
The Anti-Helicopter Parent’s Plea: Let Kids Play - mhb
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/23/magazine/the-anti-helicopter-parents-plea-let-kids-play.html
======
ideonexus
There's a big problem here: Parents are judged poorly no matter how they
oversee their children. You watch over your children and make sure they're
safe and supported? You're a helicopter parent. Took your eyes off your child
for five seconds and he jumped into a cage with a gorrilla at the zoo? You're
a horrible neglectful mother. Spoke to the principal of your kid's school
concerning a bully or about putting some padding over the concrete at the
playground? You're creating a "safe space" for your child and raising them to
be a sissy. Being a parent is a no-win scenario in the eyes of public
perception.

People always talk about "back in my day" when things were tougher and how
that made them resilient. Well, back in those days, kids got impaled on
steering wheels sitting in their parents laps while they drove, got skull
fractures from falling on playground concrete or teeth knocked out from see-
saws, or they committed suicide because school administrators saw bullying as
a natural means of letting kids establish a pecking-order. Following science-
informed safety measures is too often dismissed as coddling our children.

I'm all for letting kids roam and giving them responsibilities. But there's a
rational, measured way to provide for such freedom and responsibility. Because
if anything bad happens to your child while giving them such freedom, you will
face the wrath of social media. I watch time and again as the same people
complaining about sissification of our children are also the first to rage
against the parents when the news reports on a child coming into any kind of
harm. If people would empathize with parents instead of leaping to judgement
of them, the world would be a better place.

~~~
irrational
Hmm, reading your post makes me wonder if the problem is people not having
enough children. What I mean is, back in "the day" people were too busy trying
to keep up with their own kids to worry about what other people were doing
with their kids. But now that people have few or no kids they have plenty of
time to tell other people how they are doing it wrong. I sometimes wonder if
so much of the partisanship, outrage over seemingly little things, rude
comments on discussion boards etc. is just people having too much time on
their hands. Were people happier back when they had to struggle each day to
survive? Anyway, I need to get back to commenting on what the Kardashians are
doing today.

~~~
dleslie
People with no kids... As a parent, I find these individuals to be the most
aggravating.

I tell them that commenting on someone's parenting, as though you have any
experience or wisdom in the matter, is a bit like a white person telling a
black person how to cope with racism.

 _Edit: oh look, here they come to give me their abundant wisdom._

~~~
lagadu
You're implying that having a child magically imbues you with parenting
knowledge.

~~~
kylemaxwell
No, but as with everything else in life, experience counts.

~~~
wolfgke
> No, but as with everything else in life, experience counts.

Experience did not make me a better programmer or mathematician. Diving deep
into the details to get a much better knowledge did.

~~~
jacoblambda
but... but that's what experience is.

~~~
imron
Experience is not something you get until just after you need it.

------
modoc
I agree with this 100%! I grew up free to explore the woods, build forts,
climb trees, jump off rocks, swim unsupervised, ride mt. bikes down steep
hills, drive dirt bikes from age 10 on, drive snowmobiles, carry a pocket
knife, whittle, etc... Yes, I cut myself on occasion, even broke a couple
bones, but it was completely worth it and helped me grow up to be self
sufficient, self confident, and know my limits, strengths, and weaknesses.

I really do feel badly for most of the kids today, who are so hampered and
restrained.

Don't let you kid fall into a bonfire, but DO let them burn themselves on the
stove (after you tell them - that is hot). Inform but let them learn from
their own mistakes. There's nothing wrong with a few cuts, bruises, scrapes,
burns, etc...

~~~
throwawayReply
That's very literally survivor bias.

How many kids swam unsupervised, jumped off rocks and rode down steep hills
and didn't return home?

They're not here to tell the tale about how it "worked fine for them".

I'm not saying that things haven't gone too far the other way, but anecdotes
about how things were fine aren't good data.

~~~
mdorazio
If you want to argue against anecdote, it's best to provide actual facts
instead of your own questions. For example, only 1 in 5 drowning deaths are
children, and there's no reason to assume a significant portion of those are
unsupervised [1]. Should we be helicopter-observing adults instead, or do
their lives matter less? Traffic accidents are the largest cumulative killer
of children [2]. If you want to go the route of "how many aren't here to tell
us about it" you should really be arguing that parents should avoid putting
kids in or near cars as much as possible.

Children die, and that sucks a lot, but if you start making emotional appeals
based on preventing all possible child deaths you're going to end up espousing
that we keep all kids in padded rooms until they're adults.

[1] [http://www.cdc.gov/homeandrecreationalsafety/water-
safety/wa...](http://www.cdc.gov/homeandrecreationalsafety/water-
safety/waterinjuries-factsheet.html)

[2]
[https://www.cdc.gov/injury/wisqars/pdf/leading_causes_of_inj...](https://www.cdc.gov/injury/wisqars/pdf/leading_causes_of_injury_deaths_highlighting_unintentional_injury_2011-a.pdf)

~~~
electriclove
"Drowning was the leading cause injury death for those 1 to 4 years of age."
via
[http://www.cdc.gov/safechild/child_injury_data.html](http://www.cdc.gov/safechild/child_injury_data.html)

~~~
infinite8s
Unfortunately they don't separate out whether the drowning happened in a
swimming pool or a bathtub.

------
georgeecollins
My nine year old is very anxious to be far from an adult (more than 20 feet)
in public places, even very safe ones like residential streets, parks and
grocery stores.

Why? Because other "helpful" adults come up to him and ask him if he is OK.
Does he know where his parents are? Once a small group of adults gathered
around him when my wife was getting the car from down the street. Concerned
adults see other concerned adults and they gather like a flock, producing
great anxiety in my child. Now he is very nervous to be far from a parent in
any public place.

