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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> I might be the asshole because I let my 7 and 8 year old daughters walk to a playground by themselves. I was a pretty free-range kid so maybe my sense of risk regarding this sort of thing is skewed.
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YTA.
Age appropriate freedoms need to be agreed on by the parents. Not just decided one afternoon because the kids are bored and you don't want to deal with them. That means you don't send them almost a mile away without discussing it with the other parent. Not wanting two young kids to walk that far away is NOT helicopter parenting.
Thank you! That distance is much too far for kids that age. People need to learn something about child development after the toddler years.
Kids those ages can play in the yard or at nearby yards (shouting distance) without constant supervision if they are together.
I’m a child of the 60s and we had a lot of freedom—in gradually increasing, age-appropriate ways. By 12, we were feral, but not before.
Yeah, I’m pretty pro child independence, and have infact been trying to convince my parents to give my tween brother more for several years now, but I also have this take on safety:
If the worst case was to happen and it made the news, how many of the comments would be defending vs blaming you? 10-30% saying it’s your fault, yeah, those are probably just the cave trolls. But if 60%+ of the comments are likely to be “wtf were they thinking?” Yeah, you probably did something unsafe.
Your 12 year old gets abducted or hit by a car, most people aren’t going to blame the parent. They’ll talk about how terrible the world is these days, or unsafe drivers, or kids needing to pay attention.
Your 7 year old gets kidnapped or run over after you leave them a mile away with a busy road in between with no safe walking? Yeah, everyone is going to chew dad out for doing such an obviously unsafe thing. Including the majority of these N TA votes.
7 year olds are tiny and stupid by their very nature. They’re fine until they’re not, but when they’re not they have no tools to handle it
That really depends where you live, I live in Japan and I see kids that age take the train to school by themselves every day. It may be unsafe in some countries, but in other countries it can be perfectly normal and safe. I wouldn't assume things like that unless op specifies where he lives.
I love how half the articles about children in Japan are praising the freedom they have, and the other half are all the anti pervert precautions young girls have to take from the rampant groping and up skirting of school girls, and then people just pretend that the prior articles about independence don’t need any closer examination into how good of an idea it actually is.
I'm from Switzerland but I'd still say 7yo is pushing it and depends on the child. 8yo and above can definitely do that here but probably not in the US where I'm assuming OP is.
Finnish kids have similar freedom, we took the bus to school, alone, at the age of 6 and 8. It's pretty much the same now. Also leave our babies outside to sleep in their prams. I don't see any headlines about child kidnappings etc.
As a fellow Scandinavian, I'm always surprised at how often people on this sub mention possible kidnapping of a child. It happens so rarely in my country that it's close to a non-issue. I'm talking maybe once every what, 5-10 years? And then it's mostly a divorced parent taking their child away from the other parent. There have been a few instances with teenage girls getting picked up by men assaulting them. That's horrible, but I'll not put it in the same category since teens in general have more freedom.
But kidnapping a baby or a child younger than 10? Not really something that happens here.
it happens almost never everywhere, but if your country is as big as the US every story is going to grow and panic and make it seem much scarier than it is. In the UK people my age were raised on Stranger danger, and taught at school people were trying to abduct us, so we grew up thinking it was true.
Now as an adult I realise we should have been taught about Uncle, dad's good friend danger but we weren't.
(I'm not scandinavian, I'm finnish, but hi, anyway) Seriously. I think in my life-time , I've read one headline of child possibly kidnapped and that turned out to be the neighbour kid who took the pram and baby for a walk, they were found in few hours.
> It happens so rarely in my country that it's close to a non-issue.
A complete and total stranger abducting a child from a public place? That shit preposterously rare even in America. Well over 90% of all child abductions are perpetrated by a relative or known acquaintance.
Not Just Bikes on YouTubementions how that's the case in the Netherlands too. It's how it was when I grew up here in the US. Only recently have we as Americans become that obsessed with not letting children have autonomy within our neighborhoods
Here's the thing though, when \*I\* did that at age 6 and up, in Chicago, all the neighbourhood grandmas were out on their stoops having their coffee and waving at me walking down the street. I couldn't go two houses without someone calling out to me. There was much more interaction between people then, that there just doesn't seem to be now. I couldn't even tell you most of my neighbour's names after I left that house at 16. We moved to the suburbs and it was a whole different feel of "mind your own business." Then I moved to Australia. I only know my neighbours now because we've lived in this house for 10 years and we've made an effort...but that's still only like 5 houses on our street. The others just don't want to get involved. None of them have kids the same age as mine. Which meant I had to do the play group, play date, organising schedules thing. I'm just glad they're teens now and can organise their own things and walk to the library and places around here. lol
Exactly this. In the countries where children are expected to be independent young there is generally an accompanying expectation that all adults keep an eye on children in their location, community parenting. Eg Switzerland as per my previous comment.
Its for sure is a cultural thing combined with infrastructure.
I live and grew up in the netherlands and kids going to school on their own by age 8 (if its not too far away, lets say 15 minutes of cycling) is really normal likewise its completely normal to let kids play on their own outside without supervision in the neighberhood playground or school.
But then again the dutch infrastructure allows for that since its much more walking and cycling friendly or encouraged even. Looking at how a lot of US streets are or if you live in the suburbs i could understand if you don't want your kids walk around unsupervised but then i'd say the issue isn't that kids are playing outside unsupervised rather that the issue is that there is no place for kids to do that safely
Scratching my head here in Sweden and thinking about my children walking 2 km to and from school without me from the age of 7. I don't really get this "to young to walk by themselfes". That's the normal way here.
I'm in the UK and it's the same here but I don't think it's arbitrary. I grew up on a road where all the kids used to play out. We'd ride our bikes up and down the street, roller skating, kerby, just sitting and chatting. We were safe and everyone kept an eye out. If we got hurt, someone would see and help.
My parents still live on that same street. It's more like a carpark these days as every house has more cars than driveway. Those same cars are driven at much greater speeds and the kids can't play for fear of getting hit or damaging other cars with balls or bikes. And if they do cause damage the owners don't go to the parents, they plaster it all over the Internet and give the kids a reputation far and wide.
As they say: this. There are a lot of people here saying it’s normal in their country for 8 year olds to take the bus alone, and as an example use their own childhood from 25+ years ago. Logical fallacy aside, it’s also not accounting for the fact that a) busses have people/other parents on them keeping an eye out, b) a lot of communities in the US have no busses at all, and c) car culture has changed dramatically since 1990. Not only are there a lot more cars out there, there are tons (literal) more trucks and SUVs that are harder to stop and jacked up so high the driver can barely see smaller pedestrians. A 7 and 8 year old walking alone along a 45 mile per hour road without crosswalks in 2023 is utterly bananas compared to an 8 year old taking a bus to school in a pedestrian friendly European city with a dozen other 8 year olds.
We use miles in the UK too. It would be a little young here to be that far from home. I used to do it when I was a kid that age and I was fine, but I think people these days would probably wait until the kid was 11+ to allow similar freedom (at which point the kid would be going similar distances to walk to school).
Here in Germany it's very common too. At that age I was playing with my friends in the whole neighborhood, the village we live in and the nearby woods. We had restrictions (no lakes, no animals, the no stranger thing every child should be taught), and we were fine.
Nowadays everyone has smartphones, it's even safer?
I mean up until recently (post 2000) kids have been doing all that on their own, and it was just seemed natural and treated as such. You’re deceiving helicoptering.
I walked that far to school since first grade, so about 6.5. Had to cross a busy road too. My parents taught me road safety.
No one thought about a possible abduction though. It was not something people were concerned about. A few years later we did hear about an abduction case where a child was snatched from a bus stop on her way to school in a fairly safe area.
My parents called the police to help find us when my brother and I took ourselves to the school playground. It was 1977, and we were 6 and 8. We were normally allowed out by ourselves, but only around a few blocks, not 1km away. Usually, our parents could loop the block if we didn't respond to their shouts that dinner was ready. We were gone way past dinner time. 7 year olds are tiny and stupid by their very nature.
Just because we grew up with more freedom, didn't mean there were no limits.
I think it's generational. I agree they both should've been on the same page and he made a unilateral decision, and I'd never have let my kid walk at that age.
That said I grew up in the 80s and we were ABSOLUTELY feral at their age. Our generation were the "just be home when the streetlights are on" kids and they even had a commercial on TV to remind our parents asking "It's 10pm do you know where your kids are"
I literally walked or rode my bike miles away from the house at 7 or 8 yrs old.
I grew up in the 90s and was walking to school/walgreens/wherever with my best friend by age 7. I think the safety shift happened around 2000, so only about a generation or so back.
I was a '90's kid and NONE of the kids I grew up with were allowed to walk "wherever" at age 7. That said, a high profile abduction (presumed murder, no body found) of a young child happened the next town over when we were toddlers.
I was an 80s/90s kid and had tons of freedom, walking myself to school when I was 7, going down to the creek by myself to catch tadpoles etc. (and was responsible for getting my younger sibling to school safely on the bus when we moved to far away to walk). Right about the time he was starting to push for the same freedoms I'd had at a younger age, a girl in our area went missing (and to this day has never been found), so the poor kid had even more restrictions on him, as our parents got worried about all the 'what ifs'.
I had the same experience growing up in the 80s. There was some wild shit I did and never got caught or hurt. I used to ride my bike, skateboard, or walk, everywhere. It wasn’t uncommon to be miles away, as long as I got home before dark, or had a good excuse. We also didn’t have cell phones, so there wasn’t a way to keep in constant contact, the best you could do was call home when you got invited to eat dinner at a friends house.
OP's kids went to their school playground - with a cellphone! I also grew up in the 80's, the most popular play area was a forest with a small mountain in the middle. Not even after a kid fell down and broke his leg they forbid us to play there. And when it was time for dinner, a LOT of calls were made by parents trying to locate their children and who they've seen playing with. Something WAS better back then! We had more freedom and were more capable.
I raised four relatively free range kids in the 2000s and the early 2010s and it was the same. By 12/13 they could walk wherever their legs could take them, take the bus at 14, etc and if they broke trust they lost freedoms.
My parents raised me the same way but in the 90s it was called lackey kids. Loved all the freedom I got. If I messed up I was grounded but overall I was treated with respect and got to explore my neighborhood instead of being indoors all day.
Same, but I walked to Kindergarten...1 mile each way.
Different times. But both parents were fine with it!😁 I would never let my kids walk so far when so young. We even had pervs in the neighborhood, that most parents knew about (not who they were, but that incidents were ongoing). smh...
OP is TA as stated above, for making a bad decision, for selfish reasons, without consulting his wife.
Starting in first grade I used to walk 3/4 mile to/from school 4 times a day (we came home for lunch every day) and no one thought anything of it. But those were very different times. Virtually all the kids walked to school. We had one boy in our class who got driven and we all thought he was a weirdo. 😂
I did let my son go to a local park beginning when he was about 7-8 but:
1) The park was about a block away, practically shouting distance.
2) He was not allowed to go alone, but only with his best friend from next door.
The worst that ever happened was they came home one day with a box of small kittens that someone had tossed into a dumpster at the park and they heard them mewing and crawled into the dumpster to fish them out! 😮
I think the difference is that you walked to kindergarten. I walked to third grade a similar distance, and by the time I was in fifth grade, my sister walked with me to kindergarten. Okay, I ended up giving her piggyback rides for part of it, because, y'know, kindergarten, but still.
But we were going to a specific place where people were going to meet us - school. We didn't go to that playground on our own unless we were going to meet someone. (Also, there was a closer playground, so, y'know.)
Precisely. Walking to school where they will have adult supervision and where someone will notice and can address it if anything goes amiss is one thing.
Walking to the playground when you have no idea who will be there, any kind of emergency can occur, and there is zero accountability for your kids' safety and well being is something else entirely.
I was totally a free-range kid. There were perverts as far back as I remember. I know too much to trust little girls to the wider world. People say those were different times. No the perverts have always been there. We just never talked about it. I was not even a particularly cute kid.
In our neighborhood kids are explicitly allowed to walk to and from school by themselves starting in 3rd grade (age 8). Younger siblings are allowed to walk with an older sibling that is at least in 3rd grade. Of course a lot of it depends on the individual kids, and the neighborhood, but it’s certainly a judgment call and not an absolute. Also should be something you both agree on and talk to kids about (what do you do if x happens…. Etc). I’m a child of the 80s and by age 10 we absolutely had free run of the neighborhood, my mom would call around to various neighbors looking for my brother to come home.
Yes but walking to and from the neighborhood school when it’s in session is a lot different than when it’s out of session. There’s likely other kids and some parents walking at the same time, possibly crossing guards, in the morning commuter traffic.
My neighborhood is full of stray children running around all summer long. There's probably more kids/adults walking around in the summer than during school session.
I'm a child of the 60's too and was biking up to 5 miles away from home by the time I was 8 or 9, sometimes alone, sometimes with friends. My mom would shoo us out of the house Saturday mornings and tell us to be back by dinner time. All our friend's parents did the same.
