8 ms·

> Kids need time with their friends away from parents. I'm so glad I was able to grow up in the (sadly last) "be home for dinner, be back by dark" generation.

> Kids need time with their friends away from parents. I'm so glad I was able to grow up in the (sadly last) "be home for dinner, be back by dark" generation. Completely agree with your comment, but "sadly last" here is not accurate unless you're talking about North America and maybe Europe. I live in Japan and it's quite normal, even in a big city like Tokyo, to let kids play on their own until it gets dark. I feel quite lucky to be in a country not yet afflicted by this disease that has hit all of North America and (I hear) Europe as well - a disease of over-protecting kids to the point of suffocation. People need to call this trend for what it is. They're not doing the next generation any good, and probably lots of harm.

fzeroracer 7y ago
To be fair, I don't think Japan is exactly a good model to bring up here. Kids are independent with their free time, but most of their free time is taken up having to study seven days a week while dealing with absent parents having to work long hours and a grueling school system that is part of the reason why Japan has such a high suicide rate among youths. Which I think is more of a problem than helicopter parenting in America and is what I think our school system is turning into. We're already working longer hours for less pay and increasing pressure on children to perform well even in Kindergarten.
- shioyama 7y ago
  > Which I think is more of a problem than helicopter parenting in America Sorry, as a parent in Japan, I beg to disagree. The system here has lots of problems, don't get me wrong - and I really don't like the "juku" (cram-school) model at all. But particularly at younger ages (which in many ways are the most important ones), there is still that fundamental freedom to be on your own with your friends. Kids age as young as 5 are often out on their own with their friends outside, or walking to school, etc. That's something you would be arrested for in the U.S. I see the North American situation as much more scary, TBH.
  - seattle_spring 7y ago
    > Kids age as young as 5 are often out on their own with their friends outside, or walking to school, etc. That's something you would be arrested for in the U.S. Do you mean "until age 5"? All of the kids I knew from that area of the world, as young as elementary school, spent every second either studying for school or practicing piano/violin.
    - mikekchar 7y ago
      I'm guessing you knew upper middle class kids from over-achieving parents. Normal Japanese children don't do that. Generally speaking, elementary kids are running around on those 2 wheel wobbly skateboards (not sure what they are called), or playing baseball or basketball (around where I live basketball is surprisingly popular). Right now it is summer vacation and across the road my neighbour's kids are yelling at each other like normal ;-)
    - shioyama 7y ago
      No, I mean what I wrote, "as young as 5". > All of the kids I knew from that area of the world, as young as elementary school, spent every second either studying for school or practicing piano/violin. Sorry, but "that area of the world" is way too broad. Korea, for example, is quite different from Japan. And in any case, it's dependent on the cross-section of society you're talking about. Elementary school itself, for example, is not suffocating at all, from my experience. Too much homework, yes, but not to the point that kids have no free time. But again, my point is not about the amount of work. It's about the freedom to be on their own.
  - dragonsh 7y ago
    Well Seoul, Hong Kong, Taipei, Singapore, Beijing, Shanghai are similar when it comes to kid going out. But the childhood is still under siege in these places by constant pressure to excel with lots of extra curricular classes. My close friends kids in Tokyo, Seoul, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taipei, Shanghai and Beijing spend most of their time in extra tutoring or music or painting or dance classes or something else where they have to excel. They have very little time left to just play and learn social skills. During some free time, they spend time in self-absorbing mobile or online games. So I don't think Asian cities fair better than North America or Europe. It's a global problem. Two kids seating in front of reach other talking via instant messanger or in-game chat.
mactrey 7y ago
Kids in Japan lead carefree "be home by dark" lives up until late middle school and high school, when they start studying 4+hrs/day and sleeping <5hrs/night to prep for standardized tests. I don't think Japan is a horrific dystopia for teens but it's hardly the "let kids be kids" culture that America of yesteryear (apparently) was.
- Iv 7y ago
  Helping raise a teenager in Japan, it is pretty close to a dystopia. The idea that students could have free time seems to be frightening to the whole education system.
  - mikekchar 7y ago
    I wrote a big sibling post, but I wanted to just point out that schools do tend to use up student's time. Students are required to enter a club and often these clubs are 6 days a week, so compared to the west, students have no individual free time. I know many (most) western parents think this is awful, but most of the students I had loved club and never wanted to go home (we had to turn the lights off at the tennis courts and even then some students would try to play in the dark!) Some students hate club and we had clubs for students that hated club (unfortunately the English club was one of them). They show up for an hour a week and go home. It depends on the principal, though. Some principals are very much opposed to that idea, so if you don't want your kids to spend a lot of time at school it pays to investigate schools that will accomodate you. I will admit that I like Japanese schools and find them dramatically better than anything else I've experienced, so I'm biased.
    - Iv 7y ago
