[tillytal]

Count me as reeeeally leery of ascribing harm to an amorphous "cultural impact". Not that I think it's sensible or right that a child might not be allowed to walk around the block, but that in general, as with any other thing other people's parents seem to worry about, the kids are probably going to be fine.

Contrasted with our outrageously inverted reaction to the real and fictional (respectively) threats of climate change and terrorism, it's hard for me to muster up too much outrage. Fix this without fixing them, it's hard for me to clap too hard.

[mindfulgeek]

In general, kids and young adults are more unhealthy in measurable ways -- cancer, depression, suicide rates -- all higher. While this is just one aspect of what is causing trouble, the lack of independence has been linked to kids making really, really bad choices when they are finally alone. You can also ask any college professor how the quality of problem solving and independence has changed in the past decade or so.

In order to fix a problem, you need to fix the cause, not the effect. Many of the causes of the poor decisions we make are due to conditioning of our childhood. While adults cannot blame their bad decisions on their parents, they certainly can see a root cause of much of their poor choices -- if they can see it at all.