The heck with the nanny state; what about the protective-custody state?

[jducoeur]

So there I was, a few days ago, driving around Cambridge, when I passed a sight that has stayed uncomfortably with me. It was a neat line of small children on the sidewalk, each maybe four years old. (I'm bad with ages: small, but big enough to be walking down the sidewalk escorted.) The line was neat because they were attached to a pair of ropes -- each child's wrist was tied into the rope, and each rope had an adult at the front and back, with about six kids between them.

My inner engineer marveled at the simple efficiency of this solution for keeping a dozen children safe while walking down a busy city sidewalk. But my inner sociologist squirmed uncomfortably.

Mind, the kids didn't seem to mind: their eyes were wandering hither and yon as they walked, largely ignoring their right hand held up slightly by the rope. But that's kind of the point -- children at that age learn from everything happening to them. So I have to wonder: what does this teach?

I confess, I find it creepy as all hell. The implicit message seems to be that captivity is right and appropriate, so long as it is intended to keep you safe. I suspect that most people would word that differently, but many would agree with it in spirit. It makes my skin crawl.

To understand a person, it's often best to understand their formative literature. If you want to understand me, I commend the novelette With Folded Hands, by Jack Williamson. (The basis for the followup novel The Humanoids.) It's fairly old (I confess, I last read it decades ago), but perhaps even more than 1984 it shaped much of my political philosophy. If the above scene does *not* make you squirm, the story might help you understand why it does me...

Comments

[celiskywalker.livejournal.com]

While it is true that I have not been a parent, I was 13 years old when my sister was born and my mother was too depressed to take care of her. She went nearly everywhere with me after school for all of my high school years. If she couldn't behave herself she got carried. I wasn't walking around the streets of Boston or Cambridge with her, but I was walking around parking lots and malls and whatnot. There were rules for situations, hold my hand in the parking lot for instance. She was watched extra when we introduced new rules. New rules were tested in relatively safe environments (like the parking lot to a relatively quiet family owned grocery store before taking her to the crowded/crazy mall).

Whether my attitude would be different if it were my kid versus my sister, I don't know. And it would certainly be different with larger groups of children whom I don't know how far they can be trusted so to speak.

Maybe things have changed in the 15 years since my sister was 2.

[calygrey.livejournal.com]

Your methods sound very much like how I dealt with my two when they were 1-5. Keeping other people's children safe always terrifies me.

I've seen photos of solutions like the looped rope and giant buggies/wagons of toddlers all the way back to the 20's. I'd supposed toddlers haven't changed since then. Or since ever.

[celiskywalker.livejournal.com]

Other people's children are always a giant 'what if'. What will they do, what won't they do. Definitely terrified me when I babysat others.