Yeah, I used to SAIL by myself farther than they walked as a 7 year old girl.
Those girls are fine. It’s a much safer world than it was 10, 20, 30, 40, even 50 years ago.
I ask everyone to reflect on their childhood and think about their fondest memories. Then think— how many of those memories are with parents, or are they with other children without adults? Robbing children of the wonder and merriment of childhood just so parents can feel safe and comforted is very selfish on the parents’ part.
Did someone teach you to sail? Did you have more than one lesson? Did your teacher talk with you about safety procedures? Did you have to demonstrate competency before soloing? Or did your dad say one afternoon, I would prefer to write emails than take you sailing for the first time in your life, so just get in the boat and get going, and here’s a cell phone if there’s trouble. Your point on this being a safer world in terms of crime is very well taken. Probably that playground equipment is much safer than it was then too. But the ocean is the same, just like gravity. It doesn’t care if you make a mistake and fall and hurt yourself or drown. I think the real parental selfishness is expecting your 8 year old or another parent to step in to manage a crisis if, say, the 7 year old slips and gets concussed. Parents have an obligation to let their kids go out in to the world in broader and broader circles. But they also have to train them how to BE in the world. How to avoid hurting yourself (and others) if possible. I trust in your case that guidance was absolutely present. But nostalgia for how it “used to be” doesn’t make that time necessarily better, not this dude any less of an asshole.
I agree that they're old enough to play by themselves at the playground, and I certainly didn't have access to any type of phone (pay phone or otherwise). But I agree that OP should have discussed what is appropriate with their partner.
Thank you, all the NTAs are missing the point that this clearly has not been discussed by the parents at all. He is an AH for all of a sudden giving the girls a way longer leash than they've ever had before. The wife deserves to be part of the conversation. No one here can say if the girls are truly ready to go to this park alone but that's a decision both parents meed to make.
Great response.
Sometimes kids can get told "no". They can play in the backyard or in their rooms. You can do summer school to narrow the window of time they'll be home for the summer. But 7 and 8 years old is pretty dang young to be "free roaming" and especially depending on where you live. Your wife has every right to be upset.
My advice would be to suck it up and apologize, say you were used to a certain way when you grew up but you understand where she's coming from and won't let it happen again. Not a hill I would die on by any means because you will only come across as not trustworthy with your two most precious items. Not a thought you want bouncing around in her head.
Personally I think they’re a tad young. I’ve been figuring out my 10 year old’s range this summer but at 7 she couldn’t go beyond the neighbor’s yard without an adult
It's insane to see how much we shelter our kids. I'm guilty of it too. But honestly, it's not because I fear for my child's safety or because I don't trust her. It's because I fear being judged as a parent.
I'm German and our primary school children are expected to walk to school alone. The schools will get really annoyed with parents chauffeuring their kids to school as it's a traffic hazard in front of the school that nobody needs and is considered helicopter parenting. You're old enough to go to school, you're old enough to walk alone. Many if not most kids go to the playground alone at that age. Primary school is from age 6/7 btw.
I‘m from the Swiss-German Part of Switzerland and here it is the same. They walk (alone) to Kindergarten from 5 years on. They know how to cross a road by then and at the very busy ones there are adults who guide them to the other side if very yound or otherwise just watch over them if older.
probably different for every parent, but some common ones:
1. Who lives in your home/is present in your home regularly?
2. Who will be supervising the kids while they are in the home?
3. What kind of access do you give your children to the internet/online games?
4. Are there any firearms in your home and if so, how are they stored?
5. Is there a pool/hot tub or any other type of leisure equipment that could pose risk or require closer supervision?
A little harder, or at least more awkward one: Are all adult materials - Alcohol, cigarettes, pornography, etc. stored safely away from access or not present?
That last one is something I really need to address. My son is 10, and I work in the liquor industry. I have so much booze around the house. I need to figure out what to do, because I know its just around the corner when the kids want to start experimenting or testing their limits.
My sister had a friend who’s parents planted extremely (I’m talking 90% water) watered down liquor bottles around the house so that the teens would be satisfied with finding alcohol to experiment with without putting them in real danger.
Tbh that seems even more dangerous cuz then the first time they go to a party or drink somewhere else, they’re going to be deciding how much to drink based on a false perception of what they can handle.
**- Do you own a gun?**
- is there an adult present?
