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Comment by rychco | Hacker News Reader

The stereotypical American helicopter-parent/soccer-mom can be viewed as a direct result of poor zoning practices & the resulting suburban sprawl. A typical child is completely incapable of going anywhere without the guidance of a car-driving parent. It is unlikely, either on foot or bike, that they are able to get to school, get to/from sports practice, meet with friends, shop at local stores, run errands, have a part-time job, etc etc. No wonder they're too sheltered & unable to navigate independence: they've never even had the option of independence.

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I see this explanation a lot, but then I look at polls like this one:

https://reason.com/2014/08/19/august-2014-reason-rupe-nation...

Sprawl is just a scapegoat, the real reason is in the mindset.

In my corner of the world the idea that 12 year old teenagers should be, by law, supervised would be laughed at.

And mind you, I live in a country where 36% of the population doesn't have access to public transport due to how it was dismantled over the years in favour of cars and sprawl.

Yeah: I grew up in suburban sprawl, such that it was theoretically possible for me to get somewhere by bike but like... no, not really, and yet my parents just let me wander around the residential suburban community as much as I wanted, alone, until it got dark.

I don’t know if you’ve experienced American stroads. Theoretically you can walk from point A to point B but often times that involves crossing a stroad. Doing so is extremely unpleasant and dangerous. American car drivers just don’t expect pedestrians and are often times hostile to pedestrians. The idea of walking somewhere is an alien thought to many people.

I agree mindset is the bigger problem. Zoning and roads in a lot of the US suburbia are bad, and even now I wouldn't want to bike or walk around most of the roads myself, but it's the mindset that every stranger is someone trying to steal their child that is holding parents back.

There is no motivation to improve freedom of movement for children if parents don't even think children should have that freedom.

Independence requires free time. Kids, at least those with parent who expect them to go on to higher education, dont have free time. They dont just play baseball on the school team a couple days a week. They play on literally ALL the teams. Then there are non-school karate lessons. And thier language tutor. And thier doctor visits. And thier therapists for whatever learning disbaility they are told they have. Middle class kids are cogs in a factory. Their greatest free time is chatting with friends via smartphones while being shuttled between appointments.

Not really true.

Sure, some experiences require a car. But there are tons of things that don't, even in more isolated areas. When I lived in a fairly rural neighborhood, there weren't tons of kids, but one or two families typically. You learned how to get along with them and become friends. You could go anywhere in the neighborhood if you told your parents. You could even ride your bike on trails to the local college a few miles away (once you got older 12+ or so). You could shoot off model rockets in the local open space (not exactly a park, just an open field). Go fishing, build a fort in the woods at your friend's (yes, using sharp tools), play some sort of unorganized sport, etc. You couldn't have a real job without a car, but I certainly made money other ways such as babysitting, selling bird houses, etc.

I later lived in a rural town. Even though there was more stuff to do there, I went out less. More of the things cost money there and there was less open space. But you could walk to stores and stuff.

So the option is there, particularly if they aren't already biased to only participate in preconceived ideas of what activities should be.

Rural areas are not typical in terms of where most kids live and grow up. Explaining how things are in rural parts of the country is not a valid counter point. In large parts of the country walking has more or less become criminalized and discouraged. I’m talking about areas where a large percentage of people live. We have also criminalized giving kids autonomy.

https://www.texaspolicy.com/lets-not-criminalize-parents-who...

https://works.bepress.com/lewyn/125/

I'm not talking about truly rural areas. I'm talking about suburbs and developments where a significant number of children live. Living in town is in fact suburban or even urban depending on the density.

Honestly the walking thing is BS. CA was the last hold out. I believe all states now take the reasonable approach of it only being a crime if you impede traffic, or if you choose to walk in the stret when there is a sidewalk available.

Yes, there are parenting laws that are overbearing. This is not an urban vs rural thing given that those laws cover both areas (varies by state).

The biggest factor is mindset. Kids can have varying levels of autonomy depending on a number of factors. Not having a car only prevents autonomy for those who lack imagination.

