It’s one thing for an 80 year old to nostalgically lament that things aren’t as they used to be. The problem is, I’m only 36 years old and this country already barely resembles the place I grew up in.
I’ve mentioned in the past how I used to ride the New York City public bus to and from school by myself starting when I was around 9 or 10 years old. Many of my peers started taking the then dreaded subway by themselves around the same time. Bear in mind, this was NYC in the 1980’s, a far different place than the Disneyland for Wall Street it has become since. I can’t recall a single child abduction happening to anyone at my school, but what I can remember was a teacher being fired for molesting young boys. Makes you wonder about where the real danger lurks, doesn’t it?
This transformation into a nanny-state, snitching culture has severe negative long-term repercussions for U.S. society, as well as the economy, if the trend isn’t reversed. I have written about this dangerous change many times in the past, and links to prior articles will be attached at the end of this post.
First, let’s take a look at the ridiculous circumstances now faced by these Maryland parents for simply allowing their children a rite of passage that kids from time immemorial have enjoyed. From the Washington Post:
It was a one-mile walk home from a Silver Spring park on Georgia Avenue on a Saturday afternoon. But what the parents saw as a moment of independence for their 10-year-old son and 6-year-old daughter, they say authorities viewed much differently.
Danielle and Alexander Meitiv say they are being investigated for neglect for the Dec. 20 trek — in a case they say reflects a clash of ideas about how safe the world is and whether parents are free to make their own choices about raising their children.
The Meitivs say they believe in “free-range” parenting, a movement that has been a counterpoint to the hyper-vigilance of “helicopter” parenting, with the idea that children learn self-reliance by being allowed to progressively test limits, make choices and venture out in the world.
The fact that parents who want to allow their children to engage in normal behavior have to resort to terms like “free-range” parenting, which makes you think of livestock, tells you all you need to know.
“The world is actually even safer than when I was a child, and I just want to give them the same freedom and independence that I had — basically an old-fashioned childhood,” she said. “I think it’s absolutely critical for their development — to learn responsibility, to experience the world, to gain confidence and competency.”
On Dec. 20, Alexander agreed to let the children, Rafi and Dvora, walk from Woodside Park to their home, a mile south, in an area the family says the children know well.
The children made it about halfway
Police picked up the children near the Discovery building, the family said, after someone reported seeing them.
The Meitivs say their son told police that he and his sister were not doing anything illegal and are allowed to walk. Usually, their mother said, the children carry a laminated card with parent contact information that says: “I am not lost. I am a free-range kid.” The kids didn’t have the card that day.
Can you believe that such a card is even necessary? What planet am I living on.
She added: “Abductions are extremely rare. Car accidents are not. The number one cause of death for children of their age is a car accident.”
Danielle is a climate-science consultant, and Alexander is a physicist at the National Institutes of Health.
Alexander said he had a tense time with police on Dec. 20 when officers returned his children, asked for his identification and told him about the dangers of the world.
The more lasting issue has been with Montgomery County Child Protective Services, he said, which showed up a couple of hours after the police left.
Mary Anderson, a spokeswoman for CPS, said she could not comment on cases but that neglect investigations typically focus on questions of whether there has been a failure to provide proper care and supervision.
The Meitivs say that on Dec. 20, a CPS worker required Alexander to sign a safety plan pledging he would not leave his children unsupervised until the following Monday, when CPS would follow up. At first he refused, saying he needed to talk to a lawyer, his wife said, but changed his mind when he was told his children would be removed if he did not comply.
Following the holidays, the family said, CPS called again, saying the agency needed to inquire further and visit the family’s home. Danielle said she resisted.
“It seemed such a huge violation of privacy to examine my house because my kids were walking home,” she said.
This week, a CPS social worker showed up at her door, she said. She did not let him in. She said she was stunned to later learn from the principal that her children were interviewed at school.
Think about how terrifying this is for a second. Two clearly loving, intelligent and thoughtful parents where threatened with the removal of their children for allowing them to do something that should be seen as completely normal by all but the most scared, pathetic and uncourageous amongst us. To make matters worse, the whole thing started because a neighbor ratted them out.
This is not what freedom looks like.
For related articles, see:
A Winter Wonderland of Fear – Cities Across the U.S. Move to Ban Unregulated Sledding
The “Nanny States of America” – Mother Arrested for Allowing 7-Year-Old Son Walk to Park Alone
Connecticut Man Arrested for “Passive Aggressive” Behavior to a Watermelon
How I Remember September 11, 2001
In Liberty,
Michael Krieger
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Mike,
did you know that here in Portugal the government awards a top-tier car (an Audi) to a random taxpayer, taken from a pool of those who demanded fiscal invoices with their taxpayer number on them? It can be a 1-cent paper sheet invoice, or a €100 gasoline tank. They makeit an incentive for people to demand (and denounce those who do not demand) even the smallest invoice, and then hand out cars paid by other taxpayers among those who comply with this snitching.
And there is more.
Best
fms
Call the Institute Of Justice.
“Conspiracy To Deprive Someone Of Their Civil Rights Under Color Of Law” clearly applies to the lack of due process here, and they don’t actually have to succeed at depriving people of their rights, only try to under false pretenses, as CPS clearly did.
The lawsuits against those bullies are legion, and they clearly are more dangerous to kids than approximately every threat they cite.
Considering it came from the compost it left out some details. The kids where actually walking home from the playground. Montgomery County is indeed a rich high upper class liberal cesspool of wealth, snobs with people who do everything but mind there own business and would rather tell you how to run your own life. CPS has such a great track record of doing things look how many kids wind up in jail by age 15. Killing others by 15.
“The Meitivs say that on Dec. 20, a CPS worker required Alexander to sign a safety plan…”
Big mistake. Do not ever sign anything the child snatchers give you.
And in the mean time, in Crackimore, Maryland, there are thousands of children subjected to actual neglect … even with the parent present in the room, albeit stoned to the bejesus.
You mean the government admits it is unable to provide a safe environment for citizens?
Time to “do it ourselves?”
Here is the rest of the story as seen on local FOX 45 last night here in Baltimore Maryland that the host of this site would never dare publish. Under the forcefulness of the local children and youth services the Father and mother of the kids was forced to sign papers to state they would never let the kids walk by themselves ever again or the kids would be taken away from they. The Children and youth worker even called a police officer to make sure the parents where forced to sign the papers. Such a sad despicable world that the damn government can tell us how to raise our kids now yet growing up this was normal for us?
“Signed under duress” = “open and shut color of law investigation.”
That kind of thing has been going on a long time.
The good news is that once all the functions the goverment used to do are being done by some third party so that, you know, it actually gets done, then we’ll have the infrastructure that makes it an option to just slough off the entire parasitic package in one fell swoop, with no harm to the larger society.
So is there actually a statute on the books of the State of Maryland stating the age at which a minor may be in public, unsupervised? Because if not, its seems that the “authorities” are on shaky ground.
“Disorderly Conduct” allows for the judgement of the officer.
They frequently use it to hassle annoying people who are otherwise behaving in a perfectly legal and orderly fashion.
Wouldn’t “disorderly conduct” apply to the children, though? Where there was no allegation of such?
Letting them walk alone was probably deemed disorderly irrespective of their specific behavior.
Well-trained dogs that can heel without a leash aren’t considered leashed or under the owner’s control despite appearances OR facts.
Here’s the bookend to this story: children are going unvaccinated, and apparently their parents aren’t attracting so much as a phone call from child protection services.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2015-01-19/anti-vaccine-parents-found-to-stick-together-as-their-ranks-grow.html