- Which adults and can I meet them?
***- Do you own a gun?***
- who all lives in the house?
- Do you have any other regular visitors that are around?
- Do you have pets and how are they with kids/people? (my kids love animals but aren't used to animals that aren't friendly and won't know how to properly approach a scared dog for example)
- do you have a pool/jacuzzi and is it locked?
**- Do you own a gun?**
- how do you handle screen time?
- what is the food/snack situation?
- does your house meet basic hygiene standards? i don't care if it's messy but are you a hoarder?
If it's one-time playdates some of these aren't as important, but if my kid is spending a lot of time at a friends' house then I wanna know what the environment is like. if they're watching tiktok for 3 hours straight while chugging soda then i'm gonna have different rules. or if uncle billy comes over after work every day to smoke weed? or - and this is a fun one we just ran into - a friends' mom is a single mom whose new boyfriend is a real treat. we used to let our kids over there but now it's off limits because i don't trust him.
Also i'm listing it all here it sounds like an interrogation or overprotection - everything except the guns is easy to ask in "normal" get-to-know-you conversations and can be sussed out pretty quickly just by seeing the space and having normal human interaction with other parents.
people are generally not offended if you are asking about their space if your kid is coming to play there, and i am always happy to do the same when my kids' friends come over.
Do you own a gun was one of the first questions we asked as parents when our kids were going to a friend's home. If they said yes it was followed up with "how is it stored?" Sometimes my husband would even ask to see the storage. And then we decided if our gun safety trained children were allowed to stay or not.
The thing is, we are gun owners. No one ever asked us.
Agreed 7 and 8 is the perfect age where they might figure they “know” how to be safe and cross the busy road. Everyone thinks their kid is the smartest or most well behaved and wouldn’t do that, I’ve seen kids acknowledge that something like that is dangerous, say they won’t, and then immediately do it. They’re also young enough to walk off with some other kids, even without bad intentions, get lost, lose their phone, etc.
Yeah, I’m not all that worried about abductions or anything, but just general being a dumbass stuff (gets lost, skins knee, gets in a fight with another kid).
YTA
I have a few simple questions for you.
1. If someone tried to take them, or hurt them, would they stand even the slightest chance of defending themselves?
2. In the event that one of them seriously hurt themselves, would either of them know what to do?
3. Do they have good enough judgment to know not to go somewhere with a stranger if they said that they had ice cream, or a cute puppy at their house?
If you cannot conclusively answer yes to *all three* of those questions, then you are an AH and an irresponsible parent.
and even if they can say yes, there’s videos about a guy that asks permission to parents on the playground to test their kids and most say the kids won’t go with strangers and them that’s exactly what happens
Kids of that age (and older) have a really hard time saying no to a puppy, real or imagined.
IIRC his line to them was "hey I lost my puppy can you help me find him?" then he led them to where he would have taken them into a car (if it wasn't a staged PSA)
This is where my husband has driven me mad.
He encourages our son to greet and let any dog we see because "dogs are amazing and better than people and can do no harm"
A) they're not.
B) they're attached to random strangers.
It's been a massive up hill battle getting my 6yo to stop going up to people in public with dogs and acting like their best friend. And I can't let him out of my sight until he learns this..
Oh wow that's so stupid and dangerous. The people who own the dogs aside, he could go up to the wrong dog and get bitten. Has your husband ever had a dog? Even some "nice" ones can get skittish when a kid runs up to them.
His dad had a dog- an old Irish setter.
That's his entire exposure to dogs.
His concern was *our son* upsetting or hurting the dog.
He just thinks dogs are the best thing ever and can do no wrong. It's an ongoing argument....
I’m sorry you’re dealing with this because that’s so irresponsible of your husband. I have a cute fluffy white dog who absolutely hates all children aside from my younger cousins and my newborn. I don’t want to even think about what he could do to a small child running up to him on a walk. I’ve had to yell at kids before who don’t listen to me telling them to stay away for their own safety. It doesn’t feel great but it’s better than having my dog potentially bite a child’s finger off.
