this post was submitted on 03 Jun 2024
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Boys will be boys (lemmy.world)
submitted 3 weeks ago by Riker to c/[email protected]
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[–] Anticorp 6 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Those stories made the news because of how outrageous they are, not because they're common occurrences. There are still plenty of kids running around outside and having fun in the rest of the non-wacko towns across the country.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Imo it's not as significant that the cops were called - anyone can do that and the police have to respond - as it is that those police departments had both the will and legal standing to pursue charges, have CPS threaten to remove kids from their homes over it, and put a mother's name on a list which bans her from ever working with children.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

I think this is the thing we tend to often forget: what we read in the news, with regards to individual or anecdotal stories, is oftentimes not representative of a general experience but rather edge cases because that’s what makes them newsworthy. It can be easy to feel doom and gloom about an issue because you’re seeing it reported regularly, but countries, and the USA in particular, have massive populations so edge cases have higher absolute incidence rates.

This differs though from news reports that are more focussed on an issue as a whole and present statistics and research; that’s obviously representative as long as the statistics are being used in good faith and the research is solid.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 weeks ago

If you want statistics and hard facts I can provide those too, those were just the stories that showed up at the top of google in the 10 minutes I had to search.

Among parents of a child 9-11 years, 84% agree that children benefit from having free time without adult supervision. Fewer parents report their child does things without an adult present, including staying home for 30-60 minutes (58%), finding an item at the store while the parent is in another aisle (50%), staying in the car while the parent runs a quick errand (44%), walking/biking to a friend’s house (33%) or playing at the park with a friend (29%), or trick-or-treating with friends (15%). The top reason parents cite as preventing them from letting their child 9-11 years have time without adult supervision is worry that someone might scare or follow their child (54%); however, only 17% say their neighborhood is not safe for children to be alone. Some parents think their child isn’t ready (32%) or doesn’t want (28%) to do these things. Some parents believe state or local laws don’t allow children that age to be alone (17%), that someone might call the police (14%), or that others will think they are a bad parent (11%) if their child is not in direct adult supervision.

Over half of parents (56%) say that unsupervised children cause trouble. One-quarter (25%) have criticized another parent, and 13% have been criticized, for not adequately supervising their child.

None of these are really insignificant numbers. This is a real issue, you can't just handwave it away with platitudes of "edge cases" and "anecdotal stories". This is 85% of surveyed parents saying they would not let their 9-11 year old child go trick-or-treating unsupervised. I understand that your anecdotal experience differs, but people are actually afraid in this country.

The laws are a bit too close for comfort on this as well; according to my state's department of health and human services, "According to the Child Protection Law, these situations are determined on a case-by-case basis, but as a general rule, a child 10 years old and younger is not responsible enough to be left home alone. If the child is between 10 and 12, and someone complains, he or she will be evaluated"

[–] Anticorp 1 points 3 weeks ago

Thank you for so clearly typing out such an important point. This tends to frequently be forgotten, especially in the echo chambers of online communities like Lemmy, and Reddit. It's important we remember this if we're to avoid slipping into despair and doomerism.