AuntiE Loc: 45th Least Free State

There has been much discussion and effort to reduce childhood obesity. Dietary changes should be undertaken, but in a flexible manner. The thing little mentioned is physical activity. Occasionally one hears mention of walking or biking for children; however, little more then a mention. The following would be the reason you do not hear talk about active play for children.


http://reason.com/blog/2014/09/15/child-services-to-mom-who-did-nothing-wr

Child Services to Mom Who Did Nothing Wrong: 'Just Don't Let Your Kids Play Outside'

Kari Anne RoyChildren's book author Kari Anne Roy was recently visited by the Austin police and Child Protective Services for allowing her son Isaac, age 6, to do the unthinkable: Play outside, up her street, unsupervised.

He'd been out there for about 10 minutes when Roy's doorbell rang. She opened it to find her son —and a woman she didn't know. As Roy wrote on her blog HaikuMama last week, the mystery woman asked: "Is this your son?"

I nodded, still trying to figure out what was happening.

"He said this was his house. I brought him home." She was wearing dark glasses. I couldn't see her eyes, couldn't gauge her expression.

"You brought..."

"Yes. He was all the way down there, with no adult." She motioned to a park bench about 150 yards from my house. A bench that is visible from my front porch. A bench where he had been playing with my 8-year-old daughter, and where he decided to stay and play when she brought our dog home from the walk they'd gone on.

"You brought him home... from playing outside?" I continued to be baffled.

And then the woman smiled condescendingly, explained that he was OUTSIDE. And he was ALONE. And she was RETURNING HIM SAFELY. To stay INSIDE. With an ADULT. I thanked her for her concern, quickly shut the door and tried to figure out what just happened.

What happened? The usual. A busybody saw that rarest of sights—a child playing outside without a security detail—and wanted to teach his parents a lesson. Roy might not have given the incident a whole lot more thought except that shortly afterward, her doorbell rang again.

This time it was a policewoman. "She wanted to know if my son had been lost and how long he'd been gone," Roy told me by phone. She also took Roy's I.D. and the names of her kids.

That night Isaac cried when he went to bed and couldn't immediately fall asleep. "He thought someone was going to call the police because it was past bedtime and he was still awake."

As it turns out, he was almost right. About a week later, an investigator from Child Protective Services came to the house and interrogated each of Roy's three children separately, without their parents, about their upbringing.

"She asked my 12 year old if he had ever done drugs or alcohol. She asked my 8-year-old daughter if she had ever seen movies with people's private parts, so my daughter, who didn't know that things like that exist, does now," says Roy. "Thank you, CPS."

It was only last week, about a month after it all began, that the case was officially closed. That's when Roy felt safe enough to write about it. But safe is a relative term. In her last conversation with the CPS investigator, who actually seemed to be on her side, Roy asked, "What do I do now?"

Replied the investigator, "You just don't let them play outside."

There you have it. You are free to raise your children as you like, except if you want to actually give them a childhood. Fail to incarcerate your child and you could face incarceration yourself.



I wonder Exactly what activity are children to get inside? Are they to do jumping jacks, sit-ups, push-ups, pull-ups on the door frame? Today's children have arranged play activities. There seems to be little spontaneity. Parents schedule who, where, what, and with whom play occurs. What happened to imaginary play?

Ricktloml

Thankfully I live rurally, and blessedly next door to my daughter, wonderful son-in-law and grandchildren, who play outside all the time, although there is an adult present as the youngest is only two. But that story is frightening

Loki Loc: Georgia

It is hard to believe Austin is a part of Texas. I could say the same for Houston. It is not hard to believe bureaucratic overreach and idiocy anywhere, although, in this case, the bureaucrat may have had a point. Child molesters seem to thrive in Liberal enclaves, undoubtedly because of Liberal tolerance for deviant behavior.

funguy1949

hell as a child we would leave the house on summer days early an play in the woods with the rest of the neighborhood kids and the only time we go home Mom on the back porch would yell out our names for lunch which by the way half the kids would come running back with use mom feed most the kids all the time there parents work ful time job's but no one knew where we were at.
Those were the good old days.

Navy Rob Loc: Hampton Roads Va

Ditto funguy

Snoopy

Fun guy

Some of my best experiences in life were during unsupervised play.

We WALKED from Woodside, Queens to Manhattan and Central Park. No problems.

I can imagine what would happen to my parents today.