~~~
dougmccune
This rings incredibly true for me. I'm certainly the type of parent that lets
my kids wander farther than normal (by today's ridiculous standard of normal
anyway, which means within 5 feet) and I see constant looks of concern from
all sorts of adults. My 4 year old is perfectly capable of being a half block
ahead of me as we walk down the street and doesn't need an adult stopping him
to check in. My last walk through the airport with two kids, both always well
within eyesight, resulted in multiple concerned adults stopping in their
tracks, ready to leap into action.

If a kid is clearly lost, crying, or distressed then please, by all means try
to help. But if a kid is confidently walking without a parent within 5 feet
don't jump to the conclusion that something's wrong.

------
chrissnell
This is my ethos. I have two young boys--one 4 year-old and one 18 months--and
this is how they are growing up. My four year old was riding without training
wheels by two and on skate ramps by three [1]. My wife was initially against
it but through my stubborn insistence, she's come around. As I mentioned in
another comment, my sister and I grew up doing all sorts of dangerous shit and
I will forever be grateful to my parents for not raising pansies. We build a
rickety tree fort high in a tree and threw balls of mud and rocks at each
other and the other neighborhood kids who played with us. We rode our bikes
across major streets, we made homemade fireworks, and we had a trampoline in
the neighbors' yard and a skate ramp in the driveway. It was an amazing
childhood and it's exactly what I want for my boys. When we moved out here to
small-town Kansas from the Seattle area, we spent time looking for the right
street and we found it. Packs of kids roam unsupervised and there are few
backyard fences. It's perfect. I hope that "playborhood" does become a thing
again because there's no better way, IMHO, to raise kids.

[1] [https://www.instagram.com/p/BHNBJqmhM5T/?taken-
by=christophe...](https://www.instagram.com/p/BHNBJqmhM5T/?taken-
by=christopherjsnell&hl=en)

~~~
llimllib
Where did you find a bike that fit a two year old? I have a balance bike for
my kid but he can't stand over it yet

~~~
chrissnell
The bike in the Instagram video is a Diamondback Mini Viper. He got a balance
bike (the Strider) for his second birthday and like your son, he also had a
tough time standing over it. But, he grew and was able to get up on it pretty
quickly. First, we practiced locomotion and later, coasting with his feet up
on the stays behind the seat. Once he was flying around on that bike, we
switched to the pedal bike. We had the same problem--he wasn't quite tall
enough--but he grew again and could straddle it, sort of. The actual
transition from balance bike to pedal bike went really quickly. Main thing
they have to learn is the coaster brake.

Good luck.

------
nkrisc
I am convinced there are benefits to letting your children roam and learn
about the world on their own (within reasonable limits, of course). I grew up
in Chicago in the 90s and once I was old enough to understand the seriousness
of being careful around traffic and crossing the street safely I was allowed
to walk to the home of friends who lived a few blocks away on my own. I
learned how to navigate the city: oh my usual route is blocked by
construction, I have to find a different way.

By the time I was 12 I was taking the El home from school, a consequence of my
decision to participate in after-school Jazz band. But that's the thing, it
was my choice. If I wanted to be in the band, then I'd have to take the train
as my parents couldn't pick me up at that time.

By the time I got to college, it was painfully clear which of my fellow
students in the dorms had never had to do anything for themselves before. They
were very nearly incapable of caring for themselves, be it their living spaces
or navigating life in a new city.

~~~
monkmartinez
Would you let your child roam about Chicago these days?

~~~
teen
I think most of the major cities were actually worse when we were children

~~~
monkmartinez
Seriously? I don't have the words... especially for Chicago.

[http://heyjackass.com/](http://heyjackass.com/) <\- This is a serious website
BTW

~~~
pilom
Your own link shows that Chicago had almost twice as many shootings in the
1970's and early 1990's than it has today. Sounds safer to me.

~~~
monkmartinez
Look at 1989 to 2011 homicides... most by far. Also, 608 killings so far this
year... Trend for homicides is SKYROCKETING.

~~~
vonmoltke
Are you talking about the table under "Yearly Murder Trend"? _Of course_ the
1989 entry is the highest; it's the longest period. The only other period on
that table of comparable length is 1955 - 1976, with about 3700 less homicides
but also a much smaller city.

The line chart above the table clearly backs up the statement you were
replying to. From 1968 through 2001 Chicago never had a year with less than
600 homicides. Yes, this year has seen a sharp uptick for some reason. It is
still the first time in 15 years Chicago has broken that 600 threshold. This
year notwithstanding Chicago has been significantly safer this millennium than
it was when most of the people on this site were kids.

------
Diederich
I'll post this as a top-level comment because I think it's a relevant reply to
a number of other comments.

In response to, for example, this line from goodJobWalrus:

> I mean people get arrested for letting their kids go to the park or play in
> their own backyards, for god's sake.

Honest question: what is the objective, per-child risk of that happening? I
don't have data for that handy, but I would be shocked if it was anything
except exceedingly low, on the order of getting killed in a commercial
aircraft crash.

My wife and I frequently struggle with the this vague fear of people turning
us in to social services, because we've read a number of articles about that
happening to families who were raising their kids in a way that was completely
normal a couple of decades ago.

