# Sacramento wants daytime cerfews. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [January 27, 2003, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258 "2003-01-27T16:24:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/1 "2003-01-27T16:24:35Z")
[Sacramento wants daytime cerfews.](http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/story/6002393p-6959136c.html). You know, we wonder why kids act like animals. It seems pretty obvious. If society treated you like a cross between a criminal and a small child, would you be all that keen on society? Would you really feel like being a part of it? Kids have a right to exist. They have a right to go outside. Why is it cool to subject teenagers to laws that parallel the harshest of police states.We are talking about arresting normal, otherwise law-abiding citizens for walking around in broad daylight. We are talking about making anyone who appears under eighteen identify themselves and justify their existance to police on demand. Godwin help me, I can think of a few other situations where a certain class of citizens were required to carry papers and show them on demand if they dared to walk the streets. This is disgusting. Not too long ago, teenagers often went out on their own to start their families, careers and to build a life for themselves. Teenagers are inexperienced but fully sentient beings who are capable of making decisions, and deserve to be treated with respect for their growing autonomy. When we treat kids with suspicion and derision, they notice. I can think of a million reasons why a kid would be out during school hours. They may be home-schooled, or maybe they are sick and have to go to the doctors on their own. Maybe they are on their lunch break, maybe they got their period during class and snuck off to buy some tampons. Who cares? That is between them, their schools and their parents. But now we are going to treat kids like parolees? Now we are going to tell them that they arn’t even human enough to go outside on a sunny day? Fuck that! I was a teenager in Sacramento. That place was the most anti-youth place I know. Teenagers could expect to be harrassed in public places because they might scare off shoppers from the suburbs. The cerfew laws were strict and bizarre. Venues that catered to youth were so regulated that few entrepeneurs cared enough to open them, and those few that did open- purely out of the owners charity, under 21 events are rarely profitable- were shut down quickly or scared so badly with the threat of having their liqour licence (and livelyhood) pulled that kids had literally nowhere to go and nothing to do. The very very few events that allowed them would get overrun and unruly, and kids would go to places they did not belong and were not welcome (the farmer’s market was hip for a while) out of sheer desperation. Everywhere we went it was made plain that we wern’t wanted. Everything we loved was shut down, converted to over-21, or reworked to unfriendly to youth. Besides being unfair, it as simply ineffective. Do you have any idea how many kids get pregnant in Sacramento? Do you have any idea how many nights we spent at home sneaking off sips of our parents liqour and finding all kinds of trouble to get in, when we would have much rather been out and about at a concert or something having fun? Would you rather be smoking B-grade pot and making out with a pimply faced teenager, or out someplace having fun? Bored kids stuck at home turn into sex-having, drug-taking kids stuck at home. Disrespectful and needlessly restrictive laws turn kids into people disillusioned and unresponsive to police. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. The older I get, the more clear it becomes just how much the nation hates youth. They are the last opressed group that cannot vote against or even really speak out against their opression. Our attitude towards youth is a shame and discredit to our country. ---
**Author:** ![Kaje](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f04885/32.png) [@Kaje](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaje)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/2 "2003-01-27T16:44:37Z")
Even in it’s original intent this is crazy to quote from the story: > [@](#): > > The proposed ordinance would target expelled and suspended students, who some city leaders say roam the city unchecked because truancy laws apply only to students who are supposed to be in school. um… yes by definition that is true. If you expel them or suspend them and they are therefore not welcome at school, what the hell else can they do? I’m with you on this one. ---
**Author:** ![Gorgon\_Heap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f475e1/32.png) [@Gorgon\_Heap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gorgon_Heap)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/3 "2003-01-27T17:06:16Z")
Without time ot go in-depth with this, I just want to add my agreement with the previous posters. If I lived out there I’d be having a shit-fit. ---
**Author:** ![Neurotik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/4 "2003-01-27T17:08:19Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Kaje \* > **If you expel them or suspend them and they are therefore not welcome at school, what the hell else can they do?** Um, stay home? ---
**Author:** ![Gorgon\_Heap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f475e1/32.png) [@Gorgon\_Heap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gorgon_Heap)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/5 "2003-01-27T17:15:58Z")
> [@](#): > > Um, stay home? Not at all enforceable. What will they do, put a cop at every kids’ house to make sure they don’t leave? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/6 "2003-01-27T17:40:59Z")
