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That level of concern is a bit ridiculous for a 10 year old. I was riding my bike all over by myself at that point. Crossing the street with indirect supervision is something I'd trust a 6 year old with. Now maybe I had a charmed childhood, but I'm in my mid twenties, so it's not like I'm talking about growing up in the 50's here. My parents are older though, they did grow up in the 50s, and I I know they view independence as an important individual trait. I'm sure overprotective parents are not a recent phenomenon. One of my (younger) brother's friends was accompanied to and from school by his mother well in to High School. Walk, drive, riding a bike, you name it, she was there. My mom asked her about this once, and she was like "Oh, [Declanomous's Mother], you have [Declanomous] and [Son #2]. I just have [her son]. I don't know what I'd do if anything happened to him." My mom thought this point was kind of ridiculous, because it's not as if one child is a backup for another child. She just let my brother and I run around because she wanted us to learn to do things on our own. Personally I think the current environment vis-a-vis child rearing reflects a larger trend towards fear in overall society. Part of this is a result of a larger focus on danger in childhood development, but I feel like a whole culture around existential fear really developed after 9/11. It seems like we started viewing the entire world as dangerous, rather than being ripe for exploration. I feel like this is really noticeable when watching media from different eras. Popular TV shows before 9/11 were Seinfeld, Friends, and Fraiser. After 9/11 shows like CSI, 24, etc. became very popular. I could be completely wrong. I know shows like Law and Order and ER were very popular before 9/11. I recall them being less existentially terrifying though. This could just be because I was very young at the time though. |
Paranoia has risen because so few people have full-sized families these days. Losing one kid has become a tragedy.