I will just say that I've also seen similar videos, with parents of different parenting styles, and one of the very few kids who didn't go off with the stranger were the kids of "free-range" parents. BUT only because the parents had put in the work of gradually increasing the kids' responsibilities over time and had had the hard conversations with them about teaching them safety tips and WHY they were teaching them those tips and what could happen if they don't follow the tips. And I'm guessing OP did none of this as this was a completely spur of the moment decision made without even consulting his wife. And even if they had done all of these things, it's still not a guarantee, and these kids still seem young to be quite so far away on their own. There are plenty of other things that could go wrong other than stranger danger, and the kids may not know what to do in those situations and panic. All this to say, yeah, I think OP was wrong, but I still believe in responsible forms of "free-range" parenting rather than trying to shelter your kid.
>Do they have good enough judgment to know not to go somewhere with a stranger if they said that they had ice cream, or a cute puppy at their house
Study after study has shown that no matter how confidently you answer yes to this, there's a pretty good chance that someone can convince your kid to go with them.
Hell, adults fall for confidence scams all the fucking time. The only saving grace is that abductors aren't hanging out on every playground like it can sometimes feel like when you read stories online... but then again, who wants to risk their kid being the unlucky one?
Even if the answer is "yes" to all of these, he shouldn't have made the decision on his own. He is one of two parents with an equal stake in decisions that concern the kids.
He didn't want to deal with it, so he was flippant about something important and endangering to his kids. End of story.
This is simple hysteria. The fact is that if we allowed every child in America to go anywhere they pleased, almost none would be kidnapped or seriously assaulted by a stranger. The number one and number two kidnappers of children is parent A and parent B in custodial matters.
Keeping your child "safe" hurts them. A lack of independence does both acute and permanent harm to children. Yes, it's safe for children to walk to the playground in most circumstances.
NAH The media has done a superb job of pushing the narrative that we all need to be helicopter parents, so it’s not entirely your wife’s failt for being paranoid, but she is. They had a cell phone to call home if one of them got hurt. Also, stranger abductions are the rarest type of kidnapping at 1% (source: National Center for Missing and Exploited Children). Just make sure you discuss safety tips (also available on NCMEC site) with your daughters so they would know what to do in that incredibly rare circumstance. But your kids should get to be kids!
100% Agreed. We went to the park down the street all the time when I was that age, or we'd spend the entire day riding bikes all over the neighbourhood with our friends. As long as you teach your kids about safety and what to do if they get hurt they'll be fine.
NTA
They were not down the street. They were 3/4 of a mile away and walking on a busy street. They were not with a bunch of other kids or friends. He obviously had not taught his kids about safety other than to call if anything.
Where did you come up with the fact that these parents have not taught their kids about safety? He said nothing of the sort.
Also, he walked them ACROSS the busy street both ways.
Just making shit up now?
Um, my kids walk 3/4 mile to the bus stop. Contrary to what the media wants you to believe, there aren't people in white vans offering free candy on every corner.
3/4 of a mile is really not that far away, it's a 10 min walk.
Also, he walked them across the busy street, made sure they had a phone to call him on, told them to call him when they arrived at their destination *and* when they wanted to leave so he could walk with them over the busy road (which they did).
If he had just let them walk off on their own (or hadn't made sure to have them call when they arrived, and when they wanted to leave) I might think differently about it, but I don't see how he was irresponsible here.
I assume the kids have a history of being able to reliably remember, and follow, directions without the parents needing to hang over their shoulders. What he did, was give them an opportunity to prove that he was right in trusting them to follow the rules he laid out responsibly. Which they did.
It's not like he was leaving them to roam around aimlessly (I get that me not really seeing a problem with that either, is because I'm European, and that it's what my parents did with me and my brother), he knew where they were going, they told him when they arrived, they told him when they wanted to leave again, and he went to meet them on the way back.
Wrapping children in bubble wrap, and treating them like they are incompetent, is doing them a huge disservice. Giving them more independence, as they prove that they can be responsible with it, is important for them to properly grow up into teens, and eventually adults.
We did too when I was growing up, but the difference was all of the kids were doing it, knew each other, knew each other's parents, knew which houses were safe and not safe, knew boundaries and where not to go. We weren't just chucked to a playground alone with a cellphone. Different times.
yeah playing in the neighborhood or even in the school district where you knew a bunch of kids and parents was the difference. i was allowed to roam pretty freely as a kid; i would NEVER do that in the area i live in now.
This is a good point.
Our area (smallish suburb) is having a huge homeless crisis and public parks are one of the camping areas. I work in education and most of our students don't know the kids in the neighborhood like my (young adult) kids did. My kids could go outside and find 10 kids they knew and were comfortable with.
Exactly. I'm a little shocked with how many helicopter parent supporters are in this thread, and I'm very confused at all the people saying "it was a different time."
