Kids getting cut less slack?

[wakeflood]

I’ve pondered this issue with other parents my age (late boomers) and while we think it is the case, we aren’t sure how we feel about it.

Seems the dads – no surprise – lament this change more than the moms. What the hell am I talking about? The concept that kids in suburbia now don’t get the same slack cut by authority figures that we did back in the day.

Basically, we got into all sorts of mischief between the ages of 12-17 in the neighborhood, and occasionally ended up having to explain ourselves to some authority figure (read, got caught in the act by cops, principles, etc.)

I realize that (underage, especially) drinking and driving is a big deal and should have been dealt with more seriously at the time. And by more seriously, I mean not just pouring out our beer and getting a talking to. So that’s a given.

But we don’t have consensus on how that leniency or the current stringency has affected the experiences of youth? I took away some significant respect for a couple of cops who talked me through why what we were doing was stupid AND DIDN’T take me home or report me to school, etc. and that respect impacted my thinking AND behavior much more than the few “by the book” authority figures I ran into.

It seems like nowadays, kids entire lives can be shaped (negatively) by getting one stupid screwup black mark on their record (school, jobs, etc.)? Or maybe that’s just my perception?

Was it in spite of or BECAUSE I did all that stupid stuff and got away with it that I consider my childhood as a REALLY fun and educational period that I wouldn’t trade for anything?

Is one environment “better” than the other or just different? Do kids now under this more stringent scenario act out less? Get in less trouble? Do less stupid kid-like stuff? Will that lead to more acting out later in life? Is society better off?

Anyone care to share their thoughts? I know there’s some other reformed(?) delinquents out there… ;-)

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[justadumbguy]

Personally I think there is a really strange dichotomy these days. The combination of so called ‘zero tolerance’ policies with the advent of helicopter parenting makes for an odd tension.

Me? I’d never make it as a kid today. There is little doubt I’d be tossed out of school, and that would be only the tip of the iceberg.

I’m also struck by how much less independent many kids are in some ways these days. My 17 YO texts with their mom constantly throughout the day yet I remember at that age I’d often only interact with my parents in the morning at breakfast or right before bed.

In many ways I feel very bad for the tight rope kids have to walk these days, it is funny in some senses I think my kid at 17 knows far more than I did at that age while at the same time being far more naive if that makes any sense.

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[wakeflood]

It makes total sense. My girlfriend’s sons are both young for their age – naivety-wise. They have the street-smarts of I don’t know what. But they’re both good young men and do well in school but I think they’d both get taken for easy marks by someone who had the desire…

So yeah, I totally get what you’re saying.

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[hoffanimal]

My personal feeling on this is that kids just don’t do half the things “we” did as kids. There are computer games, phones, etc. that minimize the face to face interaction and the amount of “stuff” they do out in the real world. “We” didn’t have those easy distractions and so spent more time thinking up things to do (and often getting in trouble as a result). And I agree that cellphones have made kids less independent and have affected problem-solving skills.Man, I’m sounding like a grumpy old guy…

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[wakeflood]

No kidding! I’m pretty sure most kids today wouldn’t even know the first thing about acquiring the materials and executing proper um…detonations?? ;-)

You know, good ol’ Darwinian thinning of the herd stuff.

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[wakeflood]

And I haven’t seen a precariously located, crazy-high rope swing in I don’t know how long??

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[hoffanimal]

There’s an important distinction to be made between learning right and wrong through personal experience rather than being told.

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[wakeflood]

hoff, I completely agree. Unfortunately, my parent’s didn’t buy the argument when I tried it on them after some stunt or other. (You can TELL me that a match will burn me but I don’t know what that feels like until I try it myself, dad…OUCH!)

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[Seattle Trash]

Agreed on the post regarding “zero tolerance” and helicopter parents. Not to mentions schools aren’t very fun anymore, especially for those who don’t learn in our current teach-to-test setting.

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The media doesn’t help. Stories in the news are reported on are always bad, and guess what, pretty rare–otherwise they wouldn’t be news worthy! Kids are raised in an “anything bad can happen, everybody COULD be a predator, every swing set is a lawsuit waiting to happen!” mindset so they aren’t allowed the freedom to develop and grow on their own, out from other their parent or guardian’s arms-length. Any proof that things are exponentially more unsafe than when we were kids? I don’t see it.

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[JoB]

i do believe that kids are routinely being sent into the legal system for behavior that once would have been overlooked..

especially kids of color.

while we give real offenders little more than a slap on the wrist …

criminalizing childhood is not the answer

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[datamuse]

You all might be interested in this blog: Free Range Kids. The author’s mostly famous for letting her kid take the NYC subway by himself and subsequently getting called “America’s worst mom” which is…well, fairly ridiculous really.

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[Seattle Trash]

Datamuse. I’m a big fan of Lenore’s. Forgot to share–thanks!

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[wakeflood]

Oh yeah…I remember hearing about her and that headline on some promo for a morning news/talk show and thinking how much hyperbole they were pumping out.

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[waynster]

Wait was it spare the rod spoil the child or spoil the child spare the rod…….Dam looney tunes bugs and co. you messed up are boomer minds or was it the 60’s / 70’s……hmmmm wheres mighty mouse or underdog and superchicken when you need them …george get out of the jungle and help dam it lmao

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[wakeflood]

I’m half waiting for Mike to chime in here. I gotta’ believe he was an instigator – or at least closely aligned with one or two??