The walking “thing” as you put it was clearly not read by you. I think the author of the paper knows more about it than you. If you think walking isn’t criminalized in America then go out for a walk in an affluent white neighborhood with 4 black teenage boys and experience it for yourself.

We can believe the children of the nation lack imagination or that society has evolved in such a way that discourages walking and free roaming. One of these two seems to me to be a more reasonable explanation for the dearth of children walking in America’s populated areas.

Next time it’s best not to use rural when you don’t mean rural. I go by what people write.

I did read. It has outdated information. Appeal to authority? Any real argument behind that? You comment about black teenagers is not a cogent argument.

Walking is not a crime. Show me otherwise.

The one that's more reasonable to believe is the one where kids have their noses in phones and aren't independent enough to go out on their own.

"Fairly rural neighborhood" and "rural town". Rural, but in the context of a neighborhood or a town. There are varying levels of development, and the larger surrounding area can add context.

It sounds like you're trolling if you can't make a good argument and are simply attacking me. Bye

Appeal to authority is not an argumentative fallacy. Appealing to a false authority is. For instance, appealing to the authority of a Ph.D. in quantum physics is perfectly fine to do when the topic is quantum physics. Appealing to that same authority about the law is not.

It appears your understanding of what “trolling” is mirrors your understanding of argumentative fallacies.

Here we go again, misinterpreting me uncharitably. I never said it was a fallacy. It's a weak basis for an argument.

Appealing to authority is not a weak basis for an argument. It’s as if you don’t understand the role of expertise. Almost everything you know comes from knowledge discovered by experts. I suppose when you read a paper you don’t like sources being cited.

I didn’t uncharitably read what you wrote. You asked if I had a real argument to give because, apparently, you think getting knowledge/facts from an expert and citing said facts is not a real argument. The only reasonable interpretation of what you wrote is that you think citing an expert in their area of expertise is not a valid (“real”) arguement.

> If you think walking isn’t criminalized in America then go out for a walk in an affluent white neighborhood with 4 black teenage boys and experience it for yourself.

I feel like you answered it yourself in the opposite way. Walking isn't criminalized, the problem is the systemic racism in the US.

Walking is not criminalized as in there is a law specifically stating its criminalization. Clearly I’m talking about effects of laws designed to discourage walking. I cited a source from a law professor that goes into this in some detail.

There’s something to be said here for neighborhood interactions among children of varying ages. I used to enjoy playing around building forts in the suburbs with some other young guys in friend’s neighborhoods that had lots on kids in the same age ball-park.

It’s not life-changing autonomy, but it was definitely free from any sort of helicopter parents for afternoons at a time.

My 10-speed bicycle in 1978 (and on) was what gave me autonomy. As did my high-rise, banana-seat bike before that.

My daughters had bikes since even before the age when I had got my first bike but they seemed to rarely ride them.

There are probably a lot fewer kids per neighborhood than when you were growing up.

Not really.

I grew up in the suburbs. Nothing but houses and maybe a strip mall 2 miles away.

By the time I was 12 I was allowed to bike wherever. We rode all day long, to the strip mall, the even bigger mall (3 miles away), to each other’s houses, to hiking trails, etc.

It was a great childhood. Lots of autonomy and a safe environement.

Agreed. OP’s comment makes no sense in the suburb I live in now (built around 2000), and the suburb in which I grew up (built early 1970s). Both have nearby schools, supermarkets and plazas with retail businesses, working teenagers, playgrounds, parks, etc.

rychco’s comment makes sense in my suburb.

Even I have anxiety crossing 5 lane roads with 40mph speed limits. There is usually a huge pickup truck or SUV going at least 50mph, who may likely be distracted by their phone. This was not as much of an issue a few decades ago.

And that is just the 40mph ~30ft to 40ft wide crossings.

The 7 to 9 lane wide, 80ft crossings on 40mph roads are incredibly scary to cross, and that is in daylight.

Just the other day, at night, an old homeless woman was crossing it with her luggage, and we were stopped at the left turn lanes. The walk signal changed before the old woman could finish crossing the road, and she could easily have gotten hit by an inattentive or fast driver after she popped out as she passed the stopped cars.