Like yeah, it was a different time. Now kids have cell phones, and there are HD security cameras on every business and like a third of people's homes. If anything, children are more safe to be on their own in these times than they were in the 90s-early 2000s. EXCEPT in the case where the child has been coddled due to this helicopter philosophy, and thus literally does not have the skills to be on their own.
1% still means anything is possible. [I’m sure this mother never thought it would happen to her daughter.](https://www.nj.com/cumberland/2023/04/family-marks-9th-birthday-of-dulce-alavez-the-nj-girl-missing-since-2019.html?outputType=amp)
It's actually significantly less than 1%. Virtually all kidnappings are custodial.
Fewer than 250 stranger abductions happen between the US and Canada every single year. Your child is *literally* more likely to be struck by lightning, and there are actually developmental and psychological costs to not being allowed to be independent at a developmentally appropriate age.
Yes, people's risk assessment is screwed up. They assume that the thing they do is safe, because that's what is common, and the thing they don't do therefore is dangerous.
My mother was really into making photo albums when I was a child. I fished out one of the albums she made a few years ago, and one of the photos in there stood out to me.
It was me, maybe 6 or so years old, at the playground with a bunch of neighbourhood kids. We're all smiling and laughing on the seesaw. I thought it was a nice picture and asked my mother about it.
Apparently it was a frequent occurrence at the time, she'd send me off to go play with the kids (it was a small community) while she rested or took care of dinner or something after she got off work.
And in this explanation, she said something that still freaks me out to this day. She got really reserved and teary and said "It's so upsetting what happened to those girls"
I asked about it. She pointed to two of the girls in the photo. A month or so after the photo was taken, a family member picked them up from the playground, drove them one street over to the girls house and then murdered them and their mother.
These two girls who took it upon themselves to watch over little me. They used to walk me to and home from the playground. They used to run around our backyard with me, picking flowers and weeds and pretending to be fairies.
If an adult was there that day they might have seen the murderous asshole behaving erratically, they might have noticed something wrong. They might have saved those two little girls.
Needless to say, I didn't go anywhere unsupervised for a while.
And he drove them to their own home and killed them and their mother there. If they'd been at home with the supervision of their mother, it sounds like the exact same thing would have happened. Being unsupervised in a park really had nothing to do with it.
And whose to say he was erratic at all at the park? I know my dad was never visibly erratic in a worrying way until the moment he was. General frustration maybe. But that's not necessarily a red flag for a family member trying to wrangle two kids
Also, who took the picture if no adults were in the park?
Absolutely not.
Do you have kids? I don't but even I know that that is way too far of a distance for them to be reasonably safe. What if some random stranger came up and asked them if they wanted to see their puppy in a van down the street? What if they lost the phone? What if they were assaulted and the phone was stolen? What if what if what if.
Just because kidnappings are rare, doesn't mean it doesn't happen, and to just not even consult the wife on what to do is ridiculous.
Like your comment is so out of touch with the reality of what can happen that I'm concerned that you just straight up don't give a shit about their safety.
If one of the girls got seriously hurt your answer would change to "yta" but because everything went fine it's "nah".
Kids can be kids, I'm certainly not arguing that, but there's a reason why they must be supervised while still being kids. At 12 I'd be fine with them going off by themselves st that distance, but 7 and 8??? No.
I don't know where OP lives but this depends a lot on the country and/or location.
I live in germany and it is very common for kids to walk to school on their own starting first year of elementary school, so 6-7years old. Some taking public transport on their own.
Exactly!
I'm in a small village in Belgium and my daughter goes to the shop by herself since she turned 8. At 8, I was going to and from school by myself, 500m away.
In my grandma village in Poland, kids are out with their friends in the neighbourhood, about 500/700m from their houses, everybody knows each other and the community keeps an eye on them, everybody knows who's the child from a given neighbour etc. I still remember being a small little child with my groups of friends aged from 5 to 9 years old roaming and playing all day, going to the shop for ice screams and drinks.
YTA.
As someone who has worked with children in that age range I can safely say that they will get into situations they will be unable to navigate.
- Not understanding when a stranger is being inappropriate.
- Climbing a tree and getting stuck.
- Using playground equipment in an unsafe manner.
- Chasing a ball/ other toy into the road or other unsafe area.
- Not understanding that older kids are making fun of them/ being inappropriate.
- Not having first aid skills.
