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Comment by ploxiln | Hacker News Reader

> Are you their parent? If not, we'll cut this favor short and just call child services".

> Then do it. Call 911, say there's an injured, unattended child at the playground, and you're getting a hostile response from folks as you try to locate the guardian

That is the same thing, though! ... very quickly escalating a probable mundane situation to very serious accusations!

I'm the father of a 3 year old daughter, who I take to the playground multiple times per week. This is in Brooklyn, NYC. I haven't had any issues. But I believe the horror stories, there are just a sufficient number of crazy people out there, overly concerned "karens", or reddit warriors, or whatever. People overly confident in their judgement based on a cursory one-sided description of events. It seems you want to "fight fire with fire" or "play hardball" because that seems fair or necessary, but ... jeez. This is why guys are cautious and disengage.

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> That is the same thing, though! ... very quickly escalating a probable mundane situation to very serious accusations!

I agree. If you think the child is in danger and you’re unable to find their parents after looking around then do what you need to do for the child.

But the other parent’s reaction shouldn’t be a factor. There’s no reason to call 911 and tell them you’re getting a “hostile reaction” from someone who isn’t involved.

This isn’t how serious people operate in the real world. It’s keyboard warrior talk and it’s very unhelpful.

If your daughter is crying, injured, and you are not close enough to get to her before OP, you deserve to have a social worker speak to her 1:1, full stop.

No.

Absolutely, 100%, no.

A child could be playing out of sight of a parent, maybe a block away with friends, and get mildly injured in a way that requires minor treatment. Or just crying because of a negative interaction with a peer.

This DOES NOT mean children at a certain age and maturity level cannot be trusted to gain some independence and leave their parents line of sight for short but increasingly longer periods of time.

The GP comment is about a three year old. Not old enough to be playing a block away with friends.

I trusted my then-3 year old to be 250' away at the opposite end of a neighborhood park that abuts my house. Usually within eye sight but not always.

Once he reached 5 and showed they understood the boundaries and requirements, to go out there by himself.

And once he reached 6, he was trusted to look after his 4 year old brother in this space.

And these restrictions seem very strict compared to how I grew up and especially compared to how those older than me grew up. Or in some other places in the world, where e.g. in Japan it's not rare for 6 year olds to ride the subway and do errands and downright common for 7-8 year olds.

It was when I was a kid.

What if the girl above is crying and appears hurt because she has been mollycoddled, and this is a strategy to get attention?

Perhaps the parents had clocked-on to this, and were just letting the girl self-soothe so she could learn resillience. Then, on-cue, in steps some member of the public with their own opinion on the child they're trying to raise. This would be kind of tiring for the fatigued parent of a toddler, and the frustration of the parent in the above scenario is justifiable, particularly as encounters like this could happen multiple times daily with a child like that.

Now they could also just be a shitty parent. There's plenty of them. But it's difficult for us to judge and make hard rules in cases like this.

Then the proper response to OP would have been "Yeah, don't worry, she's okay."

Kids need to be not kept in a tiny parental bubble and do some things with (manageable levels) of risk. They need to grow into independent people, and to understand their limits.

Our society is not as safe as I would like, but it is probably safer than ever before, when children roamed, played, and did errands over wide ranges.

My world was orders of magnitude smaller than my parents'; despite my efforts, my children's world is orders of magnitude smaller than mine. In part, this is because of attitudes like yours, where a child being unwatched is not okay under any circumstance.

This will surprise you, but I can guess the # of children you have.

lol what the fuck?

When I was a child, me and my friends were gone unattended all day every day.

What a terrible way to live life, always watched over.

What kind of helicopter parenting bullshit is this?

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