Are we teaching our kids independence?

[cally]

This is a provocative article about how we raise our kids. My kids are now young adults but these type of issues were hotly debated in my house and among my peers. I'm not sure I would have let a 9 year old take the subway but I did let my then 13 year old take the bus to the city about an hour away. Many other parents refused to allow their kids to do this. :shrug:
...

"Childhood really has changed since today’s parents were kids, and not just in the United States. Australian children get stared at when they ride the bus alone. Canadian kids stay inside playing video­games. After I started a blog called Free Range Kids, I heard from a dad in Ireland who lets his 11-year-old play in the local park, unsupervised, and now a mom down the street won’t let her son go to their house. She thinks the dad is reckless.

What has changed in the English-speaking world that has made childhood independence taboo? The ground has not gradually gotten harder under the jungle gym. The bus stops have not crept farther from home. Crime is actually lower than it was when most of us were growing up. So there is no reality-based reason that children today should be treated as more helpless and vulnerable than we were when we were young.

If parents all around us are clutching their children close, it’s easy to understand why: It’s what pop culture is telling us to do. Stories of kidnappings swamp the news. Go online, and you can find a map of local sex offenders as easily as the local Victoria’s Secret (possibly in the same place). Meantime, if you do summon the courage to put your kids on a bus or a bench or a bike, other parents keep butting in: An unwatched child is a tragedy waiting to happen...."

http://theweek.com/article/index/96342/the-last-word-advice-from-americas-worst-mom

[HuckleB]

1. Too many of us seem very focused on protecting kids to their detriment.

http://freerangekids.wordpress.com/2011/02/16/outrage-of-the-week-grammar-school-cancels-val-day-for-good-of-the-students/

"Hi Readers — Our darling children, who, we’re told, can’t handle recess in the cold (see this), or waiting outside the high school to be picked up (see this), or babysitting, even at age 14 (see this), and who can’t possibly handle sleepovers (see this) or bugs ( see this) or bible stories (see this), are now being told they can’t handle Valentine’s Day, either."

Everything causes problems, and all problems must be avoided, or so it seems, at times.

[SoCalDem]

2. 24/7/365 media has convinced American parents that THEIR child is the next one

to be kidnapped/raped/killed.

[david13]

3. I think it's just the parents. They give in to whatever demand the kid

makes. If the kid whines and wants a ride to school, the parents do it every day. The kids know how to use peer pressure too. "The other kids mom drives them" they whine. And mom folds.
When I was a kid there were all kinds of stories about kidnapping and not talking to strangers and all that. But we still got out there all the time.
dc

[The2ndWheel]

4. "What has changed in the English-speaking world that has made childhood independence taboo?"

People in the English/developed world having fewer children? More attention paid to fewer children? Indulging every want and desire of fewer children because they're more able to do so financially and/or time-wise? People having children at an older age? Could that make parents more risk adverse?

I don't know, but I think the pop culture answer is probably a bit too easy.

[SoCalDem]

5. Smaller/later families have to have a LOT to do with it

When families were larger and kids closer in age, the older kids basically "raised' the younger ones:evilgrin:

and if you have just spend 5 years and $100K on in vitro, you are going to guard that little sucker like he was made of platinum:)

[HuckleB]

6. What's the "pop culture" answer, as opposed to the questions you pose?