      Our teenager is not into sports. The school only offers one non-sport club, the culture club, but, in the words of the principal "it is only for people who have a handicap and can't go to a sports club." I was appalled. We asked if club membership is mandatory, we got a very Japanese answer "It is not mandatory but everyone does it, please do it too" I remember, discussing with the head of the kendo club why she was into kendo, she said she was not really into it. She could not answer why she chose it or spends so much time there. I think acceptance and resignation are things that are taught very early in the Japanese education system. And don't get me started on the sempai/kohai system that just normalizes peer pressure and a generational hierarchy. I have seen people in their 60s still obeying their one year older sempai! I did not like the school system I went through in France, but almost every thing I disliked is magnified in Japan. Yeah, the students clean up their classrooms and the admins do their paperwork correctly that's about all I see as advantages. All the rest is about formatting perfect wage slaves with no room fro creativity or self-search.
freetime2 7y ago
Also in Japan, and we feel comfortable letting our 5 year old roam around the neighborhood on his own. And when he starts 1st grade he will walk to school with his friends. The only thing that really scares me here are cars. People tend to drive a little too fast in residential areas IMO. Especially delivery trucks... although at least you can hear them coming from far away.
- shioyama 7y ago
  Completely agree, cars are the main thing that worry me as well (in the city).
  - wallace_f 7y ago
    I remember meeting a young French dude that camped his way around Japan, even in the cities. In my home city in the US, you couldn't even walk in downtown after dark.
    - jessaustin 7y ago
      This is going too far. I've lived and spent time in various USA cities: LA, Chicago, Boston, Dallas, Denver, etc. I never had any difficulty walking downtown after dark.
      - RaceWon 7y ago
        > I never had any difficulty walking downtown after dark. You weren't a teen in [0] 1978 NYC... specifically the south Bronx. I was (though not from there although I lived just a short drive away) and street raced a bit in that area (you were Not ever going to get pulled over for speeding).. dude that was a fkin dangerous place back then; literally-- packs of wild dogs roamed the streets, and people who wanted to rob you and maybe worse didn't bother to hide. No way in hell you could walk through there and not get messed up, even if you were armed. Seriously. [0] https://www.villagevoice.com/2014/08/07/the-rise-and-fall-of-crime-in-new-york-city-a-timeline/ https://www.villagevoice.com/2014/08/07/the-rise-and-fall-of...
api 7y ago
It's a pure creation of the media, which has spent the better part of 50 years terrifying parents with panic after panic. The reality is that crime is much lower today and yet we are more afraid of crime than ever.
- lonelappde 7y ago
  In the past,. being victimized by crime was expected. Now it's prevented. That's progress.
  - Nasrudith 7y ago
    If there was any actual causal connection between the fear and safety sure. Instead it was irrational from both directions of not caring in the past about things like stupidly dangerous 50s toys to freaking out about kids playing in backyards unsupervised. Ironically safety of children seems to be the complete opposite of the direction of the 'increased safety boosts risk taking'. When children have a higher rate of mortality they tolerate risks more but when there is a lower one they become more paranoid. I suspect the reason why is that most people have a terrible innate sense of statistics and probability - as shown by the success of gambling institutions like Las Vegas and the lotto.
Red_Tarsius 7y ago
Apples and oranges. Japan is one of the safest countries in the world. - Murder rate (per year per 100,000 inhabitants) Japan: 0.20 USA: 5.30 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intention... - Rape rate (number of rape incidents per 100,000 citizens) Japan: 1.0 USA: 27.3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_statistics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_statistics
- richk449 7y ago
  If Japanese kids have a one in a billion chance of being hit by a meteorite, and US kids have a ten times higher rate, does that mean the US is justified in requiring kids to wear meteorite resistant helmets at all times?
- shioyama 7y ago
  This is a common response, but I reject it. The over-protection in the U.S. goes way beyond actually protecting kids from violent crime. It's rooted in some kind of pathological paranoia. Even with its low crime rate, I think it could hit Japan in exactly the same way.
- bildung 7y ago
  This hardly matters because both of these types of crime usually happen within the family, not by the hand of strangers. [0] murder: https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/htus8008.pdf https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/htus8008.pdf (page 16) [1] rape: https://www.rainn.org/statistics/perpetrators-sexual-violence https://www.rainn.org/statistics/perpetrators-sexual-violenc... Stats-wise, it would be best for the kids to stay clear of their family ;)
- DanBC 7y ago
  There's a lot of discussion in the Wikipedia article saying that you can't compare rates internationally. Please be a bit more careful with statistics.
  - dawidw 7y ago
    That intrigued me. Why one can't compare rates internationally? I think we can and that what rates are for, aren't they?
speeder 7y ago
I am from Brazil and here it is very accurate, I am 31 and my own childhood was already like what the article described... And seriously, it is causing lots and lots of pain now in my adult life.
Semaphor 7y ago
> and (I hear) Europe as well From what I’ve seen in Germany, not much seems to have changed since I was a kid.
- Gibbon1 7y ago
  Some French lady ten years ago got into a big mess because she parked her stroller out in front of a coffee shop and went inside. Cops and CPS took her baby away for a couple of weeks/months.
  - seanmcdirmid 7y ago
    As I remember it, it was a Danish, not French, woman. I don’t think they had the baby for that long, the embassy intervened pretty quickly.
    - Gibbon1 7y ago
      You are correct and it's 20 years ago. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/nov/26/anette-sorenson-denmark-new-york-baby-left-outside https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/nov/26/anette-soren...
- cvshepherd 7y ago
  looks that way to me too. seems to be a non issue in germany, i don't see why it would be different in other european countries. i live in one of the largest, and second most dangerous city going by crime statistics, and a good friend of mine lets his 5 and 7 year old kids cart their 2 year old around the block on their own, if they want to. can't remember the last time i read about a child being snatched off the street here.

fzeroracer 7y ago

To be fair, I don't think Japan is exactly a good model to bring up here. Kids are independent with their free time, but most of their free time is taken up having to study seven days a week while dealing with absent parents having to work long hours and a grueling school system that is part of the reason why Japan has such a high suicide rate among youths. Which I think is more of a problem than helicopter parenting in America and is what I think our school system is turning into. We're already working longer hours for less pay and increasing pressure on children to perform well even in Kindergarten.

shioyama 7y ago
> Which I think is more of a problem than helicopter parenting in America Sorry, as a parent in Japan, I beg to disagree. The system here has lots of problems, don't get me wrong - and I really don't like the "juku" (cram-school) model at all. But particularly at younger ages (which in many ways are the most important ones), there is still that fundamental freedom to be on your own with your friends. Kids age as young as 5 are often out on their own with their friends outside, or walking to school, etc. That's something you would be arrested for in the U.S. I see the North American situation as much more scary, TBH.
- seattle_spring 7y ago
  > Kids age as young as 5 are often out on their own with their friends outside, or walking to school, etc. That's something you would be arrested for in the U.S. Do you mean "until age 5"? All of the kids I knew from that area of the world, as young as elementary school, spent every second either studying for school or practicing piano/violin.
  - mikekchar 7y ago
    I'm guessing you knew upper middle class kids from over-achieving parents. Normal Japanese children don't do that. Generally speaking, elementary kids are running around on those 2 wheel wobbly skateboards (not sure what they are called), or playing baseball or basketball (around where I live basketball is surprisingly popular). Right now it is summer vacation and across the road my neighbour's kids are yelling at each other like normal ;-)
  - shioyama 7y ago
    No, I mean what I wrote, "as young as 5". > All of the kids I knew from that area of the world, as young as elementary school, spent every second either studying for school or practicing piano/violin. Sorry, but "that area of the world" is way too broad. Korea, for example, is quite different from Japan. And in any case, it's dependent on the cross-section of society you're talking about. Elementary school itself, for example, is not suffocating at all, from my experience. Too much homework, yes, but not to the point that kids have no free time. But again, my point is not about the amount of work. It's about the freedom to be on their own.
- dragonsh 7y ago
  Well Seoul, Hong Kong, Taipei, Singapore, Beijing, Shanghai are similar when it comes to kid going out. But the childhood is still under siege in these places by constant pressure to excel with lots of extra curricular classes. My close friends kids in Tokyo, Seoul, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taipei, Shanghai and Beijing spend most of their time in extra tutoring or music or painting or dance classes or something else where they have to excel. They have very little time left to just play and learn social skills. During some free time, they spend time in self-absorbing mobile or online games. So I don't think Asian cities fair better than North America or Europe. It's a global problem. Two kids seating in front of reach other talking via instant messanger or in-game chat.

mactrey 7y ago

Kids in Japan lead carefree "be home by dark" lives up until late middle school and high school, when they start studying 4+hrs/day and sleeping <5hrs/night to prep for standardized tests. I don't think Japan is a horrific dystopia for teens but it's hardly the "let kids be kids" culture that America of yesteryear (apparently) was.

Iv 7y ago
Helping raise a teenager in Japan, it is pretty close to a dystopia. The idea that students could have free time seems to be frightening to the whole education system.
- mikekchar 7y ago
  I wrote a big sibling post, but I wanted to just point out that schools do tend to use up student's time. Students are required to enter a club and often these clubs are 6 days a week, so compared to the west, students have no individual free time. I know many (most) western parents think this is awful, but most of the students I had loved club and never wanted to go home (we had to turn the lights off at the tennis courts and even then some students would try to play in the dark!) Some students hate club and we had clubs for students that hated club (unfortunately the English club was one of them). They show up for an hour a week and go home. It depends on the principal, though. Some principals are very much opposed to that idea, so if you don't want your kids to spend a lot of time at school it pays to investigate schools that will accomodate you. I will admit that I like Japanese schools and find them dramatically better than anything else I've experienced, so I'm biased.
  - Iv 7y ago
    Our teenager is not into sports. The school only offers one non-sport club, the culture club, but, in the words of the principal "it is only for people who have a handicap and can't go to a sports club." I was appalled. We asked if club membership is mandatory, we got a very Japanese answer "It is not mandatory but everyone does it, please do it too" I remember, discussing with the head of the kendo club why she was into kendo, she said she was not really into it. She could not answer why she chose it or spends so much time there. I think acceptance and resignation are things that are taught very early in the Japanese education system. And don't get me started on the sempai/kohai system that just normalizes peer pressure and a generational hierarchy. I have seen people in their 60s still obeying their one year older sempai! I did not like the school system I went through in France, but almost every thing I disliked is magnified in Japan. Yeah, the students clean up their classrooms and the admins do their paperwork correctly that's about all I see as advantages. All the rest is about formatting perfect wage slaves with no room fro creativity or self-search.

freetime2 7y ago

Also in Japan, and we feel comfortable letting our 5 year old roam around the neighborhood on his own. And when he starts 1st grade he will walk to school with his friends. The only thing that really scares me here are cars. People tend to drive a little too fast in residential areas IMO. Especially delivery trucks... although at least you can hear them coming from far away.