But even with all of the general societal paranoia we are saddled with, I'm
almost certain that we are still statistically safe from such over-reach.

~~~
ohitsdom
I'm not OK to play the odds if all it takes is one nosy neighbor to get my
kids taken away and me arrested.

[http://insider.foxnews.com/2015/06/14/florida-parents-
charge...](http://insider.foxnews.com/2015/06/14/florida-parents-charged-
felony-neglect-after-11-year-old-son-plays-backyard-90-minutes)

~~~
function_seven
You see the irony in this, right? All the parents that _don’t_ let their kids
off the leash even for a second use the same reasoning. “It not OK to play the
odds if all it takes is one kidnapping to take my kid away for ever”

I’d say that OP’s point is the odds are so low, that it is OK to play them.

~~~
fweespeech
[http://www.pollyklaas.org/about/national-child-
kidnapping.ht...](http://www.pollyklaas.org/about/national-child-
kidnapping.html)

> 99.8% of the children who go missing do come home.

> Only about 100 children (a fraction of 1%) are kidnapped each year in the
> stereotypical stranger abductions you hear about in the news.

[http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/07/in-a-
yea...](http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/07/in-a-year-child-
protective-services-conducted-32-million-investigations/374809/)

> In a Year, Child-Protective Services Checked Up on 3.2 Million Children

> 2.5 million of those kids were declared 'non-victims.' Another 686,000 were
> 'abused' or 'neglected.' And an estimated 1,640 kids died as a result.

To be fair, one of these has a much higher rate of incident than the other.

Personally, I'm more concerned with the quality and accuracy of CPS than I am
about child abduction simply because a 10% improvement in CPS would save more
lives than a 100% reduction in child abductions.

Then again, I feel that way about medical errors vs. terrorism and the value
of spending money to save lives. A 10% reduction of medical errors would save
more lies than a 100% reduction in terrorism. :/

~~~
rocqua
Regarding a 100% reduction in terrorism, in the long run, that shit might have
some very significant knock-on effects. Especially the massive reduction of
wars.

I do agree that the risk of terrorism is massively overrated. I think this is
because terrorism requires 'agency' and thus feels both worse and more
preventable.

~~~
fweespeech
> Regarding a 100% reduction in terrorism

It was meant to represent the impossible goal of 100% success, not that I
actually meant it was achievable. I don't think we can substantially reduce
terrorism below current levels.

There is always going to be some group of people who are angry and violent as
long as humanity hasn't achieved the Singularity imo.

------
Fricken
I my city in we had a little Robert Moses in the parks and rec department who
designed amazing, unique and challenging playgrounds in every new
neighbourhood that went up in the late 70s and early 80s during a time of
rapid growth for the city. From 6-12 I lived in my local playground during the
summers, it was a full time job, I wanted to be a stuntman when grew up.

Those playgrounds have since all been replaced by the common kit playgrounds
that are so crippled by draconian safety regulations that they aren't any fun
at all for any developmentally normal kid over the age of 6.

But weirdly, next to where my old playground used to be, they've put in a
fancy new skatepark. Among other concrete forms it features an 11 foot high
quarterpipe kids are encouraged to drop in on while standing on a little board
with wheels under it. The ambulance pays a visit every other day during the
summers. Thank heaven for universal health care.

Nature finds a way, sometimes.

~~~
Spooky23
That phenomenon is ADA related as well. You need to provide ground accessible
equipment, "sensory" activities for specific age ranges at specific heights,
limited slope ramps and other features now. Our local parks department
actually has a court-mandated compliance officer because they were sued a few
years ago for having a non-compliant playground.

Having connecting ramps and bridges reduces some of that burden, which is one
of the reasons why many playgrounds consist of a sprawling elevated ramp
system with a few slides, wheels and other random crap.

The skatepark is ironically easier to build, until someone manages to win a
lawsuit, despite the obvious safety hazards.

------
mighty_atomic_c
Very interesting article.

I'm an example by-product of the opposite extreme. My parents kept me from my
neighbors, other kids in school and other people in church (I can count on one
hand the number of guests that came over to hang out with me throughout my
childhood). I also had no access to TV, the internet, the library, etc. I was
isolated to such an extreme that the only thing I think I really developed was
an active imagination. I guess my parents were a little more extreme than
typical "helicopter" parents, but also unable to afford any structured
activities for me, so I was closely watched and kept indoors all the time.

By my teenage years, the home-schooling program my parents were putting me
through was so isolating and so obviously worthless on its own that I started
to spiral into depression and contemplated suicide. By that point, I was
convinced that I was wasting away mentally and physically such that when I
would attempt to enter the adult world, that I would fall on my face and
simply never be able to "catch up" with my peers who had two decades of normal
development.

Things did get orders of magnitude better when I was in college the next year
and working multiple jobs. I managed to move out somewhere after I turned 18
with nice roommates and cheap rent. I think I managed to close most of the
mental/social/physical gap that I had perceived in my teenage years, but I
would be lying if I said that I was a completely normal 25-year old. I have
the strangest deficiencies that crop up now and again in my life, and I have a
strong suspicion that kids who come from "helicopter" households will share
these problems (such as difficulty reading people's emotions, difficulty in
executive function, strange worries, low self-esteem).

So when I consider the possibility of having kids, I really like the idea of
letting them socialize with other people, explore, and solve problems on their
own without my constant interference. That's much better than my experience of
growing up, with only fantasies of being outside and doing stuff. But if
that's culturally unacceptable, then there will be a generation or two of
people like me, who struggle daily with the little things I never had a chance
to deal with growing up.

------
rayiner
The sad thing is that, unlike many other areas, parenting in the U.S. is
getting worse, not better. Millennials are leading the way in increasing
acceptance of LGBT individuals, legalizing drugs, etc., but most of the
millennial parents I know are absolutely nuts. They make my own
"overprotective asian mother" seem like a proponent of "free-range kids."

~~~
saosebastiao
I can't speak for everywhere, but at least in Seattle, most of the helicopter
parents I see and know are not millenials but genX. I'm on the upper edge of
what is called a millennial, and almost everybody I know that is younger than
me is very intentionally hands off.

~~~
pnathan
Curious, do you have kids & if so, are you doing the hands off thing?

