You bring up a good point. We've stopped by the road before so our young kids can go potty and we figured, well they are only little so what's the harm. I can certainly see though where a over dramatic reporter then posts "Parent makes child pee in front of oncoming traffic" and makes it look like something it is not.
"We've stopped by the road..."
When I lived in Ireland (3 years, late 70's-early 80's) there were numerous times we stopped by the side of the road to use the "sheep loo".