I would limit my kids crossing the 7+ lane roads until teenage years, and the 4+ lane roads until 9 or 10. And night time might even be more restrictive.

You have 7-9 lane roads in a suburb? That’s called a highway. Where I live, people cross highways on overpasses dedicated to pedestrians. Sorry you have to cross 9 lanes regularly. Sounds like you live next to a highway!

Lots of US suburbs have roads with 3 lanes in each direction.

Then you add one or two left turn lanes at the intersection and a shoulder/bike lane, and you get to an 80ft+ crossing easily. All the infrastructure is built for cars and cars only. All the businesses and places for kids to go will be along these huge roads.

This is an example of what is commonly built:

https://maps.app.goo.gl/wpdBbQJggYrpjeNz8?g_st=ic

That crosswalk/sidewalk is purely built for plausible deniability. You would have to be crazy to regularly walk across that to get to the grocery store/restaurants at that intersection.

https://maps.app.goo.gl/rnjYVbLweNQZYFqW9?g_st=ic

https://maps.app.goo.gl/bu4ow3HVTM3VTRct9?g_st=ic

https://maps.app.goo.gl/owb32s3zPFShPXJ48?g_st=ic

i'm not sure many people would describe phoenix or tampa as suburban

Whatever we want to describe it as, the point is there are a decent number of kids that live in places with roads like these.

i feel like must be where part of the disconnect lies because despite my personal antipathy towards suburban living, pretty much every one i've visited has had superb infrastructure for walking and biking.

> The stereotypical American helicopter-parent/soccer-mom can be viewed as a direct result of poor zoning practices & the resulting suburban sprawl.

Is there any evidence for that? Because, every new HN thread seems to attack suburban "sprawl".

The reasoning seems plausible but I can also present plausible reasoning that goes the other way.

99pi did a podcast on it sorta: https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/first-errand/

American vs Japanese views towards this.

It's not the reason. You see the same things in neighborhoods where you can walk places. And suburban sprawl was just as much a thing 30 years ago. It's an excuse that suburban parents use for their helicopter parenting, which is entirely anxiety driven.

it is highly specious reasoning at best especially when you consider that the advent of helicopter parenting and the boom of suburban development/white flight/etc are separated by decades. i would say the stranger danger panic of the 80s, 90s crime wave and columbine all served as cumulative frog boiling for children's autonomy.

The type suburb we build today are one of reasons. At least it enforces that behavior in parents.

Then there is also “no screen time” so the kid will not learn how to behave online, not able to detect scammers, understand things like privacy and trust, etc.

And there are also laws: you might get in trouble if you leave your 15 year old alone overnight. And when 17 not more than 2 nights. But they can join army at 18.

A deviation from this that I've seen are apartment complexes near town centers, where kids rarely have to travel via car to visit friends, go to a park, go to a store, go to school, etc.

There are comperativly few of these and walking and cycling even there is mostly bad.

Not that it _should_ be this way, but me and my friends would scooter/bike to school all the time in elementary/junior high (~2002-2008) and it was easily a few miles each way in Western Washington (not rural).

I don't plan on having kids but I wonder if I'd let them do that today.

Now that I think of it, I'm not sure I ever told my parents I did that.

Biking a few miles took 15-20 minutes I imagine. Why would you not let your 11+ year old kids bike that route? Sounds okay if there's not too much traffic.

In car-centric suburbia, there's always traffic at the same times every day, and often poor infrastructure for biking.

100% Most of the roads seem designed to prevent it.

I grew up in a small town and we all took bikes to school or walked the ~2 miles. The drivers seemed more aware that they didn't dominate the road.

Yep. It would probably be fine and I'd let my hypothetical kid do it anyway, but the fact remains that the biggest risk along the way is.. car traffic. Parents stressed about getting their kid to school and then to work on time. Of course there's winter and that commute becomes even more insane by bike or car.

Just let kids ride slower on the sidewalks and follow pedestrian street crossing rules.

That's treating the symptoms not the cause. The roads should be safe enough for kids to ride on.

Intersections are where many pedestrian injuries and fatalities happen, due to "inattentive" motorists. The reality is the motorists are probably attentive to other vehicular traffic, which poses a much greater risk to them but poses a huge risk to pedestrians.