Well, I’ll be damned. Occasionally a wingnut has a lick of sense. Since most anti-crime measures of a more or less punitive nature come from the right, it’s worth mentioning that [Michael Farris](http://www.hslda.org/about/staff/attorneys/Farris.asp), president and general counsel of the [Home School Legal Defense Association](http://www.hslda.org/), president of [Patrick Henry College](http://www.phc.edu/about/default.asp), unsuccessful GOP candidate for Lieutenant Governor of Virginia in 1993 (he was sufficiently far-right that George Allen’s coattails didn’t carry him into office), and card-carrying Christian Right activist, is fighting **against** this one. > [@](#): > > That’s not a convincing argument for Michael Farris, general counsel for the Home School Legal Defense Association. He hopes to end daytime curfews in California and plans to file an appeal to the California Supreme Court this week. > > He’s representing Monrovia private school students who were stopped by police 20 times in one month on their way to or from school. He’s also representing a 21-year-old – who looks younger – who feels hassled by the daytime curfew ordinance in Monrovia, a San Gabriel Valley community east of Pasadena. > > “If we want the next generation to be leaders of a free country, we have to treat them like leaders when they are young, not like they live in a police state,” Farris said. ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/7 "2003-01-27T19:52:51Z")
Wow, how utterly bizarre. It doesn’t seem natural to be agreeing with Mike Farris, but I guess nobody can be a wacko about _everything_. ---
**Author:** ![Angel\_of\_the\_Lord](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/angel_of_the_lord/32/2949_2.png) [@Angel\_of\_the\_Lord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Angel_of_the_Lord)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/8 "2003-01-27T20:36:15Z")
Gah. There’s no law where I grew up, but, when I was sick and/or when my district had the day off but the surrounding districts didn’t, I got stopped by mall rent-a-cops a few times (I’d go there to walk around, think, buy stuff–sometimes Mom would take me, but we’d be in different stores looking at things…I was not there to be a menace). I’d just explain the situation and they’d leave me alone. This, however, is bullshit. I mean, if the kids get MLK day off, can they leave their homes, or are they under house arrest. Also, I look younger than 18 (even though I’m almost 20). I sometimes don’t have a lick of ID on me (you know, if I’m out walking, or if a friend drove me somewhere). What the hell am I supposed to do? Feh. It’s a stupid rule. With such national attention, though. . .I doubt it’ll get passed. ---
**Author:** ![Tanaqui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3bc359/32.png) [@Tanaqui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tanaqui)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/9 "2003-01-27T20:52:26Z")
My town (Salem, OR) already has a similar curfew. Thank God, the law is apparently not enforced at all. I often wander around by myself during school hours, looking, as I do, quite a bit younger than my 17 years, and I’ve never been so much as commented on. I think these kinds of things are mostly put in effect so that the law has a reason to come down hard on any kids who are “loitering” or somehow pissing people off without actually breaking any existing laws. They don’t just go and pick up kids who are innocently shopping or walking around or whatever. Still disgusting, though. ---
**Author:** ![kniz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@kniz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kniz)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/10 "2003-01-27T21:14:32Z")
For what reason were these unfair laws passed. Surely you don’t think they were bored one day and someone said “What can we do to be unfair to teenagers.” Methinks there may be two sides to this story. I agree these laws are extreme, but sometimes extreme conditions require extreme measures. ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/11 "2003-01-27T22:44:42Z")
Always take ID with you? Is that an unreasonable thing to expect? If you’re out walking, and a car hits you (for example), you’ll need to be identified somehow when they get you to the hospital… I really don’t understand why people go out without some kind of ID in case of an emergency. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2003, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/12 "2003-01-27T22:52:26Z")
> [@](#): > > I really don’t understand why people go out without some kind of ID in case of an emergency. Goodness! It’s just one of those things that happen sometimes. Think about it: - Your wallet/purse is stolen or lost. - You’re just walking down the block to grab a newspaper. - You’re out jogging and you don’t have pockets. - You get locked out of the house or car. OR… YOU SIMPLY FORGOT TO TAKE IT WITH YOU ---
