Remind your kids.....please.

Oh, I just assumed that all pedophiles and sex-trade scumbags were Muslim.

Kidding.

He is using Muslims as a an example of how Fox News loves to whip up threats -- real or imagined -- and stoke the fears of its audience.

Scared people are much more pliant.

 

What does that say about our society if it is more dangerous today (which is subjective)? And should these incidents deter children from playing in the park or going on long bike rides around the neighborhood or to the local 7-11? I guess a lot of it depends on right place, right time. But people shouldn't change the way they live because of these types of actions, and they should teach their kids the dangers of them. It's all they can do.

 

This "market" didn't just arrive in the last few years and anyone who believes it did is naive. There always has been one. There always have been abductions. This "market" wasn't as well-known, though, because we didn't have the Internet to spread the word about all the worldwide perversion, sex crimes, abductions, etc.

Probably is much worse today with the Internet helping these low-life POS slimeballs make connections and send information.

 

My wife and I have a 12 and a 10 yr old. One of the largest tension points for me is how much rope do you give them?

Forty years ago, as a 6 yr old I rode buses in San Francisco to go visit my grandparents. As an 8 yr old I rode my bike whereever in the suburbs without telling my parents where I was going. On hot summer nights I stayed out until way past dark. Yet I still remember the Chowchilla kidnapping (kids in a bus buried in central Cal.) but it did not change our habits.

Nowadays, my wife and I know where my 10 yr old is at all times and I still walk him across the street to 5th grade. That's more sentimental than anything though since he walks home on his own. My 12 yr. old walks 2 blocks to middle school and rides his bike around town yet I still worry about him.

I think its more about necessity than feeling safer. Both my parents worked so they could not watch my sister and I like a hawk. My wife is a stay at home mom so the dynamics are different.

 

Yup.

Just thumb through old newspapers... pick a decade.

 

I'm not at all downplaying the importance of protecting your children; I have a 4-year-old and worry about him plenty. But this thread reminded me of this thought-provoking essay from Michael Chabon, called "The Wildreness of Childhood," from his anthology "Manhood for Amateurs." A must-read for all fathers.

An excerpt:
The sandlots and creek beds, the alleys and woodlands have been abandoned in favor of a system of reservations — Chuck E. Cheese, the Jungle, the Discovery Zone: jolly internment centers mapped and planned by adults with no blank spots aside from doors marked staff only. When children roller-skate or ride their bikes, they go forth armored as for battle, and their parents typically stand nearby.

There are reasons for all of this. The helmeting and monitoring, the corralling of children into certified zones of safety, is in part the product of the Consumer Reports mentality, the generally increased consciousness, in America, of safety and danger. To this one might add the growing demands of insurance actuarials and the national pastime of torts. But the primary reason for this curtailing of adventure, this closing off of Wilderness, is the increased anxiety we all feel over the abduction of children by strangers; we fear the wolves in the Wilderness. This is not a rational fear; in 1999, for example, according to the Justice Department, the number of abductions by strangers in the United States was 115. Such crimes have always occurred at about the same rate; being a child is exactly no more and no less dangerous than it ever was. What has changed is that the horror is so much better known. At times it seems as if parents are being deliberately encouraged to fear for their children’s lives, though only a cynic would suggest there was money to be made in doing so.


A link to the full essay: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2009/jul/16/manhood-for-amateurs-the-wilderness-of-childhood/?page=1

 

I don't think that's cynical. I think that's factual.

Good gosh, all the cop shows on TV probably have done more "kids abducted" storylines than actual kids abducted in the past year.

 

I think Chabon is being coy when he says that. He knows it's factual, but realizes many will (wrongly) see him as cynical for writing it.

 

Another reminder: Your kids are about 1,000 times more likely to be sexually molested by one of your friends, acquaintances, relatives or fellow community members.

 

Didn't this happen in an episode of My Name Is Earl?

 

Bravo. Absolutely on point.

I was walking around major cities alone when I was 10. I had incredibly trusting parents who pretty much followed Rick's advice. They knew that I knew where to go, how to comport myself, and how to avoid trouble at all costs.

My older brother? Not so much. They didn't trust him to leave his room most of the time