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Making Playgrounds a Little More Dangerous

273 points by Reedx 7y ago

lb1lf 7y ago
This, this, a thousand times this. Life is about evaluating risk. You need to learn it at some point. A playground is as good a place as any. By all means, make them safe enough that kids won't get maimed or killed - but keeping kids from ever falling far enough to feel any real pain is probably counter- productive in the long term. Sigh. My eldest kid's kindergarten advertised themselves as an outdoor experience thingy, then proceeded to cut down every tree on their premises as kids climbed them (the horrors!) and occasionally fell down (Aaaieee!) - so better make the playground look like any generic McPlayground.
- fatnoah 7y ago
  My son's school was in the city and went to a local playground. The main play structure was so high (about 20-25' at the top) that it took a couple months for my kindergarten-aged son to muster the courage to climb it. Even though it's been almost seven years, I still remember his immense pride at conquering that fear and climbing to the top for the first time.
- quakenul 7y ago
  > By all means, make them safe enough that kids won't get maimed or killed - but keeping kids from ever falling far enough to feel any real pain is probably counter- productive in the long term. There is no room between "overprotection" and "freedom", that guarantees safety from harm. Serious accidents have to be accepted before they even happen. A scary prospect for many parents, I am sure.
  - ip26 7y ago
    I'm not giving my seven year old the freedom to operate a chainsaw. I don't think that counts as "overprotection", and I think it confers considerable margin of safety from harm by chainsaw.
    - quakenul 7y ago
      > I don't think that counts as "overprotection" Rest assured, I don't think anyone else does either.
- oska 7y ago
  I sympathise with your comment about the trees being cut down. Trees are natural, 'undesigned' features that are good for thrilling and risky climbing activities. And yes, good for learning to evaluate risk, something I did a lot of when climbing trees as a child (I used to go very high). But I don't agree with accepting risk in a designed playground. Safety for the children using it should be a very high priority, because it is being expressly made for children to play on and therefore the designers have a responsibility to design for safety. And life is more than just evaluating risk and so is play. Play is also physical activity and building co-ordination and strength while having fun. Playgrounds can provide this without including risk. Risk is available elsewhere and the adventurous kids will easily find it if they seek it out (e.g. by climbing trees, if they haven't all been cut down).
fatnoah 7y ago
The only anecdote I can share about this comes from the time my family was touring a local day camp. On the tour, they showed us everything: archery, fishing, swimming, ropes, and everything else you could think of. At one point, we came to a massive, 10 foot high pile of dirt. The kids immediately ran for the dirt pile and the parents' reactions were a 50/50 mix of "Awesome" or "What are you building here?" I knew this was the camp for my kid when they explained, the pile of dirt was just that. A big pile of dirt for the kids to play in. It complemented the big pile of rocks that they also had.
- function_seven 7y ago
  I remember when I was 7 years old and my dad was working on our back yard. Up until that point, the yard was just weeds and dirt. But now we were going to get sod to cover it all. First step was to bring in a mountain of good soil. That soil mountain was piled 6' high for a week, and I spent a lot of time playing on it. (My brother: "You know that pile is half cow shit, right?" ... Me: "Don't care")
  - rags2riches 7y ago
    The large piles of firewood before it had been stacked were great fun. The hayloft is of course a classic playground. And a gravel pit (the site where gravel is mined) is quite exciting...
    - function_seven 7y ago
      Ha. Now you just reminded me of my other favorite playground. The rock quarry by our house. It was private land full of ravines and (in the winter/spring) small streams. In wetter seasons, one of the pits would flood with muddy water. When we were younger we'd climb the fence and go adventuring. As we got older, it was bolt cutters to get the gate open and ride our ATCs out there. If you saw a truck in the distance, it was time to scatter. I'm pretty sure the cops/security back then were content with us running away.
    - frosted-flakes 7y ago
badcede 7y ago
"Grown-ups have taken all the fun out of being a kid just to save a few thousand lives." https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/2017/04/06/george-carlin-you-are-all-diseased-transcript/ https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/2017/04/06/george-carlin-you-a...
- sp332 7y ago
  This feels like a really unconvincing argument. A few thousand is a lot of lives. A few lives would feel like a few too many.
  - stickfigure 7y ago
    A few thousand per month would be a problem, sure. But how about a few thousand per decade? There are four million babies born in the US every year (130 million worldwide).
  - tomatotomato37 7y ago
    This may sound callous, but in a US population of 300 million, a few thousand of any lives is on the order of 0.001%. One of the realities of living in a world of billions of people is that risks of incredibly low precentage still end up happening due to just the sheer magnitude of people To put it another way, lightning strikes are one of the rarest forms of death in the country, and yet still kill more people in the US than the size of my family's big holiday dinner
  - base698 7y ago
    What's the risk threshold you'd be comfortable with? 1 in a 1,000? 6 in 10,000? 13 in 10,000? 1 in 100,000?
- lb1lf 7y ago
  There is more than a grain of truth to this; a couple of years ago it's was brought to my attention that since the 1950s, children being killed in traffic in Norway was down by a couple of orders of magnitude, even though traffic had increased by a couple of orders of magnitude in the same time. Drowning? Also down by a similar ratio. Generic accidents? Same, same. Sure, there has never been as safe a time to be a kid as today. Big question is, does being wrapped in cotton throughout your formative years make for a safer life as an adult, or did you miss some lessons in risk assessment which makes you more prone to getting it good and hard later in life?
arx1422 7y ago
My kids love that playground. Sure you hold your breath when you see them from afar (no parents allowed in) messing around with a sharp saw, but it's worth it. A great space.
aidos 7y ago
I’m going to a festival next weekend where they have a building area for the kids. They give them wood, nails hammers and saws and set them free. It’s just awesome.
- trophycase 7y ago
  Do you have a link or a name? I'm interested in hearing more.
  - aidos 7y ago
    Elderflower fields in Sussex (England). There’s not a whole lot of info at the below link, but it’s one of the great many things going on - which is basically kids stomping around in the woods having a lovely time. https://www.elderflowerfields.co.uk/2019/woodland-tribe/ https://www.elderflowerfields.co.uk/2019/woodland-tribe/ Edit: better link of the people that organise it https://www.woodlandtribe.org/ https://www.woodlandtribe.org/
- AnimalMuppet 7y ago
  My kids were in a makerspace last year. It was adult supervised, but they had access to power tools, laser cutters, and so on.
speeder 7y ago
My second worst accident as a kid, was on a "safe" playground, when my finger got stuck on a hinge of a swing. My most daring stunts, were on "safe" playgrounds too, for example trying to make swings do a 360 (yes, I tried that, never succeeded). Both times what was going on my mind is that I wanted to do something fun, and the equipment looked like it would work for what I wanted... Ended once even accidentally disassembling a swing (it had a "hook" shaped hinge and I swung it too far and it detached). But the most fun I ever had... was playing on an uncle storage closet full of boxes and old stuff, climbing on trees, learning to cook, making my own sword when I was 16, and so on. "Safe" looking stuff make people (even adults) do unsafe things (see the other article about road speeds, mentioning how wider lanes make people speed more and crash more often).
- clairity 7y ago
  > "...trying to make swings do a 360 (yes, I tried that, never succeeded)." ha, my childhood friends and i used to try to do that too. we settled on swinging as high as we could and doing backflips out of the swing. i don't know how not one of us got injured that way.
- Tsagadai 7y ago
  A 360 on a children's swing can definitely be done. I've done it as a child and as an adult. It usually needs to have a much longer rope/chain on it to get the momentum up.
  - Doxin 7y ago
    Wouldn't you be limited to going 180 degrees? any more than that and you'll start falling straight down on the backswing instead of swinging.
    - glaurung_ 7y ago
      You're definitely right. I wonder if he's thinking of jumping off of the swing and doing a 360 in the air. Apparently it can be done if your swing has rigid bars in stead of ropes: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6KvBn7QvzaI https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6KvBn7QvzaI
devchix 7y ago
A recent episode of 99% Invisible: Play Mountain looked at how the playground got to be safe and boring. "A two-year-old boy named Frank Nelson was climbing a 12-foot-tall slide in a Chicago park when he slipped through a railing and hit his head so hard that it caused permanent brain damage. The park system of Chicago was sued and had to pay out millions of dollars to Nelson’s family. At that time, in the late 70s, there were no laws, or real industry standards when it came to the safety of playground equipment. Frank Nelson’s fall was one of a number of lawsuits that led the Consumer Product Safety Commission to publish the Handbook for Public Playground Safety in 1981. Then another standards organization, the ASTM, published its own guidelines. Pretty soon these rulebooks were in the hands of insurance companies and parks departments and school boards across the United States. To this day, almost all playgrounds have to be approved by a certified playground safety inspector. And safety inspectors look for places where kids could fall, or get pinched, poked, or trapped. As you might imagine, all of these rules and regulations make the job of playground designers a lot harder. This is the reason why the playgrounds that you see everywhere all look more or less the same. A majority of playgrounds are “post and deck” systems with standard swings, slides, and monkey bars in one piece of equipment." https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/play-mountain/ https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/play-mountain/
- daenz 7y ago
  You hit the nail on the head. From the article: >“Many agencies fear being sued if a child gets hurt,” said Teri Hendy, the president of an Ohio-based playground consultancy, Site Masters. Ms. Hendy blamed outdated federal rules on playground design developed decades ago by the Consumer Product Safety Commission. She favors more flexible guidelines, arguing that playgrounds don’t have to be boring to be safe. We got to this point because of lawsuits and regulation. Unless we make parents sign waivers for their kids to use the playground, we can expect more of the same. It just takes one lawsuit to ruin it for everyone else, so that's what organizations like these really need to protect themselves from.
  - maxxxxx 7y ago
    It’s a really tricky balance. On the one hand we should have rules that don’t allow building unnecessarily dangerous stuff (eg covering toys with lead coating) but on the other hand we shouldn’t expect 100% safety because the only really safe thing is something that doesn’t exist. It’s really difficult.
jeffrallen 7y ago
My yard is an adventure playground. My kids' favorite toys are things they dig out of the dump each Saturday morning (and which I sneak back into the dump the next weekend).
emptybits 7y ago
Something from a similar set of values: "Why I’m Sending My Child to Forest School and not Kindergarten" https://www.cbc.ca/parents/learning/view/why-im-sending-my-child-to-forest-school-and-not-kindergarten https://www.cbc.ca/parents/learning/view/why-im-sending-my-c...
- shereadsthenews 7y ago
  Unfortunately in California "forest school" and other play schools attract mainly anti-vaxxers and other weirdos. It might be a good idea, but the self-selecting clientele are a problem.
United857 7y ago
Same can be said for a lot of other things/activities many of us enjoyed during childhood. E.g. I remember playing with real chemistry sets with chemicals that could be potentially harmful if ingested, alcohol burners, glass tubing we had to flame-polish ourselves. Those are long gone; just replaced with "safe" but incredibly dumbed-down kits that are little more than dyes/food-coloring.
- burfog 7y ago
  Thankfully you can still get stuff at the hardware store. The plumbing supply section has copper sulfate, sodium hydroxide, and sulfuric acid. The pool supply section has 10 molar hydrochloric acid. The garden section has sulfur. The paint section has xylene, acetone, and methanol. For example, you can purify garden sulfur by recrystallizing it with xylene. This is plenty dangerous, since xylene is almost like gasoline (a bit less volatile) and you'll be heating it up nearly to boiling. The aromatic ring structure is required; most other solvents produce deadly hydrogen sulfide gas.
dllthomas 7y ago
Can we get the spinny-thing-of-death back?
- Something1234 7y ago
  The Merry Go Round?
  - bugs_bunny 7y ago
    I think he might be referring to the slide with 20 ft drops made with two pipes...as in the Darwinian versions shown here.... https://clickamericana.com/toys-and-games/dangerous-old-playgrounds-our-great-grandparents-somehow-survived https://clickamericana.com/toys-and-games/dangerous-old-play...
  - dllthomas 7y ago
    Not the Merry Go Round. https://playgroundology.wordpress.com/2018/06/29/whats-in-a-name-or-the-spinny-thing-of-death https://playgroundology.wordpress.com/2018/06/29/whats-in-a-... A glorious, if occasional, feature of my childhood. We did refer to it that way, I think organically (perhaps just looking back and not at the time - I can't recall). I found the article about it by googling the phrase! I'm not sure how I'd feel about my own child on it, to be honest. I'm more bummed that he isn't allowed to climb any of the disused locomotive engines that are still present (but now fenced off) at a number of playgrounds.
dawnerd 7y ago
This is essentially how I grew up. Was free to use just about any tool I wanted. We dug holes, built tree houses ourselves, you name it. At one point we even built two different sheds, just us kids without any adult really helping. I don't recall if any of us even got hurt doing this. I also think cities moving towards higher density with little to no yards for full homes isn't helping.
- agotterer 7y ago
  I have a very vivid memory of being between 8 and 10 years old and building a play house unsupervised with a friend. We used all sorts of power tools and materials. It was a blast and the play house came out awesome.
- matwood 7y ago
  I got hurt plenty as a kid with quite a few scars to show for it. None of the injuries were life changing though. Some of the dumbest things we did would probably trigger a SWAT team today. Bottle rocket fights (do they even sell bottle rockets anymore?). BB gun fights. They always lasted until that one kid would pump his up more than once. We also lived on a river and started taking the John boat out around 12 or 13.
lemoncucumber 7y ago
I grew up going to the city of Berkeley's Adventure Playground (https://www.cityofberkeley.info/adventureplayground/ https://www.cityofberkeley.info/adventureplayground/), which has been around since 1979. It was one of most memorable and fun places I remember going as a kid. I did once end up with a nail in my arm (which I still have a scar from), but even after that happened my parents let me keep going back.
- shereadsthenews 7y ago
  That place is hilarious. One time when I was there some kids were trying to cut through a piano with a back saw, which makes an unbelievable noise.
umvi 7y ago
You're right - anything that provokes fear or outrage gets instant attention. Everything else doesn't. North Korea imprisoning a single idiot American who crossed the border = national dialogue because it's outrageous School shooting where 3 people die = national dialogue on gun control because it's outrageous. DUI accident that kills a family of 5 = small blurb in local news because it's not outrageous (even if it should be). Thousands of people dying from obesity-related health issues = crickets because it is not outrageous.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- TimTheTinker 7y ago
  Millions of children dying in the womb = crickets. (or hot debate, depending on your country) I know that's a controversial issue. No offense intended toward any individuals - but this is my viewpoint.
  - unknownkadath 7y ago
    See, here's the thing: a neural tube with the same number of neurons as C. elegans isn't the same thing as a human being. I can see how some folks can get confused, though.
    - hyperdunc 7y ago
      Comparing snapshots of organisms isn't that useful. C. Elegans is never going to turn into a conscious human being.
      - unknownkadath 7y ago
        Why not? So what?
        TimTheTinker 7y ago
        I think the commenter is just pointing out a potential fallacy -- comparing things that are fundamentally different to force a conclusion that is nonsensical.
bongo662 7y ago
I was lucky growing up in Kentucky, behind my parents house was roughly 20 acres of woods that couldnt be developed due to flooding. Was a great place to play at all ages growing up - playing cowboys and indians, paintball, setting up a ‘bmx’ course. We got hurt a lot of course falling out of trees breaking arms and legs or landing in rocks and needing stitches. But it was a ton of fun!
gumby 7y ago
An example from the '00s: We sent our kid to a German school in Menlo Park. He immediately loved it on the first visit because the under-5s' playground was full of old wood with splinters and dangerous tools (hammers, saws etc) and the little kids could cause all sorts of ruckus, like building dams and flooding them. But the reality of a foreign-language school is that you need more than just "nationals" (people who speak German at home or have one German-speaking spouse in a couple) to make the finances work. And quite a few American parents were and are interested because of the quality of education. But once their kids were enrolled, many of them wanted more safety, more discipline, a less casual attitude to kids getting naked, and academic work assigned to preschoolers which is not part of the German pedagogy. All of which made me wonder "why did you choose this school? And if you chose it for its results, why challenge the process that gets those results?" But indeed, by the early 201Xs, the playground had been neutralized into the same old anodyne sterility of the public parks. (Amazingly, Silicon Valley has two German schools within a few miles of each other; one is subsidized by the government, the other is not so you get to pick your ideology. But it does split the customer base).
- ip26 7y ago
  Not having seen said playground, I can only wonder as to the specifics of the dangerous tools. I presume they were kid-versions, e.g. no 2lb claw hammers or razor sharp 16" rip saws.
  - gumby 7y ago
    They weren’t 20 lb hammers, no, but nails (safer than brads actually), small hacksaws and the like — a regular rip saw is too heavy for a little kid!. Things like hot glue guns were plugged in indoors - kids went in and used them on their own as needed. But also more was expected: I remember nobody thought it remarkable when the after school teacher just decided one day to take 8 or 10 kids aged 5-11 on foot to downtown Palo Alto (3-4 miles round trip) by herself.
    - cheschire 7y ago
      In Germany the field trips like this are typical even for kids under 5, though the control types vary. Sometimes it's one teacher, sometimes one in front and one in back. Sometimes they just make the kids pair up and hold hands, and sometimes they give them a rope that they have to hold onto. This facilitates school age kids in all grades who are capable of riding city buses and trains on their own to and from school. Obviously the lack of child abduction in the news plays a role in parents allowing this.
tempguy9999 7y ago
I can't find it, but a few years ago one of the leading members of RoSPA (The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, <https://www.rospa.com> https://www.rospa.com>) came onto BBC radio 4 and argued their job wasn't to prevent all accidents, that some were unavoidable and society shouldn't try for perfect safety. It was a pleasure to hear.
radiorental 7y ago
I have a zipline in my back yard, when I first put it up it was roughly 80' long, my kids were 4 & 6 and I would manage them because (a) be a parent and (b) they were careless/clueless AF. I extended the zipline to 200' this spring, it goes over about 50' of water. They're 6 & 8 now, they hook themselves up and do all the safety checks I showed them once. Literally once. They also have full access to my workshop, they respect it and ask before cutting off their fingers. I think we underestimate the young mind's respect for responsibility when we give it to them. Conversely, if you protect your child from everything, they do not develop the skills that ask inherent questions such as 'how can this thing I'm about to do grow wrong? What is my plan if it does go south?'
- matwood 7y ago
  I hated it at the time, but while growing up my dad made me help him with a lot of his side jobs. These jobs often involved power tools like various kinds of saws, chain saws, log splitters, etc... There was also minor electrical, plumbing, and engine work often involved. My dad would point out what to do and how not to get hurt. Obviously he would do anything beyond my ability or strength, but I learned a lot just being part of the overall process. Fast forward many years and I'm thankful for the learning that came out of those times.
- ip26 7y ago
  Kids have a respect for responsibility, but they also test limits and are still developing their sense of risk & consequences. So IMO it's the parent's job to permit reasonable risk & educate the kid, and permit further, greater risk as they prove themselves. History is absolutely full of young people who did not survive due to but a moment's inattention or foolishness.
bitwize 7y ago
When I was a kid, my elementary school had an elaborate playground. The standard swings, slides, and monkey bars -- with sand underneath for a soft landing -- were supplemented with numerous structures built out of old tires, including tire geodesic domes to serve as spaceships or houses and a tower built out of giant tractor tires packed with sand and a wooden spire in the middle to serve as a watchtower, ship's mast, or Decepticon base. Central to this tire wonderland was TireTown, a huge two-story fortification with many rooms, tire bridges to two smaller tire outposts and poles to slide down for a quick escape. But of course, this is southern Connecticut, where people have their lawyers on speed dial. TireTown and its accoutrements were a lawsuit waiting to happen. When I surveyed my old school on Google Maps a few years ago, they were all gone, replaced with a much smaller standard playground.
- takk309 7y ago
  That reminds me of my elementary play ground. We had lots of wood structures and wood chips to "soften" a fall. Those wood chips were brutal when they would freeze together in the winter!
kissgyorgy 7y ago
This came to my mind about this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seWHLTt3oNQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seWHLTt3oNQ First, I was surprised, then I read the comments.
- Lowkeyloki 7y ago
  What do the comments say? Only one is in English and that's the only language I can read.
stickfigure 7y ago
Along these lines, Bay Area folks might be interested in Camp Tipsy, the crazy campout run by Chicken John where people build boats from junk and try (not) to sink them. Lots of opportunity for kids to get in (the right amount of) trouble. It's coming up in a few weeks: http://camptipsy.com/ http://camptipsy.com/ (I'm not involved, just a frequent attendee - it's fun)
newnewpdro 7y ago
As a kid we would visit some elderly relatives who lived in a much older neighborhood than our home's new suburban sprawl. The park there had slides made of steel which towered above the area homes. It was awesome and made those relatives my favorite to visit until the town modernized the park and got rid of all the remotely risky stuff in the process. But shortly after that I discovered skateboards and stairs, and the joys of evading the local community college police. Maybe it's OK that the parks are neutered, we can still find risk if we want it.
petschge 7y ago
How many extra lives are lost to obesity because children never learn how fun it is to move outdoors? Everything is so safe and non-fun. Of course the deaths 3 decades down the line are not attributed to overly safe playgrounds and overprotective parents and nobody gets sued. So there is no need to fix this...
- dragonwriter 7y ago
  > How many extra lives are lost to obesity because children never learn how fun it is to move outdoors? Everything is so safe an non-fun. I've yet to find a kid that doesn't find a flat field of grass outdoors to be fun, so if there's a problem here, it's parents keeping kids indoors, not playground safety being too good.
  - fjsolwmv 7y ago
    Hills are known to promote mentally stimulating play.
eweise 7y ago
If you like unsafe playgrounds check out this place in Berkeley https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adventure_Playground_(Berkeley) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adventure_Playground_(Berkeley... Almost stepped on nails a few times. Only took my kids once. Felt a little too unsafe.
dillonmckay 7y ago
So, I remember in preschool, we were allowed to play with hammers, nails, and pieces of scrap-wood. I tried to build a miniature wrestling ring with four nails, some rubber-bands, and a square piece of wood. I hit my thumb alot.
tr33house 7y ago
I loved this from one of the article's comments by Deb: "The coup de grace, though, came the day I went to pick a student up from the playground and as the child was running to greet me, the preschool teacher sang out ‘Remember the new rule, Kai! No running on the playground!’ No. Running. On. The. Playground."
- asciirobot 7y ago
  This is a real thing. Playground monitors are often little Hitlers. My old co-worker and his wife have been dealing with this with their son. Playground monitor woman makes them line up against the wall, has outlawed running, no shouting or loud sounds, the list goes on. By all accounts, she's an extremely bitter unpleasant human being and all round miserable wretch so she just takes it out on the kids, robbing them of what little free play time they have. Luckily my ex co-worker's wife is a bit of a trouble maker and has taught her son to organize. He successfully organized a bunch of kids to protest the unfair rules and draft their own set of rules they thought was reasonable. Last I heard, they succeeded. Unfortunately that worked with a Napoleon complex is still around but she's been somewhat neutralized.
lucb1e 7y ago
I was a stupid kid that fell from a high slide. My parents apparently made a sizable donation after I landed with no harm other than a scare because of the special tiles laid under it. Rather than paying for lawsuits, I'm happy to be able to tell a story to the contrary of many in this thread, with a happy ending and money going to the playground. My parents are great and I hope to live up to this one day.
eitally 7y ago
For anyone in the bay area, I found a playground with adult sized monkey bars a few weeks ago. You know, the old school steel pipe structures from the good old days.... Some kind soul even place-marked it on Google Maps. I present, the Kennedy Middle School (Cupertino) Monkey Bars: https://www.google.com/maps/place/KMS+Monkey+Bars,+Cupertino,+CA+95014 https://www.google.com/maps/place/KMS+Monkey+Bars,+Cupertino...
throw7 7y ago
I lived near and went to Action Park in New Jersey a couple of times. I was too young to ride the water speedboats and motor go-karts though... bah! Those were the days. The issue is one of scaling risk as the knowledge and responsibility of the child increases. It's not surprising we have sued things down to the lowest/safest common denominator.
- alexhutcheson 7y ago
  For those who aren't familiar with Action Park, the story is incredible. This 14-minute video has some of the highlights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKDx_piZvsg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKDx_piZvsg This oral history is pretty fascinating too: http://mentalfloss.com/article/536412/action-park-water-park-oral-history http://mentalfloss.com/article/536412/action-park-water-park...
fuck-the-world 7y ago
Pah hahahahhaa!!! It's kind of funny to see what "thinking of the children" actually looks like in a genuine Think Of The Children thread. Pretty much everyone sucks.
mherdeg 7y ago
I was watching some kids in our local playground climb pretty high in some of our local trees and wondering whether this a good idea, and came across this writeup on risky play: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/freedom-learn/201404/risky-play-why-children-love-it-and-need-it https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/freedom-learn/201404... Modern parents who keep up to date on the parenting zeitgeist will have been exposed to the complementary idea to risky play that instead of saying "Be careful!" to a kid, you can instead ask "Do you feel safe?", helping emphasize what it is that you actually care about and helping your kid develop their gut feeling for what is/isn't a good idea. (See one writeup of this at https://rhythmsofplay.com/get-outside-connect-climb-a-tree/ https://rhythmsofplay.com/get-outside-connect-climb-a-tree/ but a Web search for ["do you feel safe" "be careful"] will find lots of people saying essentially the same thing). I wonder what the zeitgeist will say in 10 or 20 years - given what everyone is thinking now, where will they be in a little while when we've had a chance to reflect on what we've tried and how it's gone?.
- fjsolwmv 7y ago
  Kids feel safe when they don't know what the dangers are. My kid would feel safe sticking his hand in a pan of boiling oil
  - 9nGQluzmnq3M 7y ago
    Once, but they won't do it again. I wouldn't recommend starting with a pan of boiling oil, but my five-year-old loves helping to make pancakes, and it took exactly one glancing touch for him to learn that the edge of the frying pan is hot.
    - ahoka 7y ago
      These are the small dangers we rob our children of.
ausbah 7y ago
I am frankly appalled how some people in this thread appear so nonchalant about willing to accept the deaths of children in the name of letting a majority of kids "have the right kind of fun".
- leetrout 7y ago
  I don’t get that vibe. I’m not sure of your age or if you’re a parent but there’s some recent writing in “Coddling of the American Mind” where they speak about making the road for the child instead of the child for the road and how that’s influenced adolescents today and their lack of maturity in college and beyond. It’s terrifying to think about something happening to my daughter but I know if I don’t give her the opportunity to learn about responsibility and safety on her own I’m not doing my job as a father. Having a playground or similar option (hiking trails, rustic camping, etc) to explore this is a plus and IMO part of what we need in society and less safetyism.
  - djsumdog 7y ago
    That's exactly the book I thought of when I saw this article. I think he mentions this type of playground in the book.
- iMerNibor 7y ago
  That's how life works though. You can never eliminate all the risks. So much is just out of your control, accidents happen - be it for kids or adults. People are obviously not advocating for creating deadly play spaces for the future generation, but we did manage so far with the decent enough security standards. Kids hurting themselves is normal, thats just part of learning their limits. I dont know how many times I fucked up and caused myself (non-critical) damage - did I do the same stupid mistake twice? nope. I could've died or seriously hurt myself a lot of times would I have just been unlucky, but I wasn't - cause there was a very slim chance anything bad could have even happened. Climbing trees? never slipped or jumped off a height that wasnt harmless. Cycling around? Never fell bad enough to do more than scrape my skin. And so many more instances of things going bad, but working out fine
- 7y ago
iamtheworstdev 7y ago
why do all of the photos look fake?
megous 7y ago
Well, why not. It's a lot of fun to be playing with, climbing over and exploring garbage like what is shown on the photos. I'd just not kid myself. It will come with more injuries, hopefully not debilitating. I got several unpleasant injuries by playing freely with anything available. I threw a metal rod through my feet. Jumped on a 4" nail while running, securing my shoe to my feet, quite well, cut half my thumb off with my favorite knife. :) All these things and more I can see kids be able to achieve in such an environment. I suspect that had my parents have to do more than just drive me to the emergency, they'd be more involved in ensuring I don't do these things again. I wonder if free public healthcare like in many EU countries vs whatever is in the US has an effect on what parents let their children do.
achenatx 7y ago
My kids (11,6, 3) are so lame they are scared to play outside by themselves. I bought 100 acres with a creek so we would have a place to hike, camp, explore, build forts, shoot guns etc. My kids have been so coddled, they cant even play in the yard for long before they want to come in. Over the last year they are getting better, but when they have friends over, many of them wont even go into the forest and will only stay close to the house.
- starpilot 7y ago
  Why is that? Did you make the mistake of teaching them to code?
  - SCUSKU 7y ago
    Why is that a mistake?
    - sq_ 7y ago
      I think starpilot is trying to make a joke off of the stereotypical "I taught my kid to ___ and it was a horrible mistake!" articles, especially the ones where the gist is "I taught my kids to code and now they sit in front of their computers all day". Could be wrong in that assessment, but that's how I read it.
- novaleaf 7y ago
  fyi, I think age has a lot to do with it. my kids were 8 and 6 before they started playing outside (0.83 acres) no neighborhood kids to speak of.
- throwaway9980 7y ago
  My kids are about a year behind yours, but are quite adventurous despite growing up in the city. My parents live at the edge of the metropolis and have a similar sized property with forest and stream and a small lake. It’s quite often that the older two simply vanish on a nice afternoon at grandparents. What’s disturbing is my own panic at not knowing where they are when they’ve gone off exploring the same land that I did as a child.
alexhutcheson 7y ago
There is good evidence that the rubber "safety" matting that's common on new playgrounds causes significantly more long-bone injuries (broken arms and legs) than previous surfaces like wood chips. Kids test the limits and play up to the point of pain, so they'll leap off structures onto rubber matting in a way that they wouldn't do onto wood chips or pea gravel. In the name of "safety", we're using surfaces that prevent scrapes and road rash, but have higher risk of more significant injuries when you account for the change in kid behavior.
- skavi 7y ago
  Why not use rubber mulch then? Lots of playgrounds already use it, and it offers the cushioning of wood chips and the "softness" of rubber matting.
  - PetahNZ 7y ago
    I think he means wood chips hurt, so kids don't jump off things from so high, so its less likely to break bones.
    - alexhutcheson 7y ago
      My understanding (not an expert) is that it's a combination of less high jumps/falls because "wood chips hurt", and reduced long bone injuries for the jumps/falls that due occur due to differences in the way the material responds to the impact. Wood chips slide and absorb some of the kinetic energy, while rubber matting (and probably rubber chips?) stay in place and rebound the energy back.
      - robocat 7y ago
        As a kid there was gravel under the monkey bars. Not sure if it taught you not to fall (I did fall, a lot!), but it definitely hurt when you did!
  - ip26 7y ago
    I visited a playground made of some kind of rubber mulch, maybe chippered tires. The sun was out in force (hot summer day, 10k ft). You could see the haze of chemicals hovering over the chips as they offgassed, as well as smell them.
nkzednan 7y ago
In a similar vein, a big park/playground recently opened in Tulsa, Oklahoma. They had some inspiration from playgrounds outside the US. https://stateimpact.npr.org/oklahoma/2018/12/06/the-surprising-design-of-a-new-tulsa-park-where-children-learn-by-escaping-adults-and-facing-obstacles/ https://stateimpact.npr.org/oklahoma/2018/12/06/the-surprisi... - mentions how some parts were designed to make it easy for kids to go to certain places but hard for parents to follow. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/10/arts/design/tulsa-park-gathering-place.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/10/arts/design/tulsa-park-ga...
deleted 7y ago
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stuart78 7y ago
I'm all for these, but I do find it somewhat ironic that we've 'productized' the junk yard, making it just safe enough for us to be comfortable with our kids roaming 'free'. If it is a step towards liberation of youth I'll take it, but it is still a half measure.
djsumdog 7y ago
In high school I remember walked through the primary school and noticing both jungle gyms were gone. Another friend said the big metal jungle gym at his elementary school were gone too. Only the overhead monkey bars remained. I suspect kids probably go hurt on these (they are solid metal bars that go up pretty high after all). I've seen them return to playgrounds, but today they're all made of rope and above softer material like sand or recycled tiers. Sure kids are safer today, but that element of danger is gone. I recently though about that when I read "The Coddling of the American Mind," where the authors talk about how kids are 'anti-fragile' and how trying to make them safe actually keeps them from learning how to deal with tough situations in life. I think they mention these types of playgrounds in the book.
- Fwirt 7y ago
  I think some of this falls into the category of obvious risk versus hidden risk. When I was a kid, I was playing in the park with some other kids who were dropping through the bars of a dome-shaped jungle gym. I tried to follow, dropped through, and found myself hanging by my head, which had gotten wedged in the bars. I dangled there writhing around until my dad lifted me out about 10 seconds later. I had giant welts on the front and back of my head, and tore all the connective tissue in my forehead, I could wrinkle it up like a Klingon for years afterward. I think that particular jungle gym was removed after that.
twothamendment 7y ago
One "dangerous" playground. Neptune Park, Saratoga Springs, UT. You have to see a picture of the pyramid. https://www.google.com/search?q=neptune+park+utah#imagekey=!1e10!2sAF1QipP4R2nlltRK0xuaDEB-r68BS0UKaTgeQNsZvfzO&lkt=LocalPoiPhotos&trex=m_t:lcl_akp,rc_f:nav,rc_ludocids:4568581851318178043,rc_q:Neptune%2520Park,ru_q:Neptune%2520Park&viewerState=lb https://www.google.com/search?q=neptune+park+utah#imagekey=!...
bryanrasmussen 7y ago
Ok I'm in Denmark, so also in the EU - can it really be that in our socialist paradise playgrounds are more dangerous and less boring than in the US? I can't remember the playgrounds from the US very well anymore but thinking about it yeah most places I went to were pretty cookie cutter, but I'm also old so I think the boring part is maybe not directly correlated with safety. Here is a company that makes playgrounds in Denmark http://monstrum.dk/en/ http://monstrum.dk/en/ I have several of them in my area. I just wonder if there is really less of a focus on safety in Denmark of all places. And if so, why? on edit: fixed typo
winrid 7y ago
I love it! This is basically the environment I grew up in for a good portion of my life (and I'm so happy for it).
standinator 7y ago
In my primary school we had some poles in the shape of a right triangle (with one of the legs being formed by the ground) with different slopes, all of which were 5-6 metres tall. The slope of the steepest one was nearly 80 degrees. The ground was tiny pebbles/gravel which made small falls somewhat less of an issue. They served no purpose other than being climbed, it was built to explore one's boundaries and to be brave. Most of us were scared to climb them but some who were really good climbers had no problems and got instant street cred by doing that.

