The "I got a big tip on a small bill" part suggests America, but the "three ten year old boys in public without anyone calling the cops" suggests Europe. Hmmm
this post was submitted on 03 Jun 2024
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I mean the dollars means it's not Europe
honestly not necessarily, i've converted my currency to dollars when talking about prices before because i know there's just a lot of Americans online and everyone else has already adapted to understanding how much a dollar is in their currency anyway
You know, the US is not the only country to use a 'dollar' as the term for its currency.
I had once been flamed by people who didn't know that
yes but when someone says "dollar" on the Internet the chances are they mean USD
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everyone else has already adapted to understanding how much a dollar is in their currency anyway
I don't think that's true.
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What has led you to believe that we call the cops in the United States when we see 10 year old kids out having fun? What a strange belief.
It's not uncommon. Here's just a few stories I was able to pull up, though my google-fu isn't what it used to be and theres a lot of noise from all the headlines made for the first one.
The Washington Post reported last week that last month, a 10-year-old boy and his 6-year-old sister were walking one mile home from a park in Silver Spring. Someone called the cops, who picked them up about halfway and took them the rest of the way home. Their parents, Alexander and Danielle Meitiv, faced no criminal charges, but a few hours later Montgomery County Children's Protective Services (CPS) showed up. According to the Meitivs, a CPS worker required Alexander to sign a safety plan promising not to leave his children unsupervised until the following Monday, when CPS would follow up. If he refused, the worker said his children would be removed. CPS has since interviewed both children at school and returned to the Meitivs' house. - grist.com, USA Today, The Washington Post
8 and 10-Year-0ld Escorted Home by Firefighters After Neighbors Report Unsupervised Kids - reason.com
Mom Sues Cops Who Arrested Her for Leaving 14-Year-Old Daughter Home Alone - reason.com
a cop came knocking after someone reported two of Hershberger's children, ages five and almost seven, walking a few blocks from her home in Reading—a Boston suburb—and picking up litter. - reason.com
A Mom Let Her 7-Year-Old Play in the Park. Arizona Arrested Her and Banned Her From Working With Kids. - reason.com
I'm glad you came with receipts. I (probably very obviously) both grew up and currently live in the US and this is wild to me. When I was a kid we ran around in the woods on the weekends and when I visited my grandparents we walked to the arcade, corner store, or the grocery store without being hassled.
I see a bunch of kids in my neighborhood playing ball, having Nerf wars, and generally just being kids from the time the spring rain stops until it starts back up again next year. The oldest I've seen this year probably isn't quite old enough to drive yet and the youngest is probably somewhere in the 5-7 range. They're just out being mild nuisances and having the time of their lives. No one has said a thing.
Those stories made the news because of how outrageous they are, not because they're common occurrences. There are still plenty of kids running around outside and having fun in the rest of the non-wacko towns across the country.
Imo it's not as significant that the cops were called - anyone can do that and the police have to respond - as it is that those police departments had both the will and legal standing to pursue charges, have CPS threaten to remove kids from their homes over it, and put a mother's name on a list which bans her from ever working with children.
I think this is the thing we tend to often forget: what we read in the news, with regards to individual or anecdotal stories, is oftentimes not representative of a general experience but rather edge cases because that’s what makes them newsworthy. It can be easy to feel doom and gloom about an issue because you’re seeing it reported regularly, but countries, and the USA in particular, have massive populations so edge cases have higher absolute incidence rates.
This differs though from news reports that are more focussed on an issue as a whole and present statistics and research; that’s obviously representative as long as the statistics are being used in good faith and the research is solid.
If you want statistics and hard facts I can provide those too, those were just the stories that showed up at the top of google in the 10 minutes I had to search.
Among parents of a child 9-11 years, 84% agree that children benefit from having free time without adult supervision. Fewer parents report their child does things without an adult present, including staying home for 30-60 minutes (58%), finding an item at the store while the parent is in another aisle (50%), staying in the car while the parent runs a quick errand (44%), walking/biking to a friend’s house (33%) or playing at the park with a friend (29%), or trick-or-treating with friends (15%). The top reason parents cite as preventing them from letting their child 9-11 years have time without adult supervision is worry that someone might scare or follow their child (54%); however, only 17% say their neighborhood is not safe for children to be alone. Some parents think their child isn’t ready (32%) or doesn’t want (28%) to do these things. Some parents believe state or local laws don’t allow children that age to be alone (17%), that someone might call the police (14%), or that others will think they are a bad parent (11%) if their child is not in direct adult supervision.
Over half of parents (56%) say that unsupervised children cause trouble. One-quarter (25%) have criticized another parent, and 13% have been criticized, for not adequately supervising their child.
- A University of Michigan survey of a national sample of 1000 parents across the demographic, geographic and economic spectrum
None of these are really insignificant numbers. This is a real issue, you can't just handwave it away with platitudes of "edge cases" and "anecdotal stories". This is 85% of surveyed parents saying they would not let their 9-11 year old child go trick-or-treating unsupervised. I understand that your anecdotal experience differs, but people are actually afraid in this country.
The laws are a bit too close for comfort on this as well; according to my state's department of health and human services, "According to the Child Protection Law, these situations are determined on a case-by-case basis, but as a general rule, a child 10 years old and younger is not responsible enough to be left home alone. If the child is between 10 and 12, and someone complains, he or she will be evaluated"
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It's a symptom of our increasingly car-dependent infrastructure imo. You feel much more exposed in the middle of parking lots or walking along neighborhood roads without sidewalks, or trees and buildings providing cover, and god forbid you end up footing the main arterial roads we have to take to access any commerce. More of our lives are being lived in these "in-between" areas, making us feel less safe in general. Houses being further apart and less people going out on foot means there are less eyes incidentally looking out if anything were to go wrong, and kids have to go further to get anywhere safe.
All of this makes adults feel less comfortable letting kids go out on their own, and cast judgement (and sometimes call the police, who sometimes take legal action!) upon anyone that does. Plus the monoculture of suburbia makes people much more susceptible to fear mongering by mainstream media, not to mention the unprecedented access to that media provided by the internet.
Anyways, here's a great video from Not Just Bikes on the topic, Why We Wont Raise Our Kids in Suburbia
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Stop man, just stop, he's already dead
These stories make the news because they're so outlandish. This is far from common behavior.
The fact that it happens at all is far too much. The US has become a country of essentially helicopter parents. I blame this largely on suburbs. They are built for cars and there's not really a good way for children to travel alone. This has caused a situation where parents are involved in whatever the child is doing anytime they aren't at school. This leads to ethe expectation that a parent will always be a with their child, so this not being the case becomes suspicious.
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I'm exaggerating slightly to be funny. That said, I'm the type of parent that sends my kids out to play unsupervised, and that's really not as common as it was when I was a kid. I've dealt with:
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When my daughter was 6, she did a loop around our block alone. About a quarter of a mile, most of it visible from the front or back yard. A neighbor came to tell me she saw my daughter walking alone, and I told her I knew. She insisted that my daughter was too young, and it was too cold for her to be out alone (I think around 40 degrees? My daughter was wearing a coat, anyway). I said she'd be fine. This lady then went and convinced my daughter to walk home with her. She brought her up to the door and I was completely blown away that this woman basically took it upon herself to decide what my kid can and cannot do.
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A different neighbor posted a picture of my son on Facebook, at 8 years old, asking where the parents were because he was too old to be out playing alone.
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One of my daughter's friends isn't allowed out of the house without a parent (now 9 years old) so my daughter always goes to her house. It's weird.
That's not a lot. It's not even that serious. But it's fucking weird that we've arrived here, as a society.
Some commenter mentioned people on Lemmy being scared of everything. Yeah, I combine my experiences with those stories of people being arrested for neglect or abuse because they let their kid out of their sight for a minute and it terrifies me. This is a nation of nosy busybodies, convinced by around-the-clock news that there's a pedophile kidnapper lurking in every neighborhood waiting for the chance to strike.
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The suburbs, where children being outside is a capital punishment according to retirees
Yous are fuckin terrified of your own shadows
Never seen such an entire nation of quivering shitebags
😂
Ar ye jest mad we gotchure lucky charms?
I don't think they're allowed to sell those in Scotland, they're classed as candy, not cereal
Lol so yes then
It's not like we drive our kids to the bus stop and then sit in the car until they get on the bus.
People very much do that here. I see it literally all the time.
I think that's more about being lazy. You have to make sure the bus actually comes because every once in a while, it doesn't, but most people don't want to stand to wait to make sure the bus came.
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This is Lemmy. These people are terrified
I think if these were girls, a lot of Karen types would freak out about them being alone
This might be news for you, but tipping exists in a lot of places other than just America.
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Also "check" suggests America
uffff.. just deleted a long ass comment about tipping.. but in the end.. I can't be bothered.. have a nice day guys!
Sometimes the best comments are the ones we don't send.
I’ve written long comments and regretted it. I’ve never once regretted deleting a long winded pile of shit before hitting Submit.
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I swear that's more common on Lemmy. We all know it's a small enough community that we'll remember each other. I like the accountability.
It’s interesting how you can guess the age of this tweet based on the prices listed. Is this from the pre-Covid days?
All the places I’ve worked (pre and post Covid), virgin drinks are charged like sodas unless it’s something like a virgin Bloody Mary with lots of stuff in it.
So around here, currently, you’d be looking at like $3.50 for each of them, which is pretty close, assuming this is like a Mexican restaurant with free chips and salsa.
Free chips and salsa? What is this sourcery? Also a Virgin cocktail would be 5 us dollars at least over here.
Regards from Norway
Here in the Land of the Free, we may not have cheap healthcare, a real democracy, safety in schools, unrestricted book access, or affordable housing...
But at least we get free chips and salsa at Mexican restaurants. Oh and free water in restaurants.
You can drink the tap water everywhere here. So if you ask for water at a restaurant that's what you get and it will be free of charge. Some outdoor concert venues only keep bottled water and charge for it. That is considered a dick move.
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I’ll trade you the free chips and salsa (and bread at some places), as well as the cheaper virgin drinks… for your social safety nets.
Deal? No? Damn.
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Yeah. I was more surprised that 3 drinks were only $11.
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Country club life.
$11 for three drinks? How many years old is this story?
Not just 3 drinks, but 3 virgin cocktails.
Did they get caught in the rain?
The concept of a personal ad is slowly fading into obscurity.
they orders
check
I'm guessing America, but you guess which predicate led to the conclusion.
"Chips and drinks kind of day"?
Do they eat nothing but chips all day?
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