
The Overprotected American Child - simulate
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-overprotected-american-child-1527865038
======
danmg
[http://archive.is/kWzYa](http://archive.is/kWzYa)

------
ourmandave
_A wallet-sized Let Grow “Kid Card” is meant to be carried by children when
they are out on their own, to calm the fears of overly concerned adults._

[https://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/B3-AQ358_INDEPE_M...](https://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/B3-AQ358_INDEPE_M_20180531175517.jpg)

^This here.

Except the Concerned Adults will never get a chance to read it because they'll
call the police to rescue the 12-year-old dropped off at the mall by her mom.

[https://www.brainchildmag.com/2014/01/guilty-as-
charged/](https://www.brainchildmag.com/2014/01/guilty-as-charged/)

~~~
empath75
she left a 12 year old in charge of a three year old at the mall which is a
much different situation.

~~~
ivm
11-13 year old me was regularly walking with my 1-3 year old brother alone. It
was in Russia, in the 90s.

~~~
lstamour
Same here in Canada, though I wonder if part of the reason older siblings are
trusted with younger ones is that parents are less worried the second or third
time around—if they’re more trusting that “the kids will be alright,” by then.

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aphextron
You can always tell when someone grew up like this. They are always afraid of
doing anything that might even remotely be considered outside the box. They
lack that ability and drive to find things out for themselves, and instead
rely on others for help and guidance to a fault. Professional occupations are
full of these people who were coddled from birth, through college, and
straight into a high paying job with zero understanding of how life actually
works. It makes relating to someone like that almost impossible.

~~~
watwut
If they ended in high paying profession and are reasonably happy then maybe
their decision to follow advice given to them was right.

~~~
DoreenMichele
So you are okay with people with no spine basically running this country?
Because that's what high paying professionals typically do. It may not be
politics, but they typically have a lot of power and their spinelessness
impacts a lot more people than just themselves.

I don't think this is at all a good thing.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Luckily, these people rarely have enough confidence to stay in positions of
real responsibility.

~~~
DoreenMichele
#silverlining

But I don't know how much that mitigates the damage. If good leaders spend all
their time cleaning up the mess left behind, it goes pretty far in preventing
anything really good from happening.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Part of being a good leader (IMHO) is realizing you’re going to be spending
time mitigating the actions of others who derail progress, for whatever reason
(intentional & unintentional). You are the tip of the spear, blocking the
impediment of progress for those who report to you.

~~~
DoreenMichele
I do a whole lot of that. I have aspirations of someday getting paid for (some
of) it.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Based on my limited knowledge of you from your HN posts and your history in
corporate america, you’d be a great fit for a Chief Of Staff role, or any
other executive role where you’re unblocking progress through mediating
relationships (internally) and partnerships (externally).

------
Pinckney
As a counterpoint, Canada (and presumably the US too) has seen a dramatic
decrease in unintentional injury mortality among children over the last 70
years.

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28026710](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28026710)

~~~
ghaff
Yes, although that study suggests the big declines have been with things like
choking and burns among very young children. I don't think anyone is arguing
for more dangerous products or getting rid of safety precautions for toddlers.

That study also suggests more vehicle-related accidents but it's hard to know
what to make of that without knowing more about the type of accidents,
population patterns, etc.

~~~
wallace_f
>I don't think anyone is arguing for more dangerous products or safety
precautions for toddlers.

Maybe some people think that way. Colloquially, I've heard about a million
times Europeans laugh at how ridiculous they think some laws are in that
regard, such as Kinder eggs being banned in America.

~~~
JackCh
Are kinder eggs actually a dangerous product, or are they just getting swept
up by broader American legislation? It's my understanding the American law
preventing the importation of kinder eggs is a law against inedible objects
from being embedded inside edible objects, which seems generally reasonable.
_Generally._ But are Kinder eggs _actually_ dangerous? Are many European
children dying because of Kinder eggs specifically?

~~~
ghaff
Very unusual but apparently it can happen:
[https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/kinder-
egg-t...](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/kinder-egg-toy-
death-france-three-year-old-french-girl-chokes-a6822626.html)

~~~
Luc
Note she choked on the toy, not on the egg. That could have happened with a
US-friendly 'chocolate egg with toy not inside it' packaging as well.

The egg has been redesigned some years ago. The two parts now stay attached
together.

------
ThomPete
When I first moved my family (from Denmark originally) to New York we had to
put our oldest son in a daycare.

We have always been fairly "free range" i.e. our kids have had their share of
bruises from climbing and in general being allowed to do challenging things.

After a week at the daycare my wife went to pick my son up, one of the
teachers pulled her aside and told her that they, unfortunately, had to report
some of the bruises on his arm or shoulder (can't remember) and that they
hadn't said anything about the bruises on his legs.

My wife and I freaked out worried that the social services would come and take
him away.

Of course, we soon learned that it wasn't actually the bruises on our son they
were worried about but whether we would report them for mistreating our son.

The primary problem in the US is the liability issue which certainly doesn't
help.

People in general though are really weirdly paranoid about their kids. I
always thought it would be counterproductive for them later in life. Better to
fall when you are a little boy than when you are older.

Anyway who knows.

~~~
m_mueller
This kinda story is my biggest fear - the state interfering with my family.

------
osdiab
I wonder how much the built environment impacts the independence we can give
our children. For instance, regarding the milestone of safely crossing the
road that this article mentions, does the common milestone age decrease in
more pedestrian-friendly places? It's one thing to cross a one-lane, slow-
traffic narrow street in Europe versus a wide, high-speed one characteristic
of most American suburbs.

------
bayonetz
The proliferation of these overprotective practices reminds me of the
proliferation of simpler practices we impose on kids like showering regularly
and wearing clean clothes that we just take for granted now. The link in my
mind is how you can pick most any practice that is common amongst a majority
of the population today and look back 50, 200, sometimes 2000 years and you
can trace it back to a minority aristocratic or ruling class. You know, like
medieval kings taking regular private hot baths but this not becoming feasible
for the rest of Europe until the last century.

Another commenter made an observation along the lines of you see overprotected
children nevertheless succeeding (or failing up, depending on your
perspective) professionally as adults. That would make sense if what we are
doing is slowly handing down practices from the higher classes to lower. The
failing up phenomenon is clearly highly correlated with the privilege you were
born into. As everyone becomes relatively more privileged, then practices
would radiate out and be institutionalized amongst more of the population,
i.e., everyone would start overprotecting because as long as your kid makes
it, worse case, they will be able to succeed via the fail up method.

~~~
5DFractalTetris
It used to be said that certain kings or personages were made of glass and
that if you touched them, they would shatter and the kingdom would fall. Much
like a regular private hot bath, I fail to see the value of a Glass King.

Once I visited the UK and some kids threw lit firecrackers into my scarf. Then
all the adults kept drinking. I assume America is currently behind the times,
Europe having since updated the myth to Atomic Motorcycle Danger King.

This failure has something to do with Americans having enjoyed Downton Abbey
more than Mad Max: Fury Road. My investigation continues.

~~~
cosmojg
Don't forget to come back here when you ultimately publish your findings. I
know I'll be keeping an eye open.

------
HarryHirsch
You do wonder how a contemporary American would read Herman Hesse's _Demian_.
Emil Sinclair, the protagonist, he had a _protected childhood_!

------
tropo
Abraham Lincoln was left in a cabin for 6 months, responsible for his sister,
when he was 9 and she was 11. There were some dried berries to eat, and
Abraham Lincoln could go hunt with a rifle. The house didn't have power or
water.

He turned out OK. Modern social workers would have taken him. Heck, they'd
literally swipe baby Jesus.

------
5DFractalTetris
I grew up in the Danger Zone and it was dull.

------
garyvee_
Paywall removed [https://outline.com/E8VPNv](https://outline.com/E8VPNv)

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viburnum
Child poverty is the real problem.

[https://peoplespolicyproject.org/2018/02/16/americas-
bizarre...](https://peoplespolicyproject.org/2018/02/16/americas-bizarre-
income-distribution-for-children/)

~~~
closeparen
> "20 percent of US children live in families with incomes below 50 percent of
> the national median income"

This is a bizarre metric. If richer families started having children at a
higher rate, or poorer families slowed down, the problem would be fixed?

What if we simply cut the pay of the upper 50%, not even redistributing the
income? That would lower median income, and therefore shrink the "less than
50% of median income" demographic, "solving" child poverty.

~~~
taeric
Well, yes, if richer families started having children at a higher rate, this
would almost fix itself.

Two major problems, though. a) By and large, rich people don't have more
children and b) having a child is a good way to destroy your wealth. That is,
many that are just barely in the "rich" category won't be once they have
children. More, most wealth in the US does not survive generations. (And this
is generally agreed to be a good thing, I believe.)

For the second, ok. Cut the pay. How? That sort of suggestion is literally
"wishful thinking." If everyone could get by with less money, everyone would.
Folks do grab for the advantages they can get, though, and most rise in costs
and pay are ascribable to scarcity. Only wishful thinking will make housing
and energy costs flat across the board. Same for social mobility. Or physical
mobility.

~~~
closeparen
Neither of the things I mentioned are a genuine improvement to anyone’s
situation, yet they would fix this metric.

It’s _great_ that the lowest end of the income distribution still has enough
resources to have children. It would help no one to reduce productivity.

The metric is probably not the right way of thinking about this problem.

~~~
taeric
They wouldn't, was my point. One actively works against it through feedback
systems. Having kids typically lowers your income. The other isn't actually
doable.

Is the metric perfect? No. But neither is attacking it in ways that it can't
be attacked.

Do you have alternatives? What are they?

~~~
closeparen
Food security, nutrition, housing stability, rent burden, medical and dental
care, K12 institutions that meet standards, college affordability, etc.
Essentially anything focused on objective conditions instead of relative
positioning.

The upper half of a country’s income distribution can absolutely be more or
less productive compared to another time or another place. How would you go
about it? Defunding education and research and starting a trade war would be
great first steps.

~~~
taeric
I would wager that all of those correlate so heavily to wealth bracket that it
would be a wash. And a surprise for you.

That is, wealth is a proxy for all of those measures. And every attempt at
fixing those measures has ended poorly. At best.

~~~
closeparen
It looks like 8% of children are food insecure, for example. That’s awful but
we’re also a lot further along than the 20% figure in TFA.

~~~
taeric
Is this just a contest to look good? Yes, we have made great progress. I
actually think we should celebrate more of it. Some metrics do give pause for
concern, though. Long before they give pause for alarm.