273 points by Reedx 7y ago

This, this, a thousand times this. Life is about evaluating risk. You need to learn it at some point. A playground is as good a place as any. By all means, make them safe enough that kids won't get maimed or killed - but keeping kids from ever falling far enough to feel any real pain is probably counter- productive in the long term. Sigh. My eldest kid's kindergarten advertised themselves as an outdoor experience thingy, then proceeded to cut down every tree on their premises as kids climbed them (the horrors!) and occasionally fell down (Aaaieee!) - so better make the playground look like any generic McPlayground.

fatnoah 7y ago
My son's school was in the city and went to a local playground. The main play structure was so high (about 20-25' at the top) that it took a couple months for my kindergarten-aged son to muster the courage to climb it. Even though it's been almost seven years, I still remember his immense pride at conquering that fear and climbing to the top for the first time.
quakenul 7y ago
> By all means, make them safe enough that kids won't get maimed or killed - but keeping kids from ever falling far enough to feel any real pain is probably counter- productive in the long term. There is no room between "overprotection" and "freedom", that guarantees safety from harm. Serious accidents have to be accepted before they even happen. A scary prospect for many parents, I am sure.
- ip26 7y ago
  I'm not giving my seven year old the freedom to operate a chainsaw. I don't think that counts as "overprotection", and I think it confers considerable margin of safety from harm by chainsaw.
  - quakenul 7y ago
    > I don't think that counts as "overprotection" Rest assured, I don't think anyone else does either.
oska 7y ago
I sympathise with your comment about the trees being cut down. Trees are natural, 'undesigned' features that are good for thrilling and risky climbing activities. And yes, good for learning to evaluate risk, something I did a lot of when climbing trees as a child (I used to go very high). But I don't agree with accepting risk in a designed playground. Safety for the children using it should be a very high priority, because it is being expressly made for children to play on and therefore the designers have a responsibility to design for safety. And life is more than just evaluating risk and so is play. Play is also physical activity and building co-ordination and strength while having fun. Playgrounds can provide this without including risk. Risk is available elsewhere and the adventurous kids will easily find it if they seek it out (e.g. by climbing trees, if they haven't all been cut down).

fatnoah 7y ago

The only anecdote I can share about this comes from the time my family was touring a local day camp. On the tour, they showed us everything: archery, fishing, swimming, ropes, and everything else you could think of. At one point, we came to a massive, 10 foot high pile of dirt. The kids immediately ran for the dirt pile and the parents' reactions were a 50/50 mix of "Awesome" or "What are you building here?" I knew this was the camp for my kid when they explained, the pile of dirt was just that. A big pile of dirt for the kids to play in. It complemented the big pile of rocks that they also had.

function_seven 7y ago
I remember when I was 7 years old and my dad was working on our back yard. Up until that point, the yard was just weeds and dirt. But now we were going to get sod to cover it all. First step was to bring in a mountain of good soil. That soil mountain was piled 6' high for a week, and I spent a lot of time playing on it. (My brother: "You know that pile is half cow shit, right?" ... Me: "Don't care")
- rags2riches 7y ago
  The large piles of firewood before it had been stacked were great fun. The hayloft is of course a classic playground. And a gravel pit (the site where gravel is mined) is quite exciting...
  - function_seven 7y ago
    Ha. Now you just reminded me of my other favorite playground. The rock quarry by our house. It was private land full of ravines and (in the winter/spring) small streams. In wetter seasons, one of the pits would flood with muddy water. When we were younger we'd climb the fence and go adventuring. As we got older, it was bolt cutters to get the gate open and ride our ATCs out there. If you saw a truck in the distance, it was time to scatter. I'm pretty sure the cops/security back then were content with us running away.
  - frosted-flakes 7y ago

badcede 7y ago

"Grown-ups have taken all the fun out of being a kid just to save a few thousand lives." https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/2017/04/06/george-carlin-you-are-all-diseased-transcript/ https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/2017/04/06/george-carlin-you-a...

sp332 7y ago
This feels like a really unconvincing argument. A few thousand is a lot of lives. A few lives would feel like a few too many.
- stickfigure 7y ago
  A few thousand per month would be a problem, sure. But how about a few thousand per decade? There are four million babies born in the US every year (130 million worldwide).
- tomatotomato37 7y ago
  This may sound callous, but in a US population of 300 million, a few thousand of any lives is on the order of 0.001%. One of the realities of living in a world of billions of people is that risks of incredibly low precentage still end up happening due to just the sheer magnitude of people To put it another way, lightning strikes are one of the rarest forms of death in the country, and yet still kill more people in the US than the size of my family's big holiday dinner
- base698 7y ago
  What's the risk threshold you'd be comfortable with? 1 in a 1,000? 6 in 10,000? 13 in 10,000? 1 in 100,000?
lb1lf 7y ago
There is more than a grain of truth to this; a couple of years ago it's was brought to my attention that since the 1950s, children being killed in traffic in Norway was down by a couple of orders of magnitude, even though traffic had increased by a couple of orders of magnitude in the same time. Drowning? Also down by a similar ratio. Generic accidents? Same, same. Sure, there has never been as safe a time to be a kid as today. Big question is, does being wrapped in cotton throughout your formative years make for a safer life as an adult, or did you miss some lessons in risk assessment which makes you more prone to getting it good and hard later in life?

arx1422 7y ago

My kids love that playground. Sure you hold your breath when you see them from afar (no parents allowed in) messing around with a sharp saw, but it's worth it. A great space.

aidos 7y ago

I’m going to a festival next weekend where they have a building area for the kids. They give them wood, nails hammers and saws and set them free. It’s just awesome.

trophycase 7y ago
Do you have a link or a name? I'm interested in hearing more.
- aidos 7y ago
  Elderflower fields in Sussex (England). There’s not a whole lot of info at the below link, but it’s one of the great many things going on - which is basically kids stomping around in the woods having a lovely time. https://www.elderflowerfields.co.uk/2019/woodland-tribe/ https://www.elderflowerfields.co.uk/2019/woodland-tribe/ Edit: better link of the people that organise it https://www.woodlandtribe.org/ https://www.woodlandtribe.org/
AnimalMuppet 7y ago
My kids were in a makerspace last year. It was adult supervised, but they had access to power tools, laser cutters, and so on.

speeder 7y ago

My second worst accident as a kid, was on a "safe" playground, when my finger got stuck on a hinge of a swing. My most daring stunts, were on "safe" playgrounds too, for example trying to make swings do a 360 (yes, I tried that, never succeeded). Both times what was going on my mind is that I wanted to do something fun, and the equipment looked like it would work for what I wanted... Ended once even accidentally disassembling a swing (it had a "hook" shaped hinge and I swung it too far and it detached). But the most fun I ever had... was playing on an uncle storage closet full of boxes and old stuff, climbing on trees, learning to cook, making my own sword when I was 16, and so on. "Safe" looking stuff make people (even adults) do unsafe things (see the other article about road speeds, mentioning how wider lanes make people speed more and crash more often).

clairity 7y ago
> "...trying to make swings do a 360 (yes, I tried that, never succeeded)." ha, my childhood friends and i used to try to do that too. we settled on swinging as high as we could and doing backflips out of the swing. i don't know how not one of us got injured that way.
Tsagadai 7y ago
A 360 on a children's swing can definitely be done. I've done it as a child and as an adult. It usually needs to have a much longer rope/chain on it to get the momentum up.
- Doxin 7y ago
  Wouldn't you be limited to going 180 degrees? any more than that and you'll start falling straight down on the backswing instead of swinging.
  - glaurung_ 7y ago
    You're definitely right. I wonder if he's thinking of jumping off of the swing and doing a 360 in the air. Apparently it can be done if your swing has rigid bars in stead of ropes: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6KvBn7QvzaI https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6KvBn7QvzaI

devchix 7y ago

A recent episode of 99% Invisible: Play Mountain looked at how the playground got to be safe and boring. "A two-year-old boy named Frank Nelson was climbing a 12-foot-tall slide in a Chicago park when he slipped through a railing and hit his head so hard that it caused permanent brain damage. The park system of Chicago was sued and had to pay out millions of dollars to Nelson’s family. At that time, in the late 70s, there were no laws, or real industry standards when it came to the safety of playground equipment. Frank Nelson’s fall was one of a number of lawsuits that led the Consumer Product Safety Commission to publish the Handbook for Public Playground Safety in 1981. Then another standards organization, the ASTM, published its own guidelines. Pretty soon these rulebooks were in the hands of insurance companies and parks departments and school boards across the United States. To this day, almost all playgrounds have to be approved by a certified playground safety inspector. And safety inspectors look for places where kids could fall, or get pinched, poked, or trapped. As you might imagine, all of these rules and regulations make the job of playground designers a lot harder. This is the reason why the playgrounds that you see everywhere all look more or less the same. A majority of playgrounds are “post and deck” systems with standard swings, slides, and monkey bars in one piece of equipment." https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/play-mountain/ https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/play-mountain/

daenz 7y ago
You hit the nail on the head. From the article: >“Many agencies fear being sued if a child gets hurt,” said Teri Hendy, the president of an Ohio-based playground consultancy, Site Masters. Ms. Hendy blamed outdated federal rules on playground design developed decades ago by the Consumer Product Safety Commission. She favors more flexible guidelines, arguing that playgrounds don’t have to be boring to be safe. We got to this point because of lawsuits and regulation. Unless we make parents sign waivers for their kids to use the playground, we can expect more of the same. It just takes one lawsuit to ruin it for everyone else, so that's what organizations like these really need to protect themselves from.
- maxxxxx 7y ago
  It’s a really tricky balance. On the one hand we should have rules that don’t allow building unnecessarily dangerous stuff (eg covering toys with lead coating) but on the other hand we shouldn’t expect 100% safety because the only really safe thing is something that doesn’t exist. It’s really difficult.

