By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
A Seattle news medium saw it fitting to send a news team out to investigate a report of a child leaving school early and walking home. No, it was not The Onion but KOMO News. It does show a sense of the zeitgeist and the culture of fear that is sadly inherent in many today.
A five year old boy wanted to walk home after having first been driving to school by his father. He then left school early and walked home to see his mother. He reportedly walked a mile to reach home.
In an interview with reporters, the father reported that he was “scared to death” when he received a call from the school the boy left.
“When somebody like that calls you, you think of every milk carton kid, every lost kid, every child molester”
The parents are now saying they will be home schooling their children beginning next school year.
The school admitted its error and vowed to beef up security and have more adults guarding the perimeter of the school as well as on crosswalks and throughout the area surrounding the school. It showed surveillance video of the boy leaving.
A news crew had a video segment retracing the boy’s route home. The reporter commented how there was no sidewalk and what he described as heavy traffic. (one car driving by) He asked rhetorically at an intersection “How could a little five year old get across without being hit?”
Then came the almost predictable reference to sex offenders amok in the community
“And I did some checking. There are five registered sex offenders in this general area; [Lacey, WA] fortunately, none around this route.”
Statistically, the boy would have a greater chance of being struck by lightning than being abducted. But the fear is that child molesters wait behind trees and mailboxes all day to pounce upon wayward children.
Remembering back, somehow I survived my half-mile walk to kindergarten along with many of my other classmates. In fact, some of my elder relatives who went to school walking or on horseback generations ago seemed to have survived long enough to continue the family lineage. But today the perception of risk is so detached from actual risk the mollycoddling and defensiveness exercised by parents brings up the question of what is actually more of a risk to the children–the culture of fear or the extremely remote risk.
Sadly, a child errantly walking home becomes matter for a major news outlet.
Source: KOMO News
The views expressed in this posting are the author’s alone and not those of the blog, the host, or other weekend bloggers. As an open forum, weekend bloggers post independently without pre-approval or review. Content and any displays or art are solely their decision and responsibility.
Darren. It was edifying reading that post and thread from over a year ago. Thanks.
sgt, GREAT comment. Fear is indeed a horribly effective means of manipulation and control. So is its ugly cousin, anger.
JAG, That is a good, fact based article. I just bookmarked it. I urge the fearful people here to read it. Thanks.
JAG, You have so much common sense and savvy. Your kid is blessed to have someone w/ those great qualities as well as your other strengths. We are born w/ gut instincts. They are primal. If you teach kids to fear everything and everyone that gut instinct gets overwhelmed. The gut instinct must be used, but not forced. You listen to your gut. Your gut is LEGITIMATE fear/wariness. There is a book I have given probably 20-25 young girls in high school/college for graduation. It is called, The Gift of Fear by Gavin de Becker. I’ve plugged it here several times previously. It is about EXACTLY what you just said so well. It’s written by an ex cop. But, much of what he writes about comes from having to hone his own gut instincts from growing up in a dysfunctional household. Those gut instincts helped him immensely in his career. It is a good read even for someone w/ your savvy, and certainly for your daughter.
That TV station and some of the people commenting would freak our here in Thailand. The kids come and go, ride the baht bus all by themselves, ride motorbikes, go to the store, buy needed supplies for the family (even buy beer for dear ‘ol dad, gasp), climb trees, fall out, get cuts, scrapes etc. It is nothing to see the 6 year old holding hands and escorting the 4 year old. Most of them make it to adulthood. They help out with the house, the family business and used to work the farm, those days are passing fast. While they are children, I’ve seen some very adult behavior, especially when it comes to the slightly older taking care of the younger. The do NOT grow up afraid. And for those scary ‘ol pedophiles, they are here, like any place, mostly in the family, doesn’t stop the parents from letting the kids be kids.
When I was young, I walked to and from school. Rode my bicycle, went fishing, visited my dad at the railroad depot, all on my own. Staying at my grandfathers in deep East Texas I walked the mile to town, read comic books, always buying at least one, had cherry cokes at the very old fashioned drug store, picked plums, berries, walked the railroad track to a stock tank about a mile away for a few catfish. I bought my first gun at 14 and had learned to shoot long before that. I’m still alive and kicking, 70 in 7 days and raising 2 kids under 14.
No, the world did not come to an end 9/11. America as we knew it did. Our government and scary pants citizens did that. Fear makes the people easier to control. The people forgot, the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
Here is a GOOD article. on this.
http://boingboing.net/2015/02/24/our-children-are-safer-than-ou.html
Skenazy says that an instinct of overcaution has been instilled in us. “We can’t really go by instinct anymore, because our instinct has been corrupted by our media culture,” she says. Because terrible stories about children are constantly in front of us, it inflates the perceived risk.
She calls the current attitude “worst first thinking”: thinking up the worst-case scenario as the knee-jerk response to any situation, rather than a reasonable evaluation of the actual risk. “We’re not allowed to make any distinctions between likely and unlikely.”
There’s also plenty of urban myth, that picks up where the media ends, or that media amplifies. Joel Best, a professor of sociology and criminology at the University of Delaware, has been tracking since 1985 the myth of “Halloween Sadism”: reports that people poison Halloween candy or put pins or razor blades in items handed out. It has, essentially, no basis — he has found no substantiated case — but persists, nonetheless.