I live in Seattle (within city limits) and would love to chat with someone
about how the hands-off/free-range thing is working in practice within _this_
city.

------
mafribe
The article makes a testable statement: "Think about your own 10 best memories
of childhood, and chances are most of them involve free play outdoors [...]
How many of them took place with a grown-up around?"

Yup, that is correct for me. And I was a bookish, introverted child. Still
unsupervised exploration of forrests, abandoned factories, houses under
construction, rivers, caves, tunnels ... was awesome.

~~~
eric_h
Same here. I think my favorite unsupervised childhood memory was the time when
(I was about ~10 years old) the day after a big rainstorm, that turned a
nearby creek into more or less a river, we took a couple of inflatable rafts
and went for a little boat ride. We ended up miles and miles away from any of
our parents' houses and once it started to get dark, we hopped out of the
stream, went and knocked on some random person's door and asked to use the
phone.

Our parents weren't thrilled at having to pick us up, but we had a great time.

~~~
DavidAdams
I did this exact same thing as a teenager when our creek turned into a
torrent, but because I had thoroughly explored the forest as a free-range kid,
I knew where the creek would take us, so we arranged to have someone meet us
at a faraway bridge with a car.

~~~
eric_h
Ours was more spur of the moment and done without our parent's permission. We
spent hours on the boats, and none of us had traced this particular creek that
far (and the water was moving at a nice clip).

------
Steuard
I went into this article expecting to cheer it on: I'm grateful for everyone
who's pushing back against our modern insistence on overprotective parenting,
all too often backed by the brute force of law.

But barely a page into it (by the end of paragraph 6, and heavily reinforced
in paragraph 7), I'm already barreled over by what looks like some seriously
intense sexism. Maybe the article misrepresents him, but Mike Lanza appears to
place the blame for overprotective parenting primarily on moms ("mom
philosophy", he calls it, though the article's author tries to shelter him by
generalizing the term) dominating "passive dads". He describes the fun and
freedom that he advocates as "masculine experiences". While the article does
mention and show some girls, most of the quotes from Lanza are about boys and
what they need. (The article even politely specifies that "his focus is on
boys", without comment.)

I'm not okay with any of that. I could express that as anger on behalf of my
wife (who doesn't buy into overprotective parenting any more than I do) or on
behalf of my daughter (who was begging me just this week to lift her into a
tree again and again). But honestly I'd be just as annoyed if they weren't in
my life. It ought to be _obvious_ in this day and age that "I blame moms!" is
an embarrassing (and harmful) way to ground an argument.

Calling for revival of the term "sissy" and normalizing bullying as "normal,
boyish aggression" in paragraph 9 was just one step too much for me. Sorry:
I'm out. There are plenty of people advocating similar "free range kids"
philosophies who aren't also assholes.

~~~
clarkevans
I also had a visceral response to this article. As Mike Lanza is explaining
his childhood experience to the journalist (Melanie Thernstrom), she quotes
him:

    
    
      Since they didn’t want to “stoop all the way to girls,” he says, giving me a smile.

~~~
grotsnot
To be fair, the guy is in his 50s. 40someodd years ago was a different world
and he's just describing the attitudes of the time. Boys played with boys and
girls played with girls. I interpreted as Lanza merely walking us through the
thought process boys from the 70s _had_ , not as saying it's an attitude boys
today _should have_. It's easy to picture that smile as indicating self-
awareness of the outdatedness of the attitude.

------
redleggedfrog
I am a parent of 2 teenage boys (16 and 18) and this is similar to the
philosophy under which they were raised. Contrary to what people are saying in
the posts, it is not difficult to raise your children this way, nor more
dangerous. The worst injuries either boy has sustained have all been at
organized activities. The benefits, and I can't overemphasize this, outweigh
whatever the hazards.

The problem isn't the kids of course, but parents, who are extremely
overprotective of their children. I blame our media, which focuses on the
violence and dangers in our society to make money while ignoring we're living
in literally the safest time in history. They've scared the parents into
thinking the world is too dangerous for their children.

It's the kids who suffer. They don't get the learn autonomy, or how to use
their imagination, or how to set their own boundaries. And most of all, how to
productively manage boredom. I see how they're doing that these days - they've
got their noses in phones.

~~~
scaryspooky
As an anecdote, in 2006 I was in grad school and helped a friend with her
summer camp for nerdy teens. I still remember the brother and sister (16ish
years old) who were deathly afraid to be outside at dusk during the summer
because of the West Nile Virus, which at that point was a concern but nothing
DEET couldn't prevent. They'd read about it in the newpaper, I think.

I don't think it's the parents who are solely at fault for the safety
paranoia.

------
dzdt
I am surprised this guy's homeowners insurance hasn't dropped him. A few years
ago I had to switch companies or be dropped for having a trampoline -- with a
full net -- in my fenced backyard. Insurance companies hate anything with any
risk, especially of injury to outside visitors.

~~~
fsloth
What? That sounds crazy to a non-US person. Are you saying that if someone
came to visit and hurt themselves on the trampoline they would charge your
insurance for it?

~~~
ensignavenger
"Non-us" is awful broad- where exactly? Are you claiming that there are no
non-US jurisdictions that have similar liability laws?

~~~
gambiting
I lived in a few EU countries so far, all of them with national health
insurance. If someone got hurt in your backyard, then they would be taken to a
hospital and....no bill would ever be produced. No one would even bother
asking if you have house insurance, because any cost of treatment would be
covered by the national health cover. I don't think my house insurance even
includes coverage for things like this because it's so unheard of. Someone
could still sue you for damage to their health, but first of all - court could
order at most payment for any extra treatment(that's not already paid for by
national health insurance) or maybe perceived loss of income. Multi-million-
dollar cases where the actual loss is nowhere near that are not really a thing
outside of US.

~~~
ensignavenger
Thanks for the details. In the US, typical judgments go beyond just medical
expenses. (pain and suffering, loss of work, etc) I think it will vary a lot
between different states, too. I think a lot of the reason for this is because
of insurance- I bet people that don't have insurance are far less likely to be
sued for these types of incidents. But with the advent of insurance, has come
an attitude of "oh well, they have insurance, so it won't cost them anything,
it'll just be the insurance company that pays for it!". The insurance
companies in turn use these large settlements/judgments to support their case
for why you NEED their product. That is my theory, any way.

------
balabaster
Love this guy. Am this guy. Want to be this guy's friend. Want my kids to be
friends with this guy's kids.

I wish there were more people like this because just like him, I am an outlier
where I live. My kids don't want supervision, and I don't want to constantly
supervise them. I will offer them endless amounts of advice if they want/need
it, feed them, clothe them, keep a roof over their heads, love them, but I
want my kids to be kids and spend time discovering themselves. I fully approve
of his parenting style and tactics. I am with him.

Kudos, truly!

~~~
duderific
All except playing on the roof. That's just silly.

~~~
balabaster
I never fell off the roof... or the 80 ft trees we used to climb. That's not
to say that the likelihood of that being zero, however, of the approximately
50 people in my circle of friends that did those things, I only have
recollection of 1 falling out of a tree and breaking an arm. I once trod on a
nail and had it go through my foot... compared to the countless numbers of
sprained wrists, ankles, broken ankles, legs and arms occurring in organized
sports. I realize the fallacy of statistics, but anecdotally, 1 broken arm
from falling out of a tree in a pool of approximately 50 test subjects vs.
more than a dozen in a test pool of similar size for organized sports. I
realize that not allowing your kids to do anything is much safer, but at a
much greater cost to their happiness.

------
M_Grey
The degree to which people in this country, in this time feel entitled to
impose their neurotic crap on other people's kids, is disgusting. Ironically,
it's one of the of the few reasons to, "Think of kids".

~~~
mc32
I think it's the opposite. People used to raise children more communally.
People knew each others children and would scold them if they misbehaved while
out in the street etc.

Nowadays, people are fearful to give misbehaving children feedback for fear of
the parent getting aggressively offended.

~~~
M_Grey
There's an element of that, but it exists in combination with the air of
hysteria and constant panic influencing the decisions of police and other
public officials. It becomes a _crime_ to leave a child unattended for
minuscule periods, that kind of thing. It's an odd combination of extreme
societal neglect, punctuated with equally extreme hysteria.

~~~
mc32
Yes, very true. It's unfortunate. It seems people have moved away from being
normally concerned an offering a helping hand to becoming parenting
vigilantes.

I think the fear instilled by "stranger danger" and litigiousness has had a
big influence in how people behave toward other people's children. Since they
can only interact from a distance, it's now through official channels where
there is no leeway, common sense judgement. It's all black or white.

------
yanjuk
'Helicopter parenting' is misleading: it's not the degree of parental
involvement and oversight that's the problem, it's the degree of unwelcome
interference. True, if I'm going to err I'd rather err on the side of benign
neglect. Yet blaming 'overprotective' parents is unfair. It only takes phone
call or two and children can be temporarily removed by social services. The
mere prospect of which is a major heartache.

~~~
veidr
Let's be clear: this is an issue only in the world's sole superidiocracy. (I
share your concern, because my children and I are citizens.)

There are (many) other problems in other countries, but not that specific
problem.

------
smallnamespace
Perhaps helicopter (extreme risk-averse) parenting is a _rational_ reaction to
the recent trend of having many fewer children much later in life.

For most of human evolutionary history, women had their first child in their
teens. That means even if your child died, you would have many more chances to
reproduce.

The average age of first child is now closer to 25. If a 10-year-old kid dies
from an accident, the mother may have a lot of difficulty conceiving and
bringing another child to term.

This might also explain why the author thinks moms are more likely to
helicopter parent -- men's reproductive ability declines with age much more
slowly than women.

~~~
duderific
> The average age of first child is now closer to 25.

Probably closer to 35 among the women talked about in the article (wealthy
Silicon Valley types), so the effect is even more amplified.

------
morgante
One thing which really frustrates and surprises me is that techology should be
_helping_ to free children, not constraining them.

Parents universally have cell phones and many kids do as well these days.
These should be a huge enabler for freedom—if something happens while you're
roaming or home alone, you can easily call a parent. It seems unequivocally
_safer_ to leave children alone today than it was 20-30 years ago.

This isn't even including the fact that crime rates are substantially lower
today. It's really hard to find any empirical justification for the tide of
over-protective parenting.

------
herbps10
“What are the chances of falling off the roof?” he argued vociferously when we
tried previously to hash it out. Have I ever known anyone who has fallen off a
roof? Anyway, he said, it’s not as if he doesn’t give his kids any limits:
They are not allowed to play ball or tag up there."

Yes, but most kids are not allowed or encouraged to play on their roofs. If
they were, the rate of injury would likely be much higher.

~~~
durandal1
As a kid, me and my friends would climb any roof we could. Of course adults
would chase us down if they saw us, but we would just do it again when they
were gone. This was rural Sweden in the 80s.

You don't want to raise conformist children, you want to raise rebels.

~~~
sosborn
> You don't want to raise conformist children, you want to raise rebels.

I disagree. I want my kids to be smart enough to know when to conform and when
to rebel. Time and place :)

------
davidw
Speaking of kids and playing, here's something I'd love to see: my kids are
stuck on this 'Animal Jam' computer game, and while I try and be a good parent
and set limits and stuff, I've also thought a technical solution might be fun:
"The Great Firewall of Games". It would act like the Chinese thing: rather
than simply deny access, it progressively degrades the experience so that the
user puts the blame on the game itself, rather than whoever is denying the
access.

~~~
Crespyl
That seems technically over-complicated and personally dishonest...

Why not simply set a hard time limit, and optionally enforce it with existing
parental control software?

Surely you don't need to deface a product to manipulate children when you
could simply say "no, you've had enough, go (play outside/read a book/help
your sister set the table)" and deny access to the game?

I'd feel terrible if someone grew up thinking the games (or movies, or books)
I'd made were low quality/broken just because someone was intentionally
degrading the experience for them.

~~~
davidw
Eh, the hard limits get tiresome after a while. Sometimes parents need some
other things in their arsenal, as long as they don't become a crutch.

Little secret for the non parents: parenting is not always about complete and
total honesty. Sorry to burst your bubble.

~~~
jdbernard
Sorry. I have to disagree. Vehemently. I'm a parent of three. I don't always
tell my children everything, because they are not always capable of handling
everything, but I am always honest with them. We're not perfect, but we try
very hard never to manipulate our children.

Hard limits get tiresome, sure. Explaining yourself in terms they can
understand gets very tiresome. Little secret: parenting gets tiring. There is
no silver bullet. Sorry to burst your bubble.

~~~
davidw
I'm sure you "manipulate" your children - in the sense of getting them to do
what you want - in a variety of ways, directly or indirectly. It's part of
being a parent. You do it because you love them and want to guide them in the
right way.

I hope you're less judgmental with them than with other random people on the
internet.

~~~
jdbernard
My response was crafted to match the tone of yours. So...

As far as manipulation, no. We do exert our will and sometimes force them to
do what we want, for the reasons that you name. In that you are right, it is
part of being a parent. However, the key is that we do our very best to be
transparent with them and accountable to them about what we are doing. That is
the difference and what makes it not manipulation.

That dishonesty is what I took issue with in your original comment and the
reason I replied the way I did. Like I said, I disagree vehemently about being
dishonest or manipulative with my children because it is too easy for that to
leave lasting issues or teach lessons counter-productive to their best
interest.

Using manipulation as a parenting tool is a great way to raise rebellious
teenagers. My children do not always agree with my parenting choices and
rules, but they understand why they are there. They understand explicitly that
our actions are for their best interest, and I allow them to hold us
accountable to that!

I am accountable to them for how I use my authority. I respect them as people
and respect their free will. This makes me feel extremely careful about how I
subjugate their free will. We are surely not perfect in this, but we
explicitly give them permission to call out inconsistencies in our parenting,
to question our judgement. I apologize to my children when I fall short of my
own stated goals.

Openness, honesty, transparency, accountability. I am modeling to them the way
I believe authority should be wielded in general. Look at our society today. I
believe one of the biggest problems threatening our democracy is authority
wielded without transparent responsibility, accountability, and honesty
towards those being governed.

Dishonesty with my children is reprehensible. I stand by my earlier
statements.

------
callmeed
Only tangentially related, but I think this is part of the draw/success of
_Stranger Things_ on Netflix. Gen-Xers like me (who are now parents) get
nostalgic about the days we could freely roam town on our bikes. Well after
dark. Without a helmet. And explore without supervision. (Yes, I know helmets
save lives).

I'm very much an anti-helicopter parent similar to the article. I wonder if
deep down most parents know its better–but for whatever reason (peer pressure,
media, etc.) they hover.

~~~
duderific
My wife is a hover-er. I am always battling with her to try and give our
2-year-old son a little more space. Unfortunately, he fell down a few stairs
when he was 18 months or so (scraped up a bit but otherwise ok) and now she
won't let him walk down stairs without holding his hand. Sigh.

~~~
callmeed
lol my wife is the same. We should start a club.

------
euske
This sounds a good idea. But one of the highest reader-rated comments of the
article is intriguing to me:

    
    
        Anna - Pittsburgh 11 hours ago
    
        ... But, this whole article just oozed misogyny. The casual
        dismissal of mothers and the harsh declaration that the female
        sex and their worrying is ruining today's young men is, in a 
        word, offensive. Worrying about boys growing up to be sissies---
        who even says that anymore outside the men's rights movement?
        It sounds to me that this guy wants to create a world for his 
        boys where girls are not allowed or, at best, are merely tolerated.
        Which sort of reminds me of Silicon Valley, actually.

~~~
aaron695
I think they are more a troll than anything else.

He never called anyone a sissy.

> was putting my son at risk of turning into what used to be called a sissy

He was specifically making a commentary how the word is no longer used.

Taking the article as an entirety, it was written by a woman and ends with

> I held Kieran’s hand tightly and decided never to play there again.

But I think the writer as a female knew the story she was telling. It added to
the tale told.

------
baldfat
FORMER Residence Director at a college: US Law helps with this. I would get
dozens of phone calls about how little Johnny or Little Jenny are doing. They
wanted the numbers I would then tell them it violated US Law for me to tell
them, unless in some circumstances. They never asked what those circumstances
were, which were they your dependent :)

The sad thing is the helicoptered kids don't know how to make decisions for
themselves and so they go to town because they never got to learn self-
discipline or consequences to making the lazy choice.

Teach your kids self-discipline and learn the consequences and rewards for
their decisions. To many parents try to take away the consequences or shorten
them.

------
mordocai
While it definitely looks like Mike doesn't discriminate against girls(since
several were present in the story and pictures) I find the focus on boys less
than ideal. "Tomboys" exist, and even girls who tend more to the "traditional"
female gender roles like to play outside and be rambunctious. To me, he should
be focusing on all kids not a particular gender.

Edit: I also think encouraging kids to segregate less by gender might help
with our other discrimination/segregation issues as well but that's pure
conjecture.

~~~
w4
> _I find the focus on boys less than ideal...To me, he should be focusing on
> all kids not a particular gender._

He has sons, not daughters, so he's focussing on what's best for his sons. I
wouldn't be surprised if his approach might change if he ever has a daughter,
but he doesn't have any obligation to worry about what's best for other
people's kids.

~~~
mordocai
Right, and in my opinion part of what would be best for his sons is for them
to be playing with girls as well as boys. Therefore, in my opinion Mike
shouldn't be marketing this specifically for boys.

~~~
w4
> _in my opinion part of what would be best for his sons is for them to be
> playing with girls as well as boys_

Except they are - right in your comment you say:

> _it definitely looks like Mike doesn 't discriminate against girls(since
> several were present in the story and pictures)_

------
clarkevans
I think the freedom to play and experiment is a good thing. Talking to your
children about "risks" so -they- learn risk analysis is a very good thing.

However, from the article, Mike Lanza sounds a bit of a male chauvinist. I
don't like the tone of males vs females and his anecdotes. At young ages,
especially before puberty, there isn't that much of a gap between girl and boy
athletic capabilities. There _is_ a huge gap in parental and society
expectations and norms.

------
ksenzee
I'm absolutely a free-range parent. My kids have the same freedom I had in the
80s to play outside with friends and roam the neighborhood and walk to the
store. But come on, man. If I had wandered out on the roof at the age of 5, my
parents would have read me the Riot Act and boarded up the window. Giving your
kids a normal childhood doesn't mean throwing all caution to the winds.

------
bwooceli
My wife and I are not "helicopter parents", but that doesn't mean we don't
believe in healthy boundaries. Mike talked about wanting to believe that his
kids would respect his trust, well part of that respect can also be earned in
demonstrating that you do, in fact, "know better" about some things by virtue
of your age/experience/wisdom. As a parent I don't use my "wisdom" as an
excuse to prevent them from learning things for themselves, but in the case of
playing on the roof for example, I would put a limit. C'mmon man, don't kill
your kids for an ideal.

~~~
Prefinem
Having fallen off a roof before, I feel like going straight to the 'kill your
kids' is a little extreme. I would guess that most falls that result in death
are from either a higher than average roof height or onto ground harder than
dirt.

Also, how will a child learn about the dangers of heights if they never fall
and hurt themselves? You can teach them, and that might work for some, but
some children have / need to learn the hard way and that's okay.

~~~
sliverstorm
They can certainly have fun & play, and learn about falling, without falling
off a roof.

The same way they can learn about the hazards of sharp things without playing
on a table saw.

~~~
DannyBee
Just to point out (because hey, why not :P)

Table saws are a bad example in some cases.

My saw stop will stop the blade in <5 milliseconds of contact. It equates to
basically scratching your finger or better (blades move at 3000-3600rpm, so it
calculates out to about 1/4 revolution of the blade, max.)

As far as i'm aware, they've literally never had a brake activation failure.

It's pretty much the safest thing in my shop.

Of all the things i'd never let kids play with in the shop, it'd probably be
chisels.

Which is ironic, because people think they are a good way to introduce kids to
woodworking, when they are probably the sharpest and least safe thing due to
how sharp and easy to cause severe injury.

~~~
dzdt
I have only used old table saws. How does the saw stop tell a finger from a
board?

~~~
lfowles
Conductivity. You're not supposed to use them with damp boards or metals (I
guess you can, but then you're replacing the saw after it brakes)

~~~
DannyBee
s/saw/saw blade/

;)

I actually miter cut aluminum the other day and it didn't trigger, it depends
on how electrically isolated your metal is.

------
easyfrag
I have 2 kids and have consciously tried to avoid the helicopter-parent
mindset and let them play on their own. But now as they approach adolescence I
find myself more interested in how they spend their free time. Not so much
hovering but making sure they are busy, gentle encouraging team sports &
activities as an alternative to just "hanging out."

I believe the audience here skews younger but for those of you that have
raised kids to adulthood, any advice? And for you more recent adolescents, how
did you experience parenting at that age? When I look back it seems to me that
the smartphone has changed everything.

~~~
cortesoft
Why do you want them to do something besides "just hanging out?" What is wrong
with just hanging out?

~~~
ewhanley
Indeed - their precious supply of "just hanging out" time will begin to
evaporate quickly as they get older. There's plenty of time to be busy
(shudder) when they are adults.

------
madamelic
I think this is really great but there is a difference between "boy-ish
behavior" and bullying. Just hand-waving away bullying as "boys will be boys"
is reckless and irresponsible.

If a boy wants to shove around someone else, fine. But if your son starts
beating up and harassing children, maybe it is time for a talk with him.

------
Icedcool
This is awesome. I think this is much needed for boys and children today.

------
tarr11
The American Academy of Pediatrics advises against children using trampolines
unsupervised due to high rated of injury.

[https://www.aap.org/en-us/about-the-aap/aap-press-
room/pages...](https://www.aap.org/en-us/about-the-aap/aap-press-
room/pages/AAP-Advises-Against-Recreational-Trampoline-
Use.aspx?nfstatus=401&nftoken=00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000&nfstatusdescription=ERROR:+No+local+token)

~~~
chrissnell
There's a lot of activities that the AAP recommends against and we did almost
every one of them as a kid. I'm eternally grateful to my parents that I
enjoyed an amazing childhood full of trampolines, dangerously unstable and
high tree forts, homemade fireworks, driveway skateramps, pocketknives (and
plenty of sliced fingers), and all of the other cool shit that parents don't
let their kids do anymore.

~~~
logfromblammo
The only blade-related injury I have ever seen was actually caused by a
hatchet, while splitting small-diameter firewood for a campfire. Some topical
antibiotic ointment and butterfly bandages took care of it for the four days
it took us to reach the pick-up point. She didn't have permission to use the
hatchet unsupervised, and was not following the family-approved safe-use
technique. Needless to say, she was not allowed to do anything fun for the
rest of the trip.

It made a nice scar, though. People can ask her how she got it, and she can
say, "oh, that's from a hatchet, a four day journey away from the nearest
hospital." My most interesting scar is from the underside of the dashboard on
a Honda Civic while installing an aftermarket stereo, and you can barely even
see it.

I have never seen a pocketknife injury, though. Nor any from archery
equipment, or firearms. I'd probably be most worried about barbed treble-
fishhooks and swimming in warm freshwater lakes and rivers. Not really because
of drowning, so much as slips and falls from mud or algae-coated rocks, or
infectious parasites in the water.

My spouse, on the other hand, never got to do _anything_ fun as a kid, and
freaks out about _everything_ even remotely dangerous, like my sharp, pointy
tweezers. The only people more unreasonably intolerant of minute risks work
for the TSA.

Trampolines, though. Those things are deathtraps. I'd rather have a swimming
pool drained of water and refilled with rattlesnakes in my back yard. Also, no
[American] football.

------
aiiane
I'm sure there are some interesting points in the article but I can't get past
the sexist overtones in this piece.

------
zzzeek
By all means, lets normalize bullying again as healthy male behavior. And
normalize all their miserable victims as the losers they obviously are. Where
have I heard this recently ?

------
int_19h
Alan Dean Foster had a great book "Sentenced to Prism", one of the premises of
which is a society that evolved from such a helicopter mindset, to the point
where all adults wouldn't leave home without a protective body enclosing suit,
containing various amenities, and guaranteeing safety from most accidents,
even highly unlikely ones.

One of the main takeaways of that story was that this mindset breeds
complacency. If nothing bad ever happened to you that you didn't have to deal
with the hard way, you start to believe that you're invulnerable; and thus,
more likely to wade into dangerous situations without fully realizing just how
dangerous they are.

------
overcast
I can't imagine growing up, and not spending my summers building forts,
trekking through the woods, jumping off ramps with bikes, and beating up my
body on a skateboard. Sounds like a horrible childhood these kids have to deal
with.

------
nether
Would it be better to take these kids back inside to teach them to code?
Honest question. I've seen viewpoints for both more and less screen time
vociferously defended on HN, see:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12250500](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12250500).

------
peterwwillis
Other societies without helicopter parenting (read: most of them) don't have a
wealth of maimed and dead kids. Instead, parents are involved with their
child's development and they teach them to keep themselves safe - though their
societies are not unoften more safe than the USA, anyway.

We could do things like reduce the incidence of gun and car related injuries
and fatailities and provide more opportunities to encourage parents playing
with their children outdoors. Or we could create more protective laws and
further cushion the playgrounds we essentially "walk" our kids in, and more
organized sports leagues for children where the parents act like an unruly
mob.

This whole article is so insanely closed in view and experience that it's not
worth reading unless you're an upper middle class white American in the
suburbs. Talk about first world problems.

------
ThomPete
Raising a kid is a project not a concept.

The second you understand that your whole approach to parenting changes
drastically and you can finally start thinking about it rationally allowing
your kids to build their own life with the support of their parents.

------
gedy
They call this "helicopter parenting" \- but it's not at all, it's that both
parents usually work, people have less kids, and the fear of lawsuits.

------
javiramos
I like this blog of a couple that has been traveling the world for many years:
[http://www.bumfuzzle.com/](http://www.bumfuzzle.com/)

They had kids a few years ago and they strongly advocate giving kids freedom
to play, explore etc.

Not advocating for anything but just wanted to share an example of one of the
ends of the spectrum...

------
losteverything
When I was told that Skittles were not sold in the high school vending
machines any longer and that a bottle of vanilla in your children's bedroom
was another sign I knew Parenting was just like my career -if I didn't keep up
on the latest I would fall behind.

Parenting is like version control and awareness.

------
WillPostForFood
Are people reading the whole article (which is great) - but i was horrified by
the last sentence, which as a parent I found crushing.

* I saw the animation in the boys’ slender bodies: the power of making the grown-up world momentarily bend around them.

I held Kieran’s hand tightly and decided never to play there again. _

------
wott
I don't know what treatment the photographer applied to his pictures. They
look fake to me: the lighting is weird, the colours are weird. (I don't mean
that they are are fake, not at all, I just mean that they _look_ so).

~~~
duderific
Agree, it looks like they used some sharpening filter that makes everything
look eerily hyper-real.

------
goldfishcaura
my wife's response: [http://ahedgehoginthefog.weebly.com/hedgehogs-
adventures/-fe...](http://ahedgehoginthefog.weebly.com/hedgehogs-
adventures/-feature-the-anti-helicopter-parents-plea-let-kids-play)

------
goldfishcaura
Could not agree more. That's why my wife's preschool is play-based:
[http://www.petitefrance.xyz](http://www.petitefrance.xyz)

Sure, there is academic stuff and learning. And as a licensed preschool, we
have full-time supervision. But the helicopter parent as a concept is absent
in French upbringing. Instead, my wife focuses on building kids inner-
confidence through play and social interactions.

------
EA
I like to think of myself as more of a VTOL parent instead of a Helicopter
parent.

------
keeran
Kinda amusing that it looks like the girl in flight is about to slam hard!

~~~
EA
I'm pretty sure she is jumping from the railing on the porch of the house and
will land well onto the trampoline.

------
gjolund
Why is this on HN?

~~~
araneae
Libertarian Silicon Valley entrepreneur man tells you how best to raise your
child, of course it's on HN.