jeffrallen 7y ago

My yard is an adventure playground. My kids' favorite toys are things they dig out of the dump each Saturday morning (and which I sneak back into the dump the next weekend).

emptybits 7y ago

Something from a similar set of values: "Why I’m Sending My Child to Forest School and not Kindergarten" https://www.cbc.ca/parents/learning/view/why-im-sending-my-child-to-forest-school-and-not-kindergarten https://www.cbc.ca/parents/learning/view/why-im-sending-my-c...

shereadsthenews 7y ago
Unfortunately in California "forest school" and other play schools attract mainly anti-vaxxers and other weirdos. It might be a good idea, but the self-selecting clientele are a problem.

United857 7y ago

Same can be said for a lot of other things/activities many of us enjoyed during childhood. E.g. I remember playing with real chemistry sets with chemicals that could be potentially harmful if ingested, alcohol burners, glass tubing we had to flame-polish ourselves. Those are long gone; just replaced with "safe" but incredibly dumbed-down kits that are little more than dyes/food-coloring.

burfog 7y ago
Thankfully you can still get stuff at the hardware store. The plumbing supply section has copper sulfate, sodium hydroxide, and sulfuric acid. The pool supply section has 10 molar hydrochloric acid. The garden section has sulfur. The paint section has xylene, acetone, and methanol. For example, you can purify garden sulfur by recrystallizing it with xylene. This is plenty dangerous, since xylene is almost like gasoline (a bit less volatile) and you'll be heating it up nearly to boiling. The aromatic ring structure is required; most other solvents produce deadly hydrogen sulfide gas.

dllthomas 7y ago

Can we get the spinny-thing-of-death back?

Something1234 7y ago
The Merry Go Round?
- bugs_bunny 7y ago
  I think he might be referring to the slide with 20 ft drops made with two pipes...as in the Darwinian versions shown here.... https://clickamericana.com/toys-and-games/dangerous-old-playgrounds-our-great-grandparents-somehow-survived https://clickamericana.com/toys-and-games/dangerous-old-play...
- dllthomas 7y ago
  Not the Merry Go Round. https://playgroundology.wordpress.com/2018/06/29/whats-in-a-name-or-the-spinny-thing-of-death https://playgroundology.wordpress.com/2018/06/29/whats-in-a-... A glorious, if occasional, feature of my childhood. We did refer to it that way, I think organically (perhaps just looking back and not at the time - I can't recall). I found the article about it by googling the phrase! I'm not sure how I'd feel about my own child on it, to be honest. I'm more bummed that he isn't allowed to climb any of the disused locomotive engines that are still present (but now fenced off) at a number of playgrounds.

dawnerd 7y ago

This is essentially how I grew up. Was free to use just about any tool I wanted. We dug holes, built tree houses ourselves, you name it. At one point we even built two different sheds, just us kids without any adult really helping. I don't recall if any of us even got hurt doing this. I also think cities moving towards higher density with little to no yards for full homes isn't helping.

agotterer 7y ago
I have a very vivid memory of being between 8 and 10 years old and building a play house unsupervised with a friend. We used all sorts of power tools and materials. It was a blast and the play house came out awesome.
matwood 7y ago
I got hurt plenty as a kid with quite a few scars to show for it. None of the injuries were life changing though. Some of the dumbest things we did would probably trigger a SWAT team today. Bottle rocket fights (do they even sell bottle rockets anymore?). BB gun fights. They always lasted until that one kid would pump his up more than once. We also lived on a river and started taking the John boat out around 12 or 13.

lemoncucumber 7y ago

I grew up going to the city of Berkeley's Adventure Playground (https://www.cityofberkeley.info/adventureplayground/ https://www.cityofberkeley.info/adventureplayground/), which has been around since 1979. It was one of most memorable and fun places I remember going as a kid. I did once end up with a nail in my arm (which I still have a scar from), but even after that happened my parents let me keep going back.

shereadsthenews 7y ago
That place is hilarious. One time when I was there some kids were trying to cut through a piano with a back saw, which makes an unbelievable noise.

umvi 7y ago

You're right - anything that provokes fear or outrage gets instant attention. Everything else doesn't. North Korea imprisoning a single idiot American who crossed the border = national dialogue because it's outrageous School shooting where 3 people die = national dialogue on gun control because it's outrageous. DUI accident that kills a family of 5 = small blurb in local news because it's not outrageous (even if it should be). Thousands of people dying from obesity-related health issues = crickets because it is not outrageous.

deleted 7y ago
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TimTheTinker 7y ago
Millions of children dying in the womb = crickets. (or hot debate, depending on your country) I know that's a controversial issue. No offense intended toward any individuals - but this is my viewpoint.
- unknownkadath 7y ago
  See, here's the thing: a neural tube with the same number of neurons as C. elegans isn't the same thing as a human being. I can see how some folks can get confused, though.
  - hyperdunc 7y ago
    Comparing snapshots of organisms isn't that useful. C. Elegans is never going to turn into a conscious human being.
    - unknownkadath 7y ago
      Why not? So what?
      - TimTheTinker 7y ago
        I think the commenter is just pointing out a potential fallacy -- comparing things that are fundamentally different to force a conclusion that is nonsensical.

bongo662 7y ago

I was lucky growing up in Kentucky, behind my parents house was roughly 20 acres of woods that couldnt be developed due to flooding. Was a great place to play at all ages growing up - playing cowboys and indians, paintball, setting up a ‘bmx’ course. We got hurt a lot of course falling out of trees breaking arms and legs or landing in rocks and needing stitches. But it was a ton of fun!

gumby 7y ago

An example from the '00s: We sent our kid to a German school in Menlo Park. He immediately loved it on the first visit because the under-5s' playground was full of old wood with splinters and dangerous tools (hammers, saws etc) and the little kids could cause all sorts of ruckus, like building dams and flooding them. But the reality of a foreign-language school is that you need more than just "nationals" (people who speak German at home or have one German-speaking spouse in a couple) to make the finances work. And quite a few American parents were and are interested because of the quality of education. But once their kids were enrolled, many of them wanted more safety, more discipline, a less casual attitude to kids getting naked, and academic work assigned to preschoolers which is not part of the German pedagogy. All of which made me wonder "why did you choose this school? And if you chose it for its results, why challenge the process that gets those results?" But indeed, by the early 201Xs, the playground had been neutralized into the same old anodyne sterility of the public parks. (Amazingly, Silicon Valley has two German schools within a few miles of each other; one is subsidized by the government, the other is not so you get to pick your ideology. But it does split the customer base).

ip26 7y ago
Not having seen said playground, I can only wonder as to the specifics of the dangerous tools. I presume they were kid-versions, e.g. no 2lb claw hammers or razor sharp 16" rip saws.
- gumby 7y ago
  They weren’t 20 lb hammers, no, but nails (safer than brads actually), small hacksaws and the like — a regular rip saw is too heavy for a little kid!. Things like hot glue guns were plugged in indoors - kids went in and used them on their own as needed. But also more was expected: I remember nobody thought it remarkable when the after school teacher just decided one day to take 8 or 10 kids aged 5-11 on foot to downtown Palo Alto (3-4 miles round trip) by herself.
  - cheschire 7y ago
    In Germany the field trips like this are typical even for kids under 5, though the control types vary. Sometimes it's one teacher, sometimes one in front and one in back. Sometimes they just make the kids pair up and hold hands, and sometimes they give them a rope that they have to hold onto. This facilitates school age kids in all grades who are capable of riding city buses and trains on their own to and from school. Obviously the lack of child abduction in the news plays a role in parents allowing this.

