. Though we are exhorted to live in a constant state of hysteria when it comes to our kids, some people get just too fed up — or tired — to heed the latest safety “advice.” Here’s kaenekfdsa one of them! Let us salute Anna Claire Vollers on Alabama’s AL.com for her dismissal of the nattering nabobs of helicoptivity. (Hey — is that a new word i just coined? Kids living in helicoptivity? Are they helicoptives?) 5 photos of your kids you shouldn’t post on social media & why I do it anyway, by Anna Claire Vollers “5 photos…
Author: lskenazy
. Southwestern Law School Professor Catherine L.Carpenter puts it bluntly in her new research paper, Throwaway Children: The Tragic Consequences of a False Narrative. “Truth be told,” she writes, “we are afraid for our children and we are afraid of our children.” Being afraid for our kids has lead us to create ever harsher sex offender registration laws. We want to protect our kids from creeps. But this protection plan of ours has backfired. And now, Carpenter writes, whenever we arrest a minor for a sex crime, our fear “of our children ensnares and punishes them under the very same…
. Fresh from the Meitivs of Maryland — the family famously investigated TWICE for child abuse simply for letting their kids walk home from the playground alone — comes this video starring parents Danielle, Alexander, and kids Rafi and Dvora (and some other relatives). I think you know the song! . https://youtu.be/LNAD6gYHXiE .
This post comes to us from the amazing appellate and intellectual property attorney at Andrews Kurth LLP, Matthew Dowd, who took on the Meitiv cases(s), pro bono, and won! He says he now gets to sleep in sometimes because his 11-year-old son and 7-old-daughter walk themselves to school. Building on the Every Student Succeeds Act, by Matthew Dowd On January 10, 2016, the Every Student Succeeds Act became law of the land. Lenore Skenazy [woo hoo!] has rightfully praised the new law as the “first federal Free-Range Kids legislation.” The Act is an excellent indication that our federal lawmakers…
Can’t tell you how fantastic it is to have Cory Doctorow — Boing Boing co-editor, author of “Little Brother,” and general genius all around — recognize the new Free-Range Kids’ legislation and the role of this blog in bringing attention to the problem it tries to address. That is: parents getting harassed/investigated/arrested for allowing their kids some unsupervised time outside. Doctorow writes: After years of documenting instances in which parents and kids are terrorized by law enforcement and child welfare authorities because the kids were allowed to be on their own in public places, the Free Range Kids movement has…
. How does something become so normal no one even questions it? Something like shampooing daily, or eating whole wheat bread, or paying $3 (!!!) for a coffee? The process is gradual. Some people start doing it, then others join the crowd — or are prodded to join — and eventually what was once unusual becomes the norm. And many of those norms are great! Viva flossing! But some norms aren’t. Some are excessive, onerous, expensive or ridiculous activities that get woven into everyday life without our noticing. That’s what is happening with taking our kids out of the car,…
My friend, neighbor, and inspiration, Dan Akst, showed me this column of his about a science program one of his twin sons attended two summers ago at a New York State university. Though the program was for high school juniors — kids about 16 or 17 — here’s what the brochure promised: Resident assistants “will escort the students to both breakfast and dinner each day. . . . Students are restricted from being on any floor or wing other than the one assigned without an accompanying Summer Conference Resident Assistant. . . . Students will not be discharged to parents…
Reading this Today.com piece about four Texas schools that upped the number of recesses for their kids — with fantastic results — made my stomach clench. I thought back to my sons’ grammar school, which had only 20 minutes a day of recess, and took even that away when the kids were “acting out.” In other words — when the kids needed it the most. So here’s to the schools in Fort Worth, TX, for heeding the clarion call of Liink, an incredible group dedicated to promoting 4 recesses a day — two 15 minute breaks in the morning and…
. This ad is pretty darn off topic, except that I could note that if this boy lived in more Free-Range times, he’d have already had a bunch of kids to play ball with. It’s a few years old, so let’s call it a classic: . . .
Remember: Any law drawn up in haste on the heels of a tragedy, and/or following a breathless news report, and/or named for a child, and/or with the word “Angel” in its title will be a BAD LAW. It will not be based on any kind of study or rational examination of a problem — or even based on a real problem at all. It will be based on emotion, fury, sadness and a heaping helping of political puffery. In the case we are looking at today, the trigger was the news report on Wednesday of a Rhode Island mom who…