However, there were a plethora of parks, ponds, baseball and basketball courts, skateboarding parks, and an ice rink nearby that were somewhat walkable.
Yeah I spent a little too much time on the computer but I did have a social life and went outside a lot doing all kinds of fun.
I think you are underestimating how much fun kids can have with not very much. I agree that we have serious cultural problems but I think urban planning is the wrong culprit here.
I think at least some of it is lazy parenting who are content with just giving their kids an iPad or throwing them in front of the TV for entertainment.
You know what my sister did with her friends for “fun”? They wrote and acted out plays. This wasn’t that long ago, it was in the 90s.
Parents have stuff to do and also nothing to do on playground. So they stop taking kids there once those are over toddler age and won't destroy house put of sheer energy. Playgrouds are boring and 9-11 years old truly have nothing to do there without friends group.
So 6-10 years old kids are rarely outside. They know how to have fun at home and school, but they have no community in park and don't know games. Then they are 14-16 and everyone is like "why don't they go outside? there is basketball court". But shooting balls alone is fun for like two days and they don't known to have fun there.
That's because social media is deliberately designed to be addictive. Zuckerberg et al know this, but don't care, because all they care about is their proftis.
>Urban planning is setup so you can't get anywhere without a car so kids are stuck online all day.
This wasn't a problem in the 70s and 80s. Kids would just ride their bikes everywhere.
>We don't have public spaces where you aren't expected to spend money.
Apart from playgrounds, parks, libraries, community groups, all kinds of events... I don't think we've ever had more free public services than in the 21st century.
>Our food is tainted and industrialized to have less nutrition.
This is true for processed food, but we still have less malnutrition (macro and micro) today compared to any point in the 20th century.
I think it's really easy to pick the popular talking points from one's tribe and pose them as the problem/solution in any particular situation. If the goal is to actually identify/solve the problem, though, this more often than not is ineffective.
Edit, looked it up: https://frontporchne.com/article/parents-threatened-jail-fre...
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/restoring-america/communi...
https://slate.com/human-interest/2015/04/neighbors-of-free-r...
This also answers your questions about public spaces they can use without you.
Amazing book, everyone should go read it.
There are wast suburban areas without public parks and libraries. They are meant for living only, so if you live there, you really need car
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/soil-depletion-aN...
The reason kids were stuck online all day over the past two years is not urban planning; it is because kids were not allowed to go to school or socialize.
You can make claims against the base rate this way, but not against the increase over the past two years.
(also, I have no reason to think that urban kids are in a better mental state than suburban ones this pandemic, and have anecdotal reasons to think the opposite).
Suburban areas with yards and neighborhood playgrounds not owned by the city are were kids actually could and did socialize during the pandemic.
> #2 kept their infection waves in check with early quick nuanced NPI instead of waiting until only the big hammer could help
No place succeeded at this, other than small island nations. This is a fake narrative.
#2 wasn't about suppressing the virus to zero (true, no place succeeded at, not even China), it as about avoiding long stretches of strong countermeasures by applying lighter countermeasures earlier. They still required some escalation for maybe a few weeks but that's far from what people had who had to dig themselves out from underneath a massive wave they ran into at full speed.
The places that locked down earlier stayed locked down, and the places that locked down later re-opened earlier. No state stayed locked down to "dig themselves out of a hole"; that's not how any of the waves played out.
I’m glad there are people for whom medication and therapy works. I hope more people can get access to medication. I’m also sad that there isn’t more being done to address root causes.
The other big thing that caused kids to go inside was fear of abduction. 24/7 cable news, starting in the 80s, was constantly stoking fear of this.
In the 80's I remember watching an Oprah (while sick at home, watching TV was the way to get well, because it I hated it so much) on Adam Walsh's murder. His body was found near were I lived a few years before. I believe this was the beginning of the "your kids will be kidnapped and murdered" hysteria.
Parents reacted to this pulling their kids closer to home and when video games became a thing, it wasn't even hard to keep them inside anymore. Now, with cell phones, the battle is completely lost. These devices give kids (and everyone that uses them) little squirts of pleasure all day long.
I've been an avid walker for 26 years. Not until the pandemic did I ever see people outside (kids or adults), except people walking a dog to let it crap somewhere. I guess that's one good side effect of it.
We spent decades digging this grave