I feel so strongly on this I gave their link. Something I almost never do.
I strongly urge people w/ kids/grandkids/nieces, etc. to go to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children http://www.missingkids.com. Don’t listen to the non factual based fear in the media, blogs, etc. Arm yourself w/ knowledge, because knowledge is power. I ended my working w/ this center because they like to hit people up hard for money. So, be wary of giving your phone or email. But, you can access info w/o giving identifying info.
Nick, I totally get what you are saying.
While our first instinct as parents is to OVER protect our children,
We are protecting the GUT INSTINCT out of them, by OVER coddling.
I was about 8, and out riding my bike, and some guy started following me
in a car, I KNEW this because I LEARNED to pay attention.
YES, for a split second I was in REAL danger, but… My GUT told me that I ws in danger… So, I rode my bike to the Power Plant, City Light…
I went in and asked if I could use their phone to call my parents to come get me..
I KNEW instinctively to find a place where there was PEOPLE and to call my parents…
Now days kids have personal alarms… You can hook on their backpacks…
They have cell phones…..
They should have a bit more freedom now with smartphones, than we had with NO cell phones, but it is the opposite.
Fact is… Children do die… and some are even murdered.
Some drown with their parents standing just feet away.
Hell, some have been abducted with their parents RIGHT inside the house
when they were in the front yard.
There is just NO WAY to protect kids and entirely mitigate these risks.
Now, of course I am not condoning a 5 year old just be allowed to
just walk home on a road that has no sidewalk.
BUT, I do think that allowing a 7 year old to walk home, is absolutely reasonable. BUT, in this day and age, even that is looked at as neglect.
Come on, a mother was ARRESTED for allowing her 9 year old boy, to go play at the park alone.
This tells me, that we as a nation have gone WAY overboard
in the fear department.
Thanks Squeeky for the post with crime stats
I volunteered for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children back in the 90’s. I know that in a 5 year span there were a total of 515 confirmed stranger abductions in the entire US. Understand, MANY stranger abduction reports turn out to be false. Stranger abductions are rare. Anyone who tries to tell you they are common is FOS. The vast majority of abductions handled by this Center and the police are family abductions. Knowledge is power. Beware of fear mongers.
bam, Please get that chip off your shoulder and read what I’ve said again. Almost all of what I said was about arming your child w/ KNOWLEDGE not fear in PREVENTING problems. I knew you were a waste of time. That’s why I spoke to others. You are a Huey helicopter. Now, go put the fear of every person in your kids, grandkids, and neighbor kids. Make sure to tell them that every person is the boogey man and to NEVER talk w/ anyone.
I can’t tell your how many parents have thanked me for giving these life lessons to kids. I had a principal ask me to do a workshop on this topic. Parents, grandparents, other teachers and kids were in attendance. I know a lot more on this topic. I teach kids that knowledge is power. You teach them to fear their own shadow.
Reblogged this on Scoop Feed.
Thank you Annie, and Happy Moms Day to you as well…
and ALL the Other Moms out there… 🙂
Well, for some good background music:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCD3IhCPN5A
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Paul, I don’t care what you want to call it. Most parents have been able to balance the need for free play with other children and the child’s safety. All this “free range” talk is nothing more than a fad. Kids have been and still are free range a plenty. My kids managed to play outside ad lib with the neighborhood kids and so do my grandkids. Parents do watch out the window and keep track of their kids just fine without being hovering. Not all children have only structured play dates. Parents are actually extremely busy with after school activities, it’s not the play dates, it’s the sports.
Paul C. Shulte – Lucky for you. Would to god every child could travel unmolested. I do believe that free range children is ideal, in an ideal world.
I like, and did, what bettykaths’ mom did, watch the children in iffy situations without them knowing. Good thing I do not have young children now as I would probably put a chip in them, and intellectually, I think that is very wrong.
The world was so much safer in the 1800s when we had slavery. Here is a hypothesis, people are the same today as 1800, as 1200BC. Some are perverts, some have always have been perverts. Most are ignorant of anything around them. Some are highly aware of their surroundings and will help in an instant if they see something wrong. No different today as it was 5000 years ago.
Here is the difference, 100 (or 40) years ago you heard of a child abduction only if it happened within 50 miles of your house. Today you hear about every child abduction that happens anywhere on earth within 24 hours of it happening. About 40 years ago I read an article in Psychology Today that showed how peoples perception of crime was directly related to how much TV they watched. Watch more TV, you think more crime. I wonder what it’s like today with, what 5 or 10 24/7 News stations?
Train your child to be afraid and they will be afraid, most likely for their entire life. No thanks.
I didn’t place blame on these parents. I’m aware that they were very upset by the situation and did not give permission. I’m laying blame on those parents who don’t recognize the dangers of allowing children be be alone in a car, go to a public bathroom alone and those who think “free range kids” is the end all be all.
Inga – every study I have ever seen says that “free range” is much better for the children. A certain amount of structured activity is fine but you don’t set a schedule where mom and dad are enslaved to the children’s after school schedule.
Here are some interesting numbers.
http://www.freerangekids.com/crime-statistics/
Regardless, I think this is one of those situations where it is better to safe, and not sorry.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter