Are we too overprotective of the younglings today or have things changed?

Great Debates
1

In this thread, Dopers recall things from our childhoods that just don’t occur today. Some things are gone because they were very bad and obviously should be (public smoking, racist teachers, generic beer, etc.), but one of the most recurring themes is that Dopers, particularly those of us 35 and over, all seemed to have had a LOT more personal freedom in our childhoods than kids today have. Many Dopers in the thread talk about going trick-or-treating alone on Halloween, spending all day playing without parental supervision, being latch key kids, walking a mile to or from school, etc., and with few if any horror stories resulting from these things.

Today kids are a lot more strictly supervised in most neighborhoods, sending them Trick or Treating alone is almost unthinkable, and in many neighborhoods you won’t even see the kids playing outside. Do you believe that this is because times are more dangerous today? Or that the media just makes it seem things are more dangerous? Or are parents just too overprotective?

Discuss amongst yourselves, I’ll be back.

2

I was ridiculously overprotected in my childhood (I wasn’t allowed out of our fenced-in backyard without adult supervision until I was 9…didn’t get a bicycle until I was 10) and even I think there’s some ridiculous overprotection now. I’m 38, just to give a timeframe (childhood in the 70s/early 80s). There was a lot in the thread you linked that I remember quite well.

3

I was a latchkey kid from a pretty young age because I was the only kid in my dad and stepmom’s household and they both worked. I was given plenty of responsibility and instruction on how I was supposed to behave myself at home alone. When school was done in the summer I was barely at home because I was out playing in the neighborhood, getting into all sorts of mischief. Despite all that time alone, I still had to check in with my parents pretty regularly, and I got into deep shit if I didn’t.

So I’m not sure that today’s parents are any more protective than my parents were, but I do feel today’s parents may be much more neurotic and paranoid about what other people might do to their kids.

4

The statistics do show that times are not, in fact, more dangerous for kids. I said in that thread, and do think, that any increased danger would come from decreased permissiveness towards children - in other words, if you’re the only kid who walks to school, it isn’t as safe for you because there aren’t a bunch of other kids abroad in the world and because the soccer moms aren’t expecting to see you under the wheels of their SUVs.

I’m sure that 24 hour news and increased awareness of things that happen thousands of miles away bear a lot of the responsibility for this.

5

My group at work subscribed for awhile to a group that tracks trends and attitudes among generation sets (Iconoculture, if anyone’s interested).

They said that the new generation of kids, aged 0 - 11 – Gen We (it’s service marked, so I guess that’s Iconoculture’s name for it) – is getting back to values of community, play, and fun. Here are some snippets from their overview of Gen We. It gives me hope – these are the children of people who were kids in the 70s, which is my cohort.

I think it’s pretty interesting stuff, and I hope these emerging patterns prove out.

6

Well, there is an increased awareness of risk factors. Whether it is too increased or not can be debated – certainly Nancy Grace has given more than enough exposure to the mortal perils faced by attractive white girls/women every time they go out the door, vis a vis the actual risk.

I think we’ve also discovered or had a growing awareness of some truths it’s good to know. Pedophiles do exist, in some non-trivial proportion; they can’t be cured; they target children in specific patterns, a number of which involve/start with having access to talk to the kid in a context in which no adult is present. Some of this might not have been talked about in the past out of prudishness in discussing sexual issues, naivete (“Oh, you know Bob, he’s always been a bit off, but I’m sure that comment to little Timmy was just a joke, won’t happen again.”).

Some of it is increasing mobility (as in not living so much for years and years in the same small community, where you knew your neighbors, your neighbors could be proxy parents when they saw your kid doing something risky in your absence, where there were readily walkable/cyclable streets).

And some of it honestly is that parents back then were (consciously or not) more willing to expose or allow their child to be exposed to (low-probability) risks to life and limb. As we’ve learned about more risks, and come to an ever more offspring-centric middle class culture, parents now are less willing to tolerate risk. It doesn’t help that there’s a feedback loop. When you’ve taken ten protective measures against ten increasingly attenuated risks, when you’ve created a world in which few children get abducted or get concussions (or, compared to the past, die of whooping cough), it becomes increasingly rare for children to come to harm, thus breeding the illusion that risk of harm can and must be eliminated, thus incentivizing protective measure no. 11 against even-less-probable risk no. 11.

Also, shame. If your kid died in an accident 100 years ago, you had four others, it’s sad, but things happen, remember when Baby Alice died of typhoid and that Jenkins boy got shot to death out hunting? If your kid dies or gets hurt today, and there’s a measure you could have taken, a restriction you could have enforced, to prevent it – man, you’re the World’s Worst Parent On Earth.

To answer the OP more directly: yes, too overprotective, no, the objective risks haven’t changed as much as the protectiveness has, but yes, I can understand the impulse to coddle the kid if it were mine.

7

I don’t think the risks have increased on a per-capita basis. But most of us are living in increasing population density, and therefore the risk that “a” child in the neighborhood will be abused by a pedophile (for example) is increased. It d@mn sure won’t be the Celtling if I can prevent it.

There is also vastly increased awareness. There are several registered sex offenders in my neighborhood. I’m sure there were sex offenders in the neighborhood I grew up in, but my Mother had no way of knowing that, and so could be excused for leaving us vulnerable to them. I DO know, and could never forgive myself if I allowed such a thing to happen to the Celtling.

I know that my parents were dangerously naive, and I tink the same was true of most of their generation. By the same token, I think most of thhe parents I come into contact with are actually MORE aware of the importance of building independence in their kids than my parents were. My parents subscribed to the very hierarchy-based, “don’t question authority,” sort of discipline that made so many of my peers go decades before reporting abuse at the hands of teachers and religious leaders.

Celtling already knows that she has the right to say “no”. Until she has the physical strength to enforce it, however, I’ll be watching, or researching the backgrounds of anyone watching her in my stead.

8

I already posted this link in another thread a couple of days ago, but it is even more relevant here: George Carlin is 100% with the OP (STRONG LANGUAGE)

:smiley:

9

I think it’s useful to read that thread in conjunction with Hal’s thread which contains a few memories of the narrow escapes had by unsupervised children.

I think today’s older parents are more protective because they’ve planned their children, and often had to put effort into even the conception of children. Kids are no longer a gift from G-d, or the result of nature taking it’s course, these kids are the result of a new kind of parental effort. Kids (for these older, trend-setting parents) are like the car you’ve always wanted and can finally afford. G-d help the loser who scratches it.

I also think TruCelt and Huerta88 are correct in the increased awareness of threats. The news outlets seem to exsist to frighten parents.

10

I was one of those kids out all day long and not returning till the streetlights came on. Of course, I was only hanging out in the neighborhood. I did have to tell my mother if I was going to someone’s house. And we’d take long bike trips. And we walked, everywhere, for miles. No one ever cared where we went or what we did, we were on our own for finding our own entertainment,… When I was 14 or so my friends and I would get on the bus and go downtown to the movies, shopping…I have a friend who was overprotective to the extreme. Her girls were equipped with cell phones so she could call every 15 minutes if they were out of her sight - “where are you now? What street? You can walk as far as Main Street but then I want you to come back”. This! In the most boring suburb in the USA! Where did it get my friend? At age 17 the older girl moved out into an apartment with her boyfriend, and the younger girl shortly moved in with them (there was a nasty divorce going on). I suppose it could have gone the other way? They could have become afraid of their own shadows, clinging to mom.

11

The media also seems to make a bigger deal of overprotective parents than really exists. Many kids around here roam the neighborhood, they hang out in the woods, or at the skate park. They build forts. They have to be called in for dinner, dirty and bloody from falling on their bikes.

They seem to have less time now - by the time they get home from school its after 4:00 - I got home from elementary school by 3:00. Then they play for a bit until dinner - have homework. Then there are activities, a lot of kids are really scheduled in activities - but I did piano and dance with regularity - and tried softball, volleyball, gymnastics, basketball and tennis at their ages. In the summers there aren’t as many kids with long free days - since mom often works there is childcare.

12

One thing which has changed a lot since my childhood in the 70’s is traffic. I’m very aware that, while there were few cars to dodge on my way to the school bus in my primary school years, my daughter’s much shorter route to school crosses a divided highway with four lanes each way, and routes to the park/library/friends houses aren’t much better.

I also endorse Dangerosa’s point above. My nephews, growing up in a small country town, have been doing a lot of the stuff listed in the “unthinkable” thread since quite early ages.

13

I agree with this. There has been a cultural change in attitudes towards children that is less permissive/authoritative and more authoritarian. It’s reflected in the juvenile justice system, the zero tolerance rules in schools, and the severe punishment for rule infractions at school and crimes committed by increasingly younger children. At the same time, there has been a decrease in mental health and social services.

I have a teenage son with friends who are routinely drug test by parents. I know of another parent who had her son arrested for hijacking the family car one night. I am against drug testing in general, but I would never consider drug testing my child.
There seems to be less nurturing and more punishing, and kids have less room to make mistakes.

14

Perhaps both? Things have changed to make things more dangerous (if only in practical terms, like the heavier traffic Aspidistra mentioned), BUT parents’ response to these changes have been overreactions?

15

A little bit of both I guess. I’m 34 and my brother is 17. I definitely played outdoors more as a kid, with no supervision, pretty much all day. But then I also lived in an apartment complex next to a school, whereas my brother lived in a house on a regular block that wasn’t near a park or woods. I cooked for myself and did mine own laundry since Junior High. My brother still doesn’t and he’s going to college soon. He has a cell phone in case the parents want to check up on him. My parents let all sorts of people take me off their hands - their friends, family members, friend’s parent’s, neighbors. I took the plane when I was a kid by myself. Stayed for weeks with relatives. Walked home from school, had my own key. My parents made it very difficult for anyone else to take my brother, even including close family members. I was expected to get a part time job and they even considered making me contribute to the household funds in high school, but my brother has no such expectations and they give him lots of money for things. On the other hand, since my brother turned 16 they were relatively easy on him when they caught him trying pot, and they pretty much ignore it when he is hanging out with friends somewhere drinking alcohol.

16

I was born in the early '80s and was overprotected in a lot of ways. I didn’t get killed, but in some respects it didn’t do me any favors - for example I did great in school until I went to college and had to keep myself on track, which I did sporadically. My youngest brother, who is a full 10 years younger than me, actually got a much easier ride from my parents even though he falls into the demographic that’s supposed to be getting helicopter parented. But these things are all specific to my parents and not to the culture at large.

I don’t know if there’s any factual basis to the article Beadalin posted, but if the pendulum is started to swing the other way, I wouldn’t be surprised. Haven’t older generations always believed today’s kids were too soft?

17

I’m not sure whether it is really increased over-protectiveness, as opposed to increased parental attention to their kids’ social and recreational lives. And I think at least a good portion of this change reflects modern trend of 2-income families.

When I was young - in the 60s - single parent households and/or working moms was the exception, not the rule. Very few of my playmates did not have a mom sending them off to and welcoming them home from school. So I think that the parents may have felt they had sufficient ongoing awareness of what the kids were up to and with whom.

Also, remember that altho we were riding our bikes all over the place - and doing things our parents undoubtedly would not approve of, we did not have the instant contact to so many influences as modern technology provides. The occasional groper/exposer and “stranger danger” were entirely different hazards than can be encountered through the internet from home.

I also believe double income families may become overly involved with their kids’ lives. In some instances it might reflect guilt over not physicaly being there all the time. Other folk seem to “compete” through their kids, having them participate and excell in more and more structured activities. And yet other folks seem to try to recreate their ideas of a “perfect” childhood through their kids - dressing them in expensive designer clothes, and keeping them busy in all of the “right” kind of activities.

And while the “overprotective” parents get all the press, in my experience there are still several parents out there who are willing to let their kids experience some degree of risk, and get their hands dirty and skin their knees as they grow up.

18

This is just anecdotal, but I see kids playing outside all the time without adult supervision. Also, there was a little boy I was mentoring a few years ago, who I took trick or treating in a friend’s neighborhood. There were lots of kid out in groups without adults. We ran into a student of mine, who was 12, who took us to all the best houses. He had no adult with him. The experience was really wonderful. The entire community was decked out for the holiday, and there was plenty of ambient supervision because so many people of all ages were around, but not a lot of parental hovering. It’s one of my fondest recent memories, actually, because my little friend had never been trick or treating before, and the community was so welcoming and kid friendly.

19

Perhaps the fact that, on average, people are having children somewhat later in life and are having less of them has something to do with the trend.

All being equal, a 40 year old couple with 1 young child is more likely to be over-protective than 20 year olds with 3 (as my parents were).

20

And equally anecdotally, I never do. If I didn’t see the occasional child out with their parents I would not know there are any kids in my neighborhood. Sometimes it looks like there are pre-teen kids walking to school unsupervised, but if I wait a minute, I’ll see they are being followed by a mom (or maybe a nanny) with a stroller. I live in a pretty nice neighborhood with no major streets to cross to get to the middle school.
Last Halloween I got home from work after dark and saw at least 4 cars that had kids in them being driven from house to house. Seriously, the car would stop, kids get out run up the driveway, get treats, run down the driveway, get in the car, roll 15 feet to the next drive and repeat. I would not have thought there were that many non-walking adults.