It's only "sailed" because (some) parents demand to know where their kid is at all times. While I think it's difficult for any individual parent to, say, forbid social media for too long lest they ostracize their kid, saying "I won't track my kids" is a choice any parent can make.
I just pity the kids of these helicopter parents. The youth mental health crisis is no accident.
Since an unattended kid doesn't automatically advertise "I'm being tracked so it's ok!", the cops will likely get called regardless.
And because people are encouraged to look at any sign of child neglect (for some reason), dirty clothes or bruise that could be acquired during play, could be easily misconstrued as child abuse.
It seems like kids have to be at least teenagers these days for people to assume they're OK to be out by themselves, and even then, some people are apparently wary before the kids are old enough to drive.
In the absence of people just doing what I think is right instantly and without question, I pity the child whose parents solve this anxiety by trapping them in the house 16 hours a day.
To solve the over anxious parent problem you just need to get up to two people to chill out. It provides an immediate benefit for them (they will be chill) while it also provides them a long term benefit (a well adjusted offspring).
What is the supposed paralel here? Or what should be my takeaway from your comparision be?
Gambling, alcoholism, or hard drugs might be a more apt comparison. Quitting obviously reaps huge benefits short and long term and yet we as a society still have not solved these problems by saying "just don't actually".
Once we acknowledge that, it becomes obvious that finding ways to reduce harm is good.
The other kids seemed to have followed suit, their parents relented (mostly, the Muslim families on our block seem to keep a very tight leash on their kids) and run around the neighborhood freely. But before our kid started going out nobody was going out.
No. Not a blessed thing. Most calls to CPS are anonymous and will never be investigated, no matter often or egregious.
My neighbor called CPS so often my kid would say "Oh. You again" when they showed up in school. I was designing a brochure for CPS agents to hang at the front door. It had all the schools and relatives with their contact info, along with a map to the fridge and bedrooms.
Here in the UK we don't have Japan-level super-younglings walking to school on their own etc, but you certainly wouldn't get any bother walking around at age 6 unless you looked obviously lost.
Hearing your experience is just so mindwarpingly boggling it's unreal..
It was a good [entirety of human history] age. I'll miss it.
Not true at all. Depending on where you live it is very much alive and well.