I was self-driven by the book's description, enabled by unobtrusive parenting and a stable home life. But I also turned out really well by several objective met

I was self-driven by the book's description, enabled by unobtrusive parenting and a stable home life. But I also turned out really well by several objective metrics, and many of my peers in similar circumstances didn't. In the 60's and 70's when I grew up, free-range kids were the norm. I turned out good, but some of my peers did not. I've felt for some time that for those that do well with free-range parenting, they turn out real well, but for those that don't they turn out really bad. The swings from good to bad with that method are really big. With the current style of helicopter/over-scheduling parents, I feel the range of good-bad is much smaller. That is, the bad parts are more hidden and maybe even pushed off until sometime in adulthood; the good parts aren't very good, but because the bad parts seem minimized, it seen as an overall win. As for the bad parts I'm talking about from my childhood, they included death much more frequently from random things. I knew kids that died from accidents ranging from getting hit by cars, to drowning at the reservoir that no one was supposed to swim at, etc. My son is 17 now, and I have never heard of anyone from his school dying. As for other bad parts, I didn't even mention some darker stuff, having to do with sex and drugs. Most of what I experienced, I should really say survived, just doesn't happen anymore. And I'm not talking about kids getting drunk or high at parties. Yes, that still happens in high schools in the US.