tempguy9999 7y ago

I can't find it, but a few years ago one of the leading members of RoSPA (The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, <https://www.rospa.com> https://www.rospa.com>) came onto BBC radio 4 and argued their job wasn't to prevent all accidents, that some were unavoidable and society shouldn't try for perfect safety. It was a pleasure to hear.

radiorental 7y ago

I have a zipline in my back yard, when I first put it up it was roughly 80' long, my kids were 4 & 6 and I would manage them because (a) be a parent and (b) they were careless/clueless AF. I extended the zipline to 200' this spring, it goes over about 50' of water. They're 6 & 8 now, they hook themselves up and do all the safety checks I showed them once. Literally once. They also have full access to my workshop, they respect it and ask before cutting off their fingers. I think we underestimate the young mind's respect for responsibility when we give it to them. Conversely, if you protect your child from everything, they do not develop the skills that ask inherent questions such as 'how can this thing I'm about to do grow wrong? What is my plan if it does go south?'

matwood 7y ago
I hated it at the time, but while growing up my dad made me help him with a lot of his side jobs. These jobs often involved power tools like various kinds of saws, chain saws, log splitters, etc... There was also minor electrical, plumbing, and engine work often involved. My dad would point out what to do and how not to get hurt. Obviously he would do anything beyond my ability or strength, but I learned a lot just being part of the overall process. Fast forward many years and I'm thankful for the learning that came out of those times.
ip26 7y ago
Kids have a respect for responsibility, but they also test limits and are still developing their sense of risk & consequences. So IMO it's the parent's job to permit reasonable risk & educate the kid, and permit further, greater risk as they prove themselves. History is absolutely full of young people who did not survive due to but a moment's inattention or foolishness.

bitwize 7y ago

When I was a kid, my elementary school had an elaborate playground. The standard swings, slides, and monkey bars -- with sand underneath for a soft landing -- were supplemented with numerous structures built out of old tires, including tire geodesic domes to serve as spaceships or houses and a tower built out of giant tractor tires packed with sand and a wooden spire in the middle to serve as a watchtower, ship's mast, or Decepticon base. Central to this tire wonderland was TireTown, a huge two-story fortification with many rooms, tire bridges to two smaller tire outposts and poles to slide down for a quick escape. But of course, this is southern Connecticut, where people have their lawyers on speed dial. TireTown and its accoutrements were a lawsuit waiting to happen. When I surveyed my old school on Google Maps a few years ago, they were all gone, replaced with a much smaller standard playground.

takk309 7y ago
That reminds me of my elementary play ground. We had lots of wood structures and wood chips to "soften" a fall. Those wood chips were brutal when they would freeze together in the winter!

kissgyorgy 7y ago

This came to my mind about this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seWHLTt3oNQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seWHLTt3oNQ First, I was surprised, then I read the comments.

Lowkeyloki 7y ago
What do the comments say? Only one is in English and that's the only language I can read.

stickfigure 7y ago

Along these lines, Bay Area folks might be interested in Camp Tipsy, the crazy campout run by Chicken John where people build boats from junk and try (not) to sink them. Lots of opportunity for kids to get in (the right amount of) trouble. It's coming up in a few weeks: http://camptipsy.com/ http://camptipsy.com/ (I'm not involved, just a frequent attendee - it's fun)

newnewpdro 7y ago

As a kid we would visit some elderly relatives who lived in a much older neighborhood than our home's new suburban sprawl. The park there had slides made of steel which towered above the area homes. It was awesome and made those relatives my favorite to visit until the town modernized the park and got rid of all the remotely risky stuff in the process. But shortly after that I discovered skateboards and stairs, and the joys of evading the local community college police. Maybe it's OK that the parks are neutered, we can still find risk if we want it.

petschge 7y ago

How many extra lives are lost to obesity because children never learn how fun it is to move outdoors? Everything is so safe and non-fun. Of course the deaths 3 decades down the line are not attributed to overly safe playgrounds and overprotective parents and nobody gets sued. So there is no need to fix this...

dragonwriter 7y ago
> How many extra lives are lost to obesity because children never learn how fun it is to move outdoors? Everything is so safe an non-fun. I've yet to find a kid that doesn't find a flat field of grass outdoors to be fun, so if there's a problem here, it's parents keeping kids indoors, not playground safety being too good.
- fjsolwmv 7y ago
  Hills are known to promote mentally stimulating play.

eweise 7y ago

If you like unsafe playgrounds check out this place in Berkeley https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adventure_Playground_(Berkeley) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adventure_Playground_(Berkeley... Almost stepped on nails a few times. Only took my kids once. Felt a little too unsafe.

dillonmckay 7y ago

So, I remember in preschool, we were allowed to play with hammers, nails, and pieces of scrap-wood. I tried to build a miniature wrestling ring with four nails, some rubber-bands, and a square piece of wood. I hit my thumb alot.

tr33house 7y ago

I loved this from one of the article's comments by Deb: "The coup de grace, though, came the day I went to pick a student up from the playground and as the child was running to greet me, the preschool teacher sang out ‘Remember the new rule, Kai! No running on the playground!’ No. Running. On. The. Playground."

asciirobot 7y ago
This is a real thing. Playground monitors are often little Hitlers. My old co-worker and his wife have been dealing with this with their son. Playground monitor woman makes them line up against the wall, has outlawed running, no shouting or loud sounds, the list goes on. By all accounts, she's an extremely bitter unpleasant human being and all round miserable wretch so she just takes it out on the kids, robbing them of what little free play time they have. Luckily my ex co-worker's wife is a bit of a trouble maker and has taught her son to organize. He successfully organized a bunch of kids to protest the unfair rules and draft their own set of rules they thought was reasonable. Last I heard, they succeeded. Unfortunately that worked with a Napoleon complex is still around but she's been somewhat neutralized.

lucb1e 7y ago

I was a stupid kid that fell from a high slide. My parents apparently made a sizable donation after I landed with no harm other than a scare because of the special tiles laid under it. Rather than paying for lawsuits, I'm happy to be able to tell a story to the contrary of many in this thread, with a happy ending and money going to the playground. My parents are great and I hope to live up to this one day.

eitally 7y ago

For anyone in the bay area, I found a playground with adult sized monkey bars a few weeks ago. You know, the old school steel pipe structures from the good old days.... Some kind soul even place-marked it on Google Maps. I present, the Kennedy Middle School (Cupertino) Monkey Bars: https://www.google.com/maps/place/KMS+Monkey+Bars,+Cupertino,+CA+95014 https://www.google.com/maps/place/KMS+Monkey+Bars,+Cupertino...

throw7 7y ago

I lived near and went to Action Park in New Jersey a couple of times. I was too young to ride the water speedboats and motor go-karts though... bah! Those were the days. The issue is one of scaling risk as the knowledge and responsibility of the child increases. It's not surprising we have sued things down to the lowest/safest common denominator.

alexhutcheson 7y ago
For those who aren't familiar with Action Park, the story is incredible. This 14-minute video has some of the highlights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKDx_piZvsg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKDx_piZvsg This oral history is pretty fascinating too: http://mentalfloss.com/article/536412/action-park-water-park-oral-history http://mentalfloss.com/article/536412/action-park-water-park...

fuck-the-world 7y ago

Pah hahahahhaa!!! It's kind of funny to see what "thinking of the children" actually looks like in a genuine Think Of The Children thread. Pretty much everyone sucks.

mherdeg 7y ago

I was watching some kids in our local playground climb pretty high in some of our local trees and wondering whether this a good idea, and came across this writeup on risky play: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/freedom-learn/201404/risky-play-why-children-love-it-and-need-it https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/freedom-learn/201404... Modern parents who keep up to date on the parenting zeitgeist will have been exposed to the complementary idea to risky play that instead of saying "Be careful!" to a kid, you can instead ask "Do you feel safe?", helping emphasize what it is that you actually care about and helping your kid develop their gut feeling for what is/isn't a good idea. (See one writeup of this at https://rhythmsofplay.com/get-outside-connect-climb-a-tree/ https://rhythmsofplay.com/get-outside-connect-climb-a-tree/ but a Web search for ["do you feel safe" "be careful"] will find lots of people saying essentially the same thing). I wonder what the zeitgeist will say in 10 or 20 years - given what everyone is thinking now, where will they be in a little while when we've had a chance to reflect on what we've tried and how it's gone?.

fjsolwmv 7y ago
Kids feel safe when they don't know what the dangers are. My kid would feel safe sticking his hand in a pan of boiling oil
- 9nGQluzmnq3M 7y ago
  Once, but they won't do it again. I wouldn't recommend starting with a pan of boiling oil, but my five-year-old loves helping to make pancakes, and it took exactly one glancing touch for him to learn that the edge of the frying pan is hot.
  - ahoka 7y ago
    These are the small dangers we rob our children of.