**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:** [January 27, 2003, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/13 "2003-01-27T23:41:40Z")
The only reason I take my ID with me everywhere is because I have my wallet chained to my keys so I don’t forget either. If I don’t have my ID, I’m not getting back into my house. ---
**Author:** ![Angel\_of\_the\_Lord](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/angel_of_the_lord/32/2949_2.png) [@Angel\_of\_the\_Lord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Angel_of_the_Lord)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2003, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/14 "2003-01-28T00:04:06Z")
If I’m walking around the block or hanging out at a friend’s house, an ID isn’t really necessary. All taking it with me would do would be to give me yet _another_ opportunity to lose it. I’ve managed so far to keep my original driver’s license. I really don’t wanna wreck that ;). ---
**Author:** ![World\_Eater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f04885/32.png) [@World\_Eater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/World_Eater)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2003, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/15 "2003-01-28T00:12:00Z")
I agree that this is pretty stupid idea. One thing did annoy me though. > [@](#): > > “I’m 18, but I look like I’m 12,” said Woo, a Sacramento City College student. “What if I get stopped?” Umm carry an ID? I also think it’s stupid to throw the parents in the slammer. ---
**Author:** ![Kaje](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f04885/32.png) [@Kaje](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaje)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2003, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/16 "2003-01-28T00:23:58Z")
If it was a choice between carrying my ID and being harassed, i’d make sure to have my ID… it’s really not that difficult. I’m a very forgetful person… a complete doofus to hear some tell it, but I’m just in a habit of sticking my wallet in my back pocket everywhere i go. I can’t think of the last time i went anywhere without it… the power of habit… now if only i could do that with useful things ---
**Author:** ![SweetLucy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bcef8e/32.png) [@SweetLucy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SweetLucy)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2003, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/17 "2003-01-28T01:39:18Z")
One mall in Albuquerque has been known to really pick on teenagers, especially of the Hispanic variety, if they dare to stroll around the mall in groups of more than one. The excuse is “they scare other shoppers.” How prejudiced. I know there are gang problems, but most of the worst gangsters are adults. ---
**Author:** ![robertliguori](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/46a35a/32.png) [@robertliguori](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robertliguori)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2003, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/18 "2003-01-28T02:22:46Z")
You know, I’d really like it if there was a competency test. If you passed it, you were afforded all the rights and responsibilities of an adult (could own property, your parents could kick you out/you could leave, you could be tried as an adult, you could look at porn, drink, smoke, and neglect your education, etc.). The problem is that a large chunk of the voting populace of America could not pass such a test. ---
**Author:** ![Bongmaster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Bongmaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bongmaster)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2003, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/19 "2003-01-30T20:14:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by catsix \* > \*\*Always take ID with you? > > Is that an unreasonable thing to expect? > > If you’re out walking, and a car hits you (for example), you’ll need to be identified somehow when they get you to the hospital… > > I really don’t understand why people go out without some kind of ID in case of an emergency. \*\* Yes, that is completely unreasonable. When did we become a police state where it is necessary to have [/nazi]Your papers please[/nazi]? ---
**Author:** ![Troy\_McClure\_SF](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troy_mcclure_sf/32/4150_2.png) [@Troy\_McClure\_SF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Troy_McClure_SF)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2003, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258/20 "2003-01-31T01:13:28Z")
To the folks who say, “Well, carry an ID if you don’t want to be harassed”: You shouldn’t have to do _anything at all_ to not be harassed. Under most current laws, you don’t. It should stay that way, regardless of age (well, not 6 year olds, obviously). Shit, when I was in high school, we were broke, it was all we could do to take the bus somewhere and wander around. Is there really any good reason that _all_ teenagers must be banned from public places during school hours? > [@](#): > > “Kids … are released into neighborhoods and wandering around and getting into trouble…” No, _some_ kids are. Some adults are too. Should adults not at work from 9 to 5 carry IDs from work saying that they work nights? [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sacramento-wants-daytime-cerfews/151258.md?page=2)