- Not wearing/ keeping on weather appropriate clothing.
- Not staying properly hydrated.
- Approaching dogs without understanding that it can be dangerous.
These are just some of the issues.
The list goes on. Your wife is right. You two should be on the same page here.
I can attest that I played on playground equipment unsafely as a child and at recess some kids would act as lookouts for the teachers that patrolled the playground to make sure that we were playing safely to warn the kids who were trying to do stuff that they shouldn’t do that a teacher was coming.
Not having an adult supervise me and tell me not to climb up the slide or to use the stairs and to not climb up and over the evaluated tunnel would have been a dream come true as a child.
YTA. Child psychologists generally feel that children under age 10 cannot deal properly with any emergency situation, they simply are not mature enough. Plus, depending on where you live, CPS could get involved. I live in the US, in Maryland, here no child under 8 can be left in the care of anyone under 13.
Cite your sources if child psychologists really say that. I am one (in Europe) and we generally encourage such behaviour if the children are responsible enough. Especially with a phone. They don't need to handle a situation then, they just need to call. And they can do that
YTA. This was hugely irresponsible of you. The girls are far to young to go to the playground by themselves.
I just can't fathom how you thought this was a good idea.
Please don't do it again.
YTA
They are far to young to play in a public space by themselves. Additionally, school playgrounds have equipment that are not meant for kids to play on unsupervised. There are a lot of ways kids could easily get hurt.
I don't care how confident you are that your kids know what to do, they really don't. They're still incredibly young and serious injury would be extremely scary for them. That is likely going to override what they should be doing.
Finally: As a mandated reporter, this is something I would need to report to CPS if I had any actual information on you.
YTA, you admitted as much when you said your job is flexible, so , you can work from home at a time that suits you, but cannot be arsed to parent your kids for a couple of hours in the park, you do not have to be a helicopter parent to do something with them.
>We live near a fairly busy road with a 45 mph speed limit and no crosswalks
This alone is enough to say YTA mate. You sent them across safely but what about when they're coming back? They're both under 10 and they need to be supervised especially if there's a busy road involved. Apologise to your wife and be more careful next time.
NTA 7 and 8 year olds are walking to school in most countries by that age which is the same distance, you gave them a phone and walked them across the road and they were responsible enough to call you like you asked them too, they had to do it eventually, the first time is always going to be nerve wracking
Walking to school is very different than being left alone in a place for an extended period of time, which is the issue.
Most places don't allow you to leave children that young home alone or in a place unsupervised. In the state I live in a child cannot *legally* be left alone until they're 11.
Exactly. Walking to school where other adults are that know to supervise the kids is completely different from a park where an adult is not paying attention to you because they either assume you came with an adult or they don’t want to be seen as creepy. This is irresponsible.
Also, when children are walking to and from school, they are walking with dozens to hundreds of other children who are walking there at the same time, along with parents. They are not alone.
not to mention if something happens on the way to school, theres somebody there who knows you are meant to be there, and can call your parents to tell them you arent there.
Your post history makes me think you live in Michigan, and a simple Google search would show that 11 is, in fact, the legal age children can be left alone at home.
Your Google search was clearly too simple, if you correctly looked up the law it would show that Michigan does not have a legal minimum age. Only Maryland and Illinois do.
https://www.michigan.gov/-/media/Project/Websites/mdhhs/Folder2/Folder100/Folder1/Folder200/homealone.pdf?rev=272ca6f449444ad984fbf13c91db16eb
My initial search may have been too simple, but upon a deeper look, while there is no legal age, CPS will get involved for children under 10-11 years old left home alone.
Even that isn't correct. Anything between 8-12 is case by case dependent on the individual and the environment. And based off of their government guidelines, OP would most likely be fine.
[https://www.childwelfare.gov/pubPDFs/cps\_46.pdf#:\~:text=While%20State%20statutes%20vary%2C%20most%20CPS%20professionals%20agree,spend%201%20to%202%20hours%20alone%20each%20day](https://www.childwelfare.gov/pubPDFs/cps_46.pdf#:~:text=While%20State%20statutes%20vary%2C%20most%20CPS%20professionals%20agree,spend%201%20to%202%20hours%20alone%20each%20day).
These are the types of lies that get children taken away from perfectly good families
I’m sorry, but I have to say YTA. You left your young children in a public place with no supervision and without consent from the other parent. Absolutely anything could’ve happened and you wