# Recess police successful in removing the play from playground-more PC head in assery **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 23, 2004, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031 "2004-08-23T01:40:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![danceswithcats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9e8a1a/32.png) [@danceswithcats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/danceswithcats)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/1 "2004-08-23T01:40:32Z")
The children of this generation are at risk, IMHO. Now we have to make all playground games free of bodily contact? [What a fragrant steaming pile.](http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/story/10469970p-11389340c.html) Reflecting on recess from my own youth, they’d have put the whole lot of us on a bus to the juvenile detention home, if we had to observe these rules. Who is putting these meatheads in charge of our kids? I’m glad it hasn’t come to my town, yet. ---
**Author:** ![Granuaile](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ecccb3/32.png) [@Granuaile](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Granuaile)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/2 "2004-08-23T01:50:22Z")
[Taking Note] Yet another reason to get the _hell_ out of Sacramento. [/Taking Note] ---
**Author:** ![Jenaroph](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e8c25b/32.png) [@Jenaroph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jenaroph)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/3 "2004-08-23T02:28:27Z")
No tag? No shouting? No pushing each other on _swings_? Writing down rules, or else your game might be banned from the playground? What’s wrong with these people? ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/4 "2004-08-23T02:33:36Z")
I feel very lucky to have been a kid in the 70’s, when we could play things like “smear the queer” during recess not caring about the occasional injury (and thinking ‘queer’ merely meant ‘strange’), trick-or-treat on Halloween after dark without parents, ride our bikes without wearing a suit of armor… And I felt over-protected! ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/5 "2004-08-23T02:57:58Z")
Every day, our little world seems to get more and more like the world in Demolition Man. What is wrong with these people? We used to play baseball, football, dodgeball, some sort of “cooties” game, kick the can, lots of things. I don’t remember any of us dying or being scarred for life. Hell some of our games had no real rules, other than to just have a good time. We are gonna wind up raising a generation of brainwashed, socially deficient neurotics. ---
**Author:** ![Abbie\_Carmichael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/49beb7/32.png) [@Abbie\_Carmichael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Abbie_Carmichael)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/6 "2004-08-23T03:02:36Z")
Another argument for private or homeschooling. America’s public schools are producing a nation of wimps. ---
**Author:** ![Muad\_Dib](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/35a633/32.png) [@Muad\_Dib](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muad_Dib)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/7 "2004-08-23T03:05:34Z")
Elvira Kurt has a great bit about this in her act. I can’t remember the last time I saw a swing in a playground, let alone one of those awsome 40 ft tall rocket ship things. And one should never be proud to have grown up in the seventies, for any reason. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/8 "2004-08-23T03:12:23Z")
> [@Muad'Dib](#): > > And one should never be proud to have grown up in the seventies, for any reason. Not even because so many kids walked around with lawn-darts sticking out of our heads that it became more a fashion accessory than an injury, like a freaking hat? And besides, I was a kid in the 70’s, I didn’t grow up then. I grew up about 6 months ago, ---
**Author:** ![Joe\_Random](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e8c25b/32.png) [@Joe\_Random](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joe_Random)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/9 "2004-08-23T03:30:29Z")
> [@Jenaroph](#): > > Writing down rules, or else your game might be banned from the playground? Well, I guess Calvinball is out of the question, then. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Harborwolf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@Harborwolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harborwolf)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/10 "2004-08-23T03:45:29Z")
You’d figure Governor Terminator wouldn’t put up with this sort of crap. Man, when I was a kid the recess monitors would let us fight until somebody fell over like in the NHL. We would get into pine cone wars and whip the hard green cones at each other. We even had metal playground equipment. Now everything is plastic and Nerf foam :mad: We’re becoming a country of sissies. Next thing you know Canada is going to come south and kick our asses for our collective lunch money. ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/11 "2004-08-23T04:15:06Z")
I can’t tell which is preferable: this system, or the one it was designed to replace (mere anarchy and roving assault), which I remember from my own youth ---
**Author:** ![MrTuffPaws](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f475e1/32.png) [@MrTuffPaws](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrTuffPaws)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/12 "2004-08-23T04:18:17Z")
Ya know, **this has nothing to do with being PC** , but this does have everything to do with fear of litigation. The schools can’t afford to be sued, even it was something that would be tossed from court. The cost of representation is just too much. ---
