circle on their back pocket from the mandantory Skoal can whether they chewed or not. And a knife in their boots.
I walked home by myself down a busy city street in 3rd grade. Then it was on our bikes for the rest of the day. No cell phone. No gps. No nosey neighbors calling CPS. My house key was my bedroom window which had never had a lock put on it. In HS, we were issued plastic ID cards which no one ever looked at so was a complete waste of tax dollars. 40 students per class, lol. But the card worked faster than a key in the front door lock. I sadly shake my head at Hollyweird movies and tv shows because they are clueless how to break in with credit cards.
I’d walk or bike this entire neighborhood by myself without a care in the world when I was little. Then when our kids did the same, neighbors would tsk, tsk. Today, you never see a kid outside. When our middle school aged nephews came last summer, they didn’t know how to ride a bike and refused to learn. They refused to go outside or even to the attached garage to see the newborn kittens. They did NOTHING but sit with their noses in their phones because their parents don’t even let them play in their own back yard.
I remember those days.
You can also tell the homo you would rather he not speak to your child in such terms or even at all for that matter!. You can say “no” for the child!
He started calling my son into his yard to pet the dog he watches. I stopped that immediately. Our other neighbors watch out for us as well. They’re good people. My son is high functioning ASD, so sometimes telling him about things isn’t as cut and dry as with other kids.
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