Mike, care to share, one southwest end, suburban youth to another from the same era? ;-)

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[JoB]

If the officer friendly in our neighborhood hadn’t brought my brother home with the siren going and the lights flashing more than once to face the wrath of my mother..

my baby brother wouldn’t have had a career with his local police department that included some pretty impressive citations..

and guess who he encountered working the desk in his first posting? officer friendly.

i often wonder how many lives that one officer changed by sidestepping the legal alternatives and relying instead on family, friends and neighbors to provide positive redirection.

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[wakeflood]

Great story! And I wonder if a current cop on the beat is given the leeway to do the same thing today??

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[miws]

wake, sorry to let you down, but my tales of being at that Junior High School age when, presumably, a young man’s fancy is most likely to turn to mischief, would leave you rather bored.

Actually, those Jr. High years were spent over on the Kitsap Peninsula, returning to West Seattle for High School.

I was “too good” of a kid. I like to say that I didn’t have any fun. ;-)

In reality, it wasn’t being “good” so much, as being terribly afraid of getting into trouble. I compare it to Leave it to Beaver when, especially in the early years, the boys’ perception, Ward must have seemed almost ogre-like;

“Gee, Wally, Dad’s gonna kill us!”

“Yeah, Beav, he’s gonna be really sore!”

In their perception, when Ward would admonish them in a firm and booming voice, he was “Yelling” at them, (he actually wasn’t—although June would often agree with the boys that he was.)

I think that’s the perception I had of my own Dad. I don’t recall any physical and/or emotional abuse, and the last (and only I recall–but not to say there weren’t more) spanking would have been on Halloween of 1966, when I had just turned 8, and it was for lying. It was likely only a couple or so solid swats on the ass, over Dad’s knee, with the added perk of having to stay in my room all day, and not being able to go out trick-or-treating.

That was revoked later in the day, when a neighbor guy, named “Guy”, became my best buddy in the whole wide world when he sez: “C’mon, Fred, he’s spent all day in his room like you told him, let him go trick-or-treating.” Dad relented.

Getting into trouble, was my older than me (by three years) Brother’s profession. He was the more “Wild Child”.

As usual, I’ve gone on way too long here, and hope you wake up soon.

But, yeah, sorry to disappoint! ;-)

Mike

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[wakeflood]

Not a disappointment at all, Mike. Did your brother end up the worse for wear as the Wild Child? Do you think he would say his Wild Years were a net positive or negative?

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[miws]

He actually went into the Navy a few months prior to turning 18. Ended up making a 20 year career out of it.

I’ve lost touch with him in the last several years, (political, social issues, etc, we’re probably complete opposites), but I’d say he turned out okay.

Can’t speak to the most recent years, though. Last saw him face to face in about 2007, when he and his then relatively new wife came from Upstate New York to visit. We exchanged several phone calls in the Summer of 2008, during my lengthy hospital stay, and occasional calls/e-mails for a bit after that. Been at least three years since last contact.

Was kinda pissed/sad to see several months back, while looking through a local Cousin’s FB Page, that my Brother and his Wife had been back in Town for a visit. There’s been a lot of changes in my life in the past three years, but my e-mail addy has been the same for over ten now, and basically over 14, with a domain change. Plus, I’m FB Friends with the Cousin, (and his Sister), so it’s not like I couldn’t be found/contacted.

Mike

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[wakeflood]

Sorry to hear he’s lost touch with you, Mike. His loss, truly.

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[miws]

Thanks, wake. :-)

Mike

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[Magpie]

This is a great thread. Zero tolerance is ridiculous. Schools are so afraid of lawsuits that they have taken all common sense out of the equation. I have an example of just that.

I have a granddaughter in Houston. When she was 12, her friend wrote her initials + the initials of her 6 th grade crush with sharpie on the school bleachers (which were already covered with writing). My granddaughter then put a heart around it with the same sharpie.

They got caught. Since it is Houston, all things like this are considered gang graffiti and there is a zero tolerance. Because of their transgression, they were to be moved to the school that handles all of the troubled kids, clear across town and if they straightened up, they would be able to come back in a year.

Each and every Houston school administrator said the same thing. The decision was out of their hands. They have a zero tolerance policy due to gang graffiti.

Ultimately after a very contentious media play and the girls’ parents making quite a public fuss, the school backed down.

Appropriate punishment could have been staying after school and cleaning the bleachers, but apparently they don’t do that anymore.

This is an extreme example, but I could share other examples of where common sense has gone awry.

I took the 35 West Marginal bus to Spokane street in first grade, where I transferred to a school bus, by myself. My brother and I walked home from Guadalupe through Puget Park, the gravel pit, etc. all by ourselves when we were in grade school. We literally spent our time hanging in the woods and sometimes on the box cars on the train tracks, when the trains were parked.

I have a photo of my older brother standing on a log boom in the Duwamish. Pretty dumb, but he’s still alive. Kids aren’t allowed to do the dumb things you do to become adults. It really is a shame.

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[Spring Chicken]

I get what you’re saying, it’s sad kids aren’t free to just be kids these days without leaving behind a digital record that might haunt them forever.

But what about responsibilities? We had brothers and sisters to mind after school, chores and a paper route, part time job or worked in the parents’ store. They have more “stuff” including cars they didn’t piece together out of a junk yard. This generation has more homework and fewer responsibilities as they grow up. I think that’s why they seem less confident than we did in our teen years.

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[JoB]

i think there is a lot to be said for some kids having less responsibilities…

but i can’t imagine that the kids of the working poor or single parent households struggling to get by have any less responsibility than i did.

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[Author]

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