shioyama 7y ago
Completely agree, cars are the main thing that worry me as well (in the city).
- wallace_f 7y ago
  I remember meeting a young French dude that camped his way around Japan, even in the cities. In my home city in the US, you couldn't even walk in downtown after dark.
  - jessaustin 7y ago
    This is going too far. I've lived and spent time in various USA cities: LA, Chicago, Boston, Dallas, Denver, etc. I never had any difficulty walking downtown after dark.
    - RaceWon 7y ago
      > I never had any difficulty walking downtown after dark. You weren't a teen in [0] 1978 NYC... specifically the south Bronx. I was (though not from there although I lived just a short drive away) and street raced a bit in that area (you were Not ever going to get pulled over for speeding).. dude that was a fkin dangerous place back then; literally-- packs of wild dogs roamed the streets, and people who wanted to rob you and maybe worse didn't bother to hide. No way in hell you could walk through there and not get messed up, even if you were armed. Seriously. [0] https://www.villagevoice.com/2014/08/07/the-rise-and-fall-of-crime-in-new-york-city-a-timeline/ https://www.villagevoice.com/2014/08/07/the-rise-and-fall-of...

api 7y ago

It's a pure creation of the media, which has spent the better part of 50 years terrifying parents with panic after panic. The reality is that crime is much lower today and yet we are more afraid of crime than ever.

lonelappde 7y ago
In the past,. being victimized by crime was expected. Now it's prevented. That's progress.
- Nasrudith 7y ago
  If there was any actual causal connection between the fear and safety sure. Instead it was irrational from both directions of not caring in the past about things like stupidly dangerous 50s toys to freaking out about kids playing in backyards unsupervised. Ironically safety of children seems to be the complete opposite of the direction of the 'increased safety boosts risk taking'. When children have a higher rate of mortality they tolerate risks more but when there is a lower one they become more paranoid. I suspect the reason why is that most people have a terrible innate sense of statistics and probability - as shown by the success of gambling institutions like Las Vegas and the lotto.

Red_Tarsius 7y ago

Apples and oranges. Japan is one of the safest countries in the world. - Murder rate (per year per 100,000 inhabitants) Japan: 0.20 USA: 5.30 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intention... - Rape rate (number of rape incidents per 100,000 citizens) Japan: 1.0 USA: 27.3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_statistics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_statistics

richk449 7y ago
If Japanese kids have a one in a billion chance of being hit by a meteorite, and US kids have a ten times higher rate, does that mean the US is justified in requiring kids to wear meteorite resistant helmets at all times?
shioyama 7y ago
This is a common response, but I reject it. The over-protection in the U.S. goes way beyond actually protecting kids from violent crime. It's rooted in some kind of pathological paranoia. Even with its low crime rate, I think it could hit Japan in exactly the same way.
bildung 7y ago
This hardly matters because both of these types of crime usually happen within the family, not by the hand of strangers. [0] murder: https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/htus8008.pdf https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/htus8008.pdf (page 16) [1] rape: https://www.rainn.org/statistics/perpetrators-sexual-violence https://www.rainn.org/statistics/perpetrators-sexual-violenc... Stats-wise, it would be best for the kids to stay clear of their family ;)
DanBC 7y ago
There's a lot of discussion in the Wikipedia article saying that you can't compare rates internationally. Please be a bit more careful with statistics.
- dawidw 7y ago
  That intrigued me. Why one can't compare rates internationally? I think we can and that what rates are for, aren't they?

speeder 7y ago

I am from Brazil and here it is very accurate, I am 31 and my own childhood was already like what the article described... And seriously, it is causing lots and lots of pain now in my adult life.

Semaphor 7y ago

> and (I hear) Europe as well From what I’ve seen in Germany, not much seems to have changed since I was a kid.

Gibbon1 7y ago
Some French lady ten years ago got into a big mess because she parked her stroller out in front of a coffee shop and went inside. Cops and CPS took her baby away for a couple of weeks/months.
- seanmcdirmid 7y ago
  As I remember it, it was a Danish, not French, woman. I don’t think they had the baby for that long, the embassy intervened pretty quickly.
  - Gibbon1 7y ago
    You are correct and it's 20 years ago. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/nov/26/anette-sorenson-denmark-new-york-baby-left-outside https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/nov/26/anette-soren...
cvshepherd 7y ago
looks that way to me too. seems to be a non issue in germany, i don't see why it would be different in other european countries. i live in one of the largest, and second most dangerous city going by crime statistics, and a good friend of mine lets his 5 and 7 year old kids cart their 2 year old around the block on their own, if they want to. can't remember the last time i read about a child being snatched off the street here.