Then there are the agressive motorists. I have seen motorists intentionally[1] accelerate towards school crossing guards. People seem to get impatient when being held up in traffic, even when it is a product of their own decisions (like driving past a school on a residential side street when school is starting for the day).

[1] Of course, I don't know their actual intentions. Yet I have difficulty interpreting a vehicle that is creeping slowly into an intersection then suddenly accelerating towards a safety vested person as anything other than a deliberate act.

Very few sidewalks (at the time) in our area (unincorporated area of the county). Lots of should er space though.

Are all suburbs like this? There were plenty of things in biking distance in my neighborhood.

No, but many are, particularly modern cul-de-sacs

Cul de sac rollerblade hockey is how I spent much of my youth. So many good memories.

Indeed, the one upside of Cul-de-sac suburbs!

But really, kids should be able to do that in a park instead of having to scramble whenever a car pulls up.

True, but it was on more of a crescent. I don't think it was uncommon to see it on any side street as long as you had a certain amount of people

I could bike (or even easily walk) to a drugstore and grocery store in the neighborhood where I grew up. A "five and dime" store was within biking distance as well.

Where I live now? Nope. Some kind of generic suburbia park is about all a kid could ride to in this neighborhood. And although I have been here less than a year, I do not recall many kids on bikes. It's sad.

I wonder what happens in American cities where it is possible, such as New York.

autonomous mobility is huge for kids 6-12.

It helps if they have not previously perceived the world only through a car window.

This is a super big point. A lot of autonomy is realizing that you can do things and having experienced various ways of transportation makes a huge difference.

If you never rode the bus or subway growing up they’re very intimidating to get used to.

There is public transit, bikes and skateboards in the suburbs. That is not the case in rural areas. There was a time when more people lived in rural areas, and kids roamed about. I’d say living in the city, where there is more crime, would be a reason kids were sheltered.

No amount of zoning reform can fix the fact that it's not safe for kids in America, because it's crawling with predators. Even if you have school, shop, friends, and all that, within four blocks of each other.

> because it's crawling with predators

Indeed. The vast majority of danger to kids comes from people they know and trust.

Most kidnappings are custody disputes, for example.

We just need to get kids away from their parents and everyone else they know. Then they'll finally be safe! Maybe those nice Mongolians will take care of them...

What's wrong with having Mongolian friends of the same age?

And most child sex abuse is perpetrated by family

What the Fox News are you talking about?

By uncritically repeating the nonsense that sensationalist mass media spews, OP does illustrate two of the main dynamics ultimately causing this. Parents are gobbling up this malevolent nonsense and then hovering over their kids to protect them from their own delusions, and the kids themselves are also being blasted with the apocalyptic media fire hose.

I've not watched television since around 1990. I don't read papers. I don't visit news sites. Never had a Twitter account though I'm on Mastodon now. Never had a Facebook account. I mostly use the Internet in connection with some very specific interests of mine.

I do observe that your opinion that the mass media is all garbage and wrong isn't very original. You just repeating that from somebody. I suspect it's a common sentiment in far right circles. This is because the media in fact often reports the truth, and it's quite balanced and responsible, which upsets some people.

The news does naturally like bad news. The observation that a crime didn't happen in such and such a district over the past week will not make the news. That's just the way it is. It's the nature of the game.

For almost exactly the same basic reason you will only find bugs in a bug database. Nobody opens a ticket to tell you that your code works amazingly well.

On what are you basing the assertion that America is "crawling with predators"? Do you think it is worse than before? Worse than other places?

Please list any statistic to support your previous assertion that "America ... is crawling with predators"

Perhaps you were trying to make a sarcastic point that people are reacting to a mistaken belief, which seems inline with some of what you just said. If that was the case, you didn't succeed, which is why I made the comment I did.

And I've no idea why you're trying to invoke "far right" except as some weird shoehorned ad hominem. For reference I'm a libertarian that has recently come around to voting conservative (which in 2022 means Democrat), because I would rather suffer bureaucratic totalitarianism than autocratic totalitarianism.

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