Snoopy

no propaganda please Loc: moon orbiting the third rock from the sun

When I was a kid, my brother and I played in the creek, walked to the school yard and used the teeter totter, swings, and jungle jim all by ourselves. We walked the family dogs at least a half mile a day, and I walked the half mile to my father's veterinary office all by myself from the time I was about 9. By the time I was ten I walked there daily after school so I could help clean up the kennel area and clean the surgeries. No body worried about us, the parents knew each other and casually keep an eye on the kids. But that was a time when mothers were home, not at a full time job elsewhere. My mother had a full time job-us- and helping out in the clinic while we were in school. Times have changed. Our neighbors have the grand kids over and they play outside for hours unsupervised, either at their place or ours. They also help their grandpa clean the barn and chicken coop, gather eggs, then they come over to our place and harvest vegetables out of the garden. Those experiences are still available, but you have to live in a close knit community in a rural or suburban area.

She Who Must Be Obeyed

MrEd Loc: Georgia

If you were anything like me, our parents would be so far under the jail they wouldn't even be able to see sunlight. I used to ride my bicycle 5 miles to the next town just so we could go swimming or fishing in the lake. My Mom never ask me where I was going, she ask me where I had been. She also never told me I could not do that again. All she ever told me was to be very careful and not hurt myself. On occasion she would ask me what I had for lunch since I did not come home for that and I simply told her I was having to much fun to worry about lunch.

cant beleve Loc: Planet Kolob

After looking at all the posts on this site,it seems that most of us have been blessed to have been raised in the country or rural communities.
Just yesterday I drove past an old dairy farm ,converted into a house.
Boy,did that bring back fond memories of going to the next door dairy,to get homemade ice cream or milk fresh from the bottle. Arguing over cream,etc.
Kids now hardly know where milk comes from,let alone the experience of talking to a big,lash eyed, jersey cow. I'm certainly glad the cows didn't tattle tale or act like that women in the article. I would of been in a whole Heep of trouble ,if cows had talked back then. Since I never was In my own yard. Heck I remember biking out to an island in the middle of the Great Salt Lake. A good 20 miles+ away....
Am I ever grateful, for being raised when and where I was. Auntie,thanks for helping reflect on the blessings of an innocent childhood,something children; should all be entitled to receive. :thumbup: :-P

funguy1949

Thanks for letting some of us think back to the good old days when life was little more freedom for all of us.

Ricktloml

And that is the very heart of the problem, when society looked upon predators AS predators and not some unfortunate, misunderstood individual. Tolerance is all well and good, but when you tolerate evil, it only increases

NanaSue57 Loc: Georgia

AuntiE...I was just recently telling my husband how sad it is that today's children don't know what it's like to play outside in freedom. When I was a kid, I would ride my bike to the 7-11 in Miami, by myself, ten blocks away from my home. Us kids were all over the neighborhood playing with friends. Running, climbing trees...surfing in the rain water. Wonderful memories. Today my grandson is overweight and sits at home looking at his ipad. I have to tell him every 30 min to get up and do some sit-ups and run in place. I've started taking him for walks in our very hilly subdivision, so to shoot two birds with one stone. I need the walking too. :) But it's no wonder our kids are becoming obese! Who wants a month of interrogation for letting your kid play outside by himself?

But this article absolutely astounds me, that this happened in America. It IS unsafe these days to let the children play alone. Why? Because of the evil that has quadrupled since I was a kid. How many children go missing at the hands of some psychopath? But, in this article, it's like a Russian KGB spy came along and reported the mom to the authorities. I read somewhere else that the children belong to the "collective" communities. I feel like I'm living in an old Communist Russia.

Seems to me, Communism has staked its claim on America.

Good article AuntiE.

Garry Black

This is insane the only law that was broken was when the busybody grabbed the child to bring him home. Second all across the country kids walk further to go to school or the school bus stop. The busybody should face charges for grabbing the child and for making false reports to athorities

NanaSue57 Loc: Georgia

Amen to that!!!
:thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

dennisimoto Loc: Washington State (West)

I, too, grew up in the generation that spent as much time as possible outdoors, outside of school or church hours. Today, however, and sadly, kids just can't really do that. How many stories have we read of the 5 year old who disappeared walking to a friend's house that was 4 doors down the street? Walking home from school? Going to the 7-11 on the corner? They're out there folks. You can Google the ones in your neighborhood. Get a house with a back yard and put in a jungle gym. Have neighbor kids over, send your kids to the neighbors. But watch them every step of the way.