Crime or parenting? Cops called for kids playing alone in park
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Lenore Skenazy Guest blogger
Readers! As we approach our third annual, 鈥淭ake Our Children to the Park鈥nd Leave Them There Day鈥� (Saturday, May 19),聽this story聽is outrageous:
Apparently a dad let his two kids, ages 6 and 9, play in a local suburban Pittsburgh park on Saturday morning (April 7) for not quite two hours while he did some shopping and took a shower. That is, while he went about the tasks of everyday life.
Meantime, a woman noticed this unusual thing: Kids playing without an adult around!
That this fact was 鈥渄颈蝉迟耻谤产颈苍驳鈥� to an onlooker is what is so disturbing about our culture. For millennia, kids kept themselves occupied while their parents were otherwise engaged. A 9-year-old watching a 6-year-old was normal, not a reason to call the cops.
But call the cops she did.
And when they got there, they charged the dad with two counts of child endangerment. Meantime, of course, child protective services is investigating, too. Because any time you trust your children or your community, You cannot be trusted.
That鈥檚 what we鈥檝e come to. You are punished for believing in your kids鈥� self-reliance and the you chose to raise them in.
Hence, the Free-Range Kids movement. Hence this Free-Range Kids blog. Hence鈥 wish I knew.
We have got to turn our country around or children will be prisoners of their parents, and vice versa, all in the name of 鈥渃aring.鈥� Ask me, that word is missing an 鈥渟鈥� at the beginning. 鈥� L.
海角大神 has assembled a diverse group of the best family and parenting bloggers out there. Our contributing and guest bloggers are not employed or directed by the Monitor, and the views expressed are the bloggers' own, as is responsibility for the content of their blogs.聽Lenore Skenazy聽blogs at聽
