Free Range Parent

Posted on 08 August 2010

You know, I doubt it is as ubiquitous as I want to remember it, but I remember growing up in a world where kids were given a lot more freedom to move around. Yes, there were parts that were just downright unsafe, such as a lack of booster seats and some people not even bothering to enforce seatbelts on kids in the back seat, but there was other stuff that just felt more common sense and actually empowering to the children. Examples: for as early as I can remember, my parents would let me play outside without any supervision. My yard had no fence, but I knew to not cross the street. That still gave me two huge fields that butted up against my house to roam around in. Nowadays, I have a feeling someone would be calling CPS on me if I let Jared do that.

So, back story on this train of thought. I was at the beach today with my kids. Normally, I’m on my kids like white-on-rice in the ocean, but I was giving them a little more “leash” today as it was not very crowded, the ocean was very calm, and it was very shallow (due to low tide). I still was keeping a hawk-eye on the kids, yet some random woman decided to march up to me and scream at me, going so far as to call me a bad parent, all the while adding to any likely distraction I might have had.

I’ll admit, her rant unnerved me. Coincidentally, after her rant, it was about time for us to leave the beach anyway, and as we did, she gave me a stink eye the entire way off the sand. I do not think she was even remotely in the right. I am normally very self assured that I am a good, nurturing, caring, and safe parent. Yet, for the rest of the day, I have had a sense of worry that perhaps I’m not. Words from a stranger that has no clue what she is talking about, it would seem, can have an effect regardless.

Fortunately, I have great friends who have cheered me up. One of them, the wonderful Jennifer Liang of JordanCon fame, pointed me over to Free Range Kids. This website is dedicated to the kind of parenting I ascribe to. Granted, I might not be as free a spirit as the author (dubbed by media as “America’s Worst Mom”) who allowed her nine year old to take a subway ride on his own in NYC. Back-story! The family are NYC natives and take the subway as readily as you or I walk down the street.

Anywho, she brings up several good points, especially in her interview over at Dads Divorce, about how it is only recently that we’ve become super smothering and over-protective of our kids and raises valid worries over it. I did not need to hear her to feel these myself, but it makes me a little more comfortable to know other people feel the way I do. Sheltering kids does not help them. How is it that my generation (and perhaps the younger part of the last) has completely gone so over-protective? Easy answer: it makes people money.

Advertisers will play the trump card of “Will you protect your child, or are you just cheap” every change they get. Now, don’t get me wrong. Safety belts and helmets and car seats are awesome. Something that makes a noticeable and statistically significant change to child safety is great. But when nurses say “don’t get a baby-on-board sign, it could decapitate your child in a car accident,” I start to wonder. Did the company that makes those signs suddenly decide they could charge more for a bumper-sticker? Where did this almost assuredly urban legend come from of a baby being beheaded by a flimsy piece of plastic?

Well, at least I can rest assured of one thing. My kids are going to be strong and independent. My kids are going to know how to think for themselves and how to stand up for themselves. And when other kids are floundering over the sudden freedom of college or post-high school, my kids will excel because they have already been eased into responsibility and freedom. I am not a bad dad.