Psychology Today has a very interesting article discussing just how little of “real life” the kids of today experience. From the article:
No one doubts that there are significant economic forces pushing parents to invest so heavily in their children’s outcome from an early age. But taking all the discomfort, disappointment and even the play out of development, especially while increasing pressure for success, turns out to be misguided by just about 180 degrees. With few challenges all their own, kids are unable to forge their creative adaptations to the normal vicissitudes of life. That not only makes them risk-averse, it makes them psychologically fragile, riddled with anxiety. In the process they’re robbed of identity, meaning and a sense of accomplishment, to say nothing of a shot at real happiness. Forget, too, about perseverance, not simply a moral virtue but a necessary life skill. These turn out to be the spreading psychic fault lines of 21st-century youth. Whether we want to or not, we’re on our way to creating a nation of wimps.
[emphasis mine]
The whole article is worth reading in full, but this is something I’ve definitely worried about for Will: what will my wife and I be comfortable with letting him do? I basically had free reign of my neighborhood as a kid and was allowed to go wherever my BMX could carry me. We used to play “Army” using dirt clods as ammunition while hopping from garage roof to garage roof along the alley, for crying out loud!
So are we Americans doomed as a society since Lawn Jarts are no longer sold? Can we survive the loss of backyard football sans parental waivers? Whatever the outcome, just know this: I blame lawyers.
Would your mother/father have whipped you if they knew you were jumping from rooftop to rooftop? I know my parents would have. But they would eventually let me go out and play again.
I was hit in the shoulder with a lawn jart. The other kid got in trouble, and we weren’t allowed to use them again. Would my parents even *consider* suing the company? No way. It was me and the other kid’s fault, period.
Most definitely. I think another big factor is the working mother – back when I was a lad, there was a network of stay-at-home moms that my parents trusted to act as their proxies, should any of us get hurt or in trouble, and we kids knew it too. There was a support network to rely upon and we knew that, good or bad, our parents were going to get reports from the other kids’ moms and dads. If we got in trouble, we’d hear about it at home.
As to whether my parents would have enjoyed knowing they were raising idiotic sub-teens that enjoyed playing “bike tag”, jumping off rope swings into quarries, setting off cherry bombs and convincing neighbors’ kids to stick their heads into mailboxes, only to get them stuck there, well, they didn’t worry about that sort of stuff in advance. We were given the freedom to screw up and maybe even get hurt, which is what Kids These Days seem to be missing. Think of all the wonderful scars and associated stories that they will be missing out on!
My parents also let me free reign of the neighborhood. I am all for that but Heather will have none of it. I said we could use GPS wristband on Gabe but let him have some flexablility. Sure he will come home will a couple of cuts and bruises but he will learn independence as I did. Heather does not even know about letting him to the extents of our own property until he is “older.”
I believe the relevant movie quote is “Why do we fall? So we can learn how to get back up.”
The details of my life are…
No seriously, many of us know the kind of things that Doug, Brad, and I, with some cohorts involved, all got into.
Now, as a parent, I witnessed my co-parent seriously question the safety of The Boy running into the waves ths weekend (we went to the beach). It was an interesting study in wants, and you could see it in her eyes : She WANTS the boy to take risks and do the stupid things that become “learning experiences” – She just doesn’t want to witness or partake.
Me personally, well, lets just say that I made him face the waves head-on…
😉