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Re:The Case for the “Self-Driven Child” by zwieback on Tuesday February 13, 2018 @11:27AM (#16368324)
"automatically stop listening" is of course what young people always do to their elders but once the shoe is on the other foot you'll realize the wisdom of all that outdated advice.

The details change but the basic patterns are eternally the same.

Re:The Case for the “Self-Driven Child” by tboyd47 on Tuesday February 13, 2018 @12:05PM (#16368704)
It feels like the difference between the parent as a judge and a guide and the parent as a manager and secretary.

My parents seemed to worry more about preventing kids from getting into trouble or making the wrong friends. My wife and I worry more about how to get them out of the house and make friends, period... and I hear this sentiment echoed every so often on HN (this being one of them).

How do you get teenagers to go outside and interact with other teenagers? That would not even be a question 30 years ago. The question would be how to stop them from doing so.

The advice I hear from the older generation so often just comes down to, "let kids be kids," but what about when you have to actually teach (and in some cases, force) kids to be kids? For my kids to have a healthy childhood, I almost have to create that childhood for them.

Re:The Case for the “Self-Driven Child” by bg4 on Tuesday February 13, 2018 @12:43PM (#16369027)
Possibly because the neighborhood is no longer considered "safe" for children to roam and explore.
Re:The Case for the “Self-Driven Child” by BrazeBeefNoodle on Tuesday February 13, 2018 @12:54PM (#16369143)
Which is ironic because statistically it's dramatically safer than 20, 30, or 40 years ago.
Re:The Case for the “Self-Driven Child” by tboyd47 on Tuesday February 13, 2018 @12:57PM (#16369176)
Probably because no one goes outside! :)
Re:The Case for the “Self-Driven Child” by ddnb on Thursday February 15, 2018 @02:22AM (#16382412)
Are you saying it's kids that make a neighbourhood unsafe?
Re:The Case for the “Self-Driven Child” by Kluny on Tuesday February 13, 2018 @07:29PM (#16372309)
There's no place for them to go anymore. My solution (since I don't have kids yet) is to try to live in, or make "places". Ie agitate my city to build plazas, public gathering places and walkable neighborhoods in the hopes that my kids will get to enjoy them when they're old enough.
Re:The Case for the “Self-Driven Child” by wvenable on Tuesday February 13, 2018 @01:22PM (#16369404)
The speed at which this has changing is ridiculous -- I have two kids that are about 12 years apart in age. In a decade, things have already changed dramatically; it was a small issue then but now it's an epidemic.
Re:The Case for the “Self-Driven Child” by zwieback on Tuesday February 13, 2018 @12:42PM (#16369024)
Yeah, it can be tough. We sometimes kicked our kids out of the house and didn't go out with them. It helps to have a yard and other neighborhood kids in that case.
Re:The Case for the “Self-Driven Child” by btilly on Tuesday February 13, 2018 @03:03PM (#16370227)
...what young people always do to their elders but once the shoe is on the other foot you'll realize the wisdom of all that outdated advice.

Nope.

My experience as a parent is that I have gone down the path towards intentionally deciding what philosophy I wish my children raised by. Random advice based on what others did is usually inapplicable. It is like receiving advice on discipline from someone who spanked their children. There is no point in even trying to explain to them why you think that what they did is wrong.

If I happen to get advice that fits, then great. I'll take ideas from anywhere. But I strongly doubt that I'll regret my choice to teach children what it looks like for them to be treated with respect, or to decide that it would have been wise to do all of the standard things that the previous generation did that left children without that.

Re:The Case for the “Self-Driven Child” by Retra on Tuesday February 13, 2018 @09:27PM (#16372928)
"You'll understand when you're older" is something I heard from my parents a lot as a kid. And now that I'm older, I understand just how full of crap they were about that. I thought they were selfish and trite then, and they're no less selfish and trite today.

The basic pattern is that anybody who lives their life carelessly peddling slogans is an idiot.