ausbah 7y ago

I am frankly appalled how some people in this thread appear so nonchalant about willing to accept the deaths of children in the name of letting a majority of kids "have the right kind of fun".

leetrout 7y ago
I don’t get that vibe. I’m not sure of your age or if you’re a parent but there’s some recent writing in “Coddling of the American Mind” where they speak about making the road for the child instead of the child for the road and how that’s influenced adolescents today and their lack of maturity in college and beyond. It’s terrifying to think about something happening to my daughter but I know if I don’t give her the opportunity to learn about responsibility and safety on her own I’m not doing my job as a father. Having a playground or similar option (hiking trails, rustic camping, etc) to explore this is a plus and IMO part of what we need in society and less safetyism.
- djsumdog 7y ago
  That's exactly the book I thought of when I saw this article. I think he mentions this type of playground in the book.
iMerNibor 7y ago
That's how life works though. You can never eliminate all the risks. So much is just out of your control, accidents happen - be it for kids or adults. People are obviously not advocating for creating deadly play spaces for the future generation, but we did manage so far with the decent enough security standards. Kids hurting themselves is normal, thats just part of learning their limits. I dont know how many times I fucked up and caused myself (non-critical) damage - did I do the same stupid mistake twice? nope. I could've died or seriously hurt myself a lot of times would I have just been unlucky, but I wasn't - cause there was a very slim chance anything bad could have even happened. Climbing trees? never slipped or jumped off a height that wasnt harmless. Cycling around? Never fell bad enough to do more than scrape my skin. And so many more instances of things going bad, but working out fine
7y ago

iamtheworstdev 7y ago

why do all of the photos look fake?

megous 7y ago

Well, why not. It's a lot of fun to be playing with, climbing over and exploring garbage like what is shown on the photos. I'd just not kid myself. It will come with more injuries, hopefully not debilitating. I got several unpleasant injuries by playing freely with anything available. I threw a metal rod through my feet. Jumped on a 4" nail while running, securing my shoe to my feet, quite well, cut half my thumb off with my favorite knife. :) All these things and more I can see kids be able to achieve in such an environment. I suspect that had my parents have to do more than just drive me to the emergency, they'd be more involved in ensuring I don't do these things again. I wonder if free public healthcare like in many EU countries vs whatever is in the US has an effect on what parents let their children do.

achenatx 7y ago

My kids (11,6, 3) are so lame they are scared to play outside by themselves. I bought 100 acres with a creek so we would have a place to hike, camp, explore, build forts, shoot guns etc. My kids have been so coddled, they cant even play in the yard for long before they want to come in. Over the last year they are getting better, but when they have friends over, many of them wont even go into the forest and will only stay close to the house.

starpilot 7y ago
Why is that? Did you make the mistake of teaching them to code?
- SCUSKU 7y ago
  Why is that a mistake?
  - sq_ 7y ago
    I think starpilot is trying to make a joke off of the stereotypical "I taught my kid to ___ and it was a horrible mistake!" articles, especially the ones where the gist is "I taught my kids to code and now they sit in front of their computers all day". Could be wrong in that assessment, but that's how I read it.
novaleaf 7y ago
fyi, I think age has a lot to do with it. my kids were 8 and 6 before they started playing outside (0.83 acres) no neighborhood kids to speak of.
throwaway9980 7y ago
My kids are about a year behind yours, but are quite adventurous despite growing up in the city. My parents live at the edge of the metropolis and have a similar sized property with forest and stream and a small lake. It’s quite often that the older two simply vanish on a nice afternoon at grandparents. What’s disturbing is my own panic at not knowing where they are when they’ve gone off exploring the same land that I did as a child.

alexhutcheson 7y ago

There is good evidence that the rubber "safety" matting that's common on new playgrounds causes significantly more long-bone injuries (broken arms and legs) than previous surfaces like wood chips. Kids test the limits and play up to the point of pain, so they'll leap off structures onto rubber matting in a way that they wouldn't do onto wood chips or pea gravel. In the name of "safety", we're using surfaces that prevent scrapes and road rash, but have higher risk of more significant injuries when you account for the change in kid behavior.

skavi 7y ago
Why not use rubber mulch then? Lots of playgrounds already use it, and it offers the cushioning of wood chips and the "softness" of rubber matting.
- PetahNZ 7y ago
  I think he means wood chips hurt, so kids don't jump off things from so high, so its less likely to break bones.
  - alexhutcheson 7y ago
    My understanding (not an expert) is that it's a combination of less high jumps/falls because "wood chips hurt", and reduced long bone injuries for the jumps/falls that due occur due to differences in the way the material responds to the impact. Wood chips slide and absorb some of the kinetic energy, while rubber matting (and probably rubber chips?) stay in place and rebound the energy back.
    - robocat 7y ago
      As a kid there was gravel under the monkey bars. Not sure if it taught you not to fall (I did fall, a lot!), but it definitely hurt when you did!
- ip26 7y ago
  I visited a playground made of some kind of rubber mulch, maybe chippered tires. The sun was out in force (hot summer day, 10k ft). You could see the haze of chemicals hovering over the chips as they offgassed, as well as smell them.

nkzednan 7y ago

In a similar vein, a big park/playground recently opened in Tulsa, Oklahoma. They had some inspiration from playgrounds outside the US. https://stateimpact.npr.org/oklahoma/2018/12/06/the-surprising-design-of-a-new-tulsa-park-where-children-learn-by-escaping-adults-and-facing-obstacles/ https://stateimpact.npr.org/oklahoma/2018/12/06/the-surprisi... - mentions how some parts were designed to make it easy for kids to go to certain places but hard for parents to follow. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/10/arts/design/tulsa-park-gathering-place.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/10/arts/design/tulsa-park-ga...

deleted 7y ago

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stuart78 7y ago

I'm all for these, but I do find it somewhat ironic that we've 'productized' the junk yard, making it just safe enough for us to be comfortable with our kids roaming 'free'. If it is a step towards liberation of youth I'll take it, but it is still a half measure.

djsumdog 7y ago

In high school I remember walked through the primary school and noticing both jungle gyms were gone. Another friend said the big metal jungle gym at his elementary school were gone too. Only the overhead monkey bars remained. I suspect kids probably go hurt on these (they are solid metal bars that go up pretty high after all). I've seen them return to playgrounds, but today they're all made of rope and above softer material like sand or recycled tiers. Sure kids are safer today, but that element of danger is gone. I recently though about that when I read "The Coddling of the American Mind," where the authors talk about how kids are 'anti-fragile' and how trying to make them safe actually keeps them from learning how to deal with tough situations in life. I think they mention these types of playgrounds in the book.

Fwirt 7y ago
I think some of this falls into the category of obvious risk versus hidden risk. When I was a kid, I was playing in the park with some other kids who were dropping through the bars of a dome-shaped jungle gym. I tried to follow, dropped through, and found myself hanging by my head, which had gotten wedged in the bars. I dangled there writhing around until my dad lifted me out about 10 seconds later. I had giant welts on the front and back of my head, and tore all the connective tissue in my forehead, I could wrinkle it up like a Klingon for years afterward. I think that particular jungle gym was removed after that.

twothamendment 7y ago

One "dangerous" playground. Neptune Park, Saratoga Springs, UT. You have to see a picture of the pyramid. https://www.google.com/search?q=neptune+park+utah#imagekey=!1e10!2sAF1QipP4R2nlltRK0xuaDEB-r68BS0UKaTgeQNsZvfzO&lkt=LocalPoiPhotos&trex=m_t:lcl_akp,rc_f:nav,rc_ludocids:4568581851318178043,rc_q:Neptune%2520Park,ru_q:Neptune%2520Park&viewerState=lb https://www.google.com/search?q=neptune+park+utah#imagekey=!...

bryanrasmussen 7y ago

Ok I'm in Denmark, so also in the EU - can it really be that in our socialist paradise playgrounds are more dangerous and less boring than in the US? I can't remember the playgrounds from the US very well anymore but thinking about it yeah most places I went to were pretty cookie cutter, but I'm also old so I think the boring part is maybe not directly correlated with safety. Here is a company that makes playgrounds in Denmark http://monstrum.dk/en/ http://monstrum.dk/en/ I have several of them in my area. I just wonder if there is really less of a focus on safety in Denmark of all places. And if so, why? on edit: fixed typo

winrid 7y ago

I love it! This is basically the environment I grew up in for a good portion of my life (and I'm so happy for it).

standinator 7y ago

In my primary school we had some poles in the shape of a right triangle (with one of the legs being formed by the ground) with different slopes, all of which were 5-6 metres tall. The slope of the steepest one was nearly 80 degrees. The ground was tiny pebbles/gravel which made small falls somewhat less of an issue. They served no purpose other than being climbed, it was built to explore one's boundaries and to be brave. Most of us were scared to climb them but some who were really good climbers had no problems and got instant street cred by doing that.