**Author:** ![NinjaChick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/71c47a/32.png) [@NinjaChick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NinjaChick)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/13 "2004-08-23T04:20:39Z")
Jesus…no _tag_? I can’t begin to count the number of hours I spent playing every possible variant of tag in elementary school. We’re breeding a generation of kids who can’t amuse themselves. Either their parents plunk them down in front of the TV, or they’re at school, and even there, their recess now is playing adult-organized, structured games. What happened to tossing some balls and jump ropes out, and saying, “go have fun”? ---
**Author:** ![Brutus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@Brutus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brutus)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/14 "2004-08-23T04:21:12Z")
Pfft. I don’t see why kids are being given ‘recess’ when instead we could be using all of that low-cost labor to help us compete with China! ---
**Author:** ![Zabali\_Clawbane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/ecd19e/32.png) [@Zabali\_Clawbane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zabali_Clawbane)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/15 "2004-08-23T05:36:59Z")
I think they meant well by setting up the restrictions, but have gone too far in several instances. I too, think it’s fear of litigation that is largely moving the schools to do these things. I for one, wouldn’t have missed dodge ball. In High School we would still have co-ed P.E. from time to time, and we’d square off boys versus girls in dodge ball. Getting hit in the face with a deflated basketball thrown as hard as the boy could throw, from the sidelines was not something I’d looked forward to. (I don’t know why the teacher thought it would be fine to put a deflated basketball, volleyballs and the red rubber balls all together.) Of course the boy claimed it was an “accident”, and I was very lucky my glasses weren’t broken, though my skin was cut/bruised. Another boy saw what happened, and he “defended my honor”. Not that it really made things all better, but the boy who attacked me didn’t try that again at least. ---
**Author:** ![Marlitharn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/779978/32.png) [@Marlitharn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marlitharn)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/16 "2004-08-23T05:47:29Z")
Good Lord. So when all these kids graduate high school and head for the Real World, they’re going to find themselves completely unequipped to think for themselves, resolve their own conflicts, imagine solutions to problems, without the intervention of a Person in Authority? We’re raising sheeple. Feh. When I was a kid some of the boys spent 4 whole days worth of recesses making the World’s Biggest Snowball. This thing was taller than our principal. On Friday they shoved it down the big hill and knocked a bunch of kids flying like tenpins. These days they’d probably be charged with assault and suspended, never mind they were only 9 years old and the other kids were running to deliberately jump _into_ the snowball’s path, because to get knocked ass over teakettle by a 7 foot snowball was, like, awesome. Kids are a lot tougher, physically and emotionally, than we give them credit for, and these schools aren’t doing them any favors by not letting them screw up for themselves. I’m not advocating mass carnage and anarchy; by all means adults should be on hand to put a stop to bloodshed and overt cruelty. But they should be in the background, eyeballing the little barbarians from the shadows, not out in the middle of things press-ganging children into relay races. ---
**Author:** ![Zabali\_Clawbane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/ecd19e/32.png) [@Zabali\_Clawbane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zabali_Clawbane)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/17 "2004-08-23T06:05:02Z")
Yeah, that part of it disturbs me too **Marlitharn**. I wish there was a way that they could allow for the kids to work things out amongst themselves more, maybe teach them conflict resolution but leave the actual work up to the kids? I don’t know, they do need to learn how to resolve conflicts too. However, I didn’t really learn to do that with some of my bullies, and we were left to our own devices. So there needs to be a middle ground, just finding it is the problem, especially with the sue happy parents. The kids need to learn problem solving, and how to deal with all types of people, and resolve differences somehow. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/18 "2004-08-23T06:07:32Z")
> [@Harborwolf](#): > > Canada is going to come south and kick our asses … again … ---
**Author:** ![InternetLegend](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/internetlegend/32/13154_2.png) [@InternetLegend](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/InternetLegend)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/19 "2004-08-23T06:08:45Z")
Just to add a little real-world perspective, I’d like to interject that my own daughter played dodgeball and tag in P.E. and ran and screamed with the other kids during recess at their public school as recently as last year. My older daughter played dodgeball and some rather violent-sounding flag football during coed (public) summer-school P.E. a couple of months ago. Although they have taken out the merry-go-rounds, we do still have huge swingsets and climbing bars in our public parks. These restrictions are by no means universal. ---
**Author:** ![Grrr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grrr/32/146_2.png) [@Grrr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grrr)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2004, 9:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031/20 "2004-08-23T09:52:48Z")
I blame 90% of this on the asshats that start these frivolous lawsuits. Like the dick head parents that want to sue the school for a million dollars cuz’ poor little junior got a paper cut. Glad I was raised in the 70’s. Hell the school I went to; if you started acting up the teacher just took a paddle to your ass right then and there. There wasn’t no “Call to the parents” Living in a Nerf[sup]tm[/sup] world!! How fun for the children… :rolleyes: [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recess-police-successful-in-removing-the-play-from-playground-more-pc-head-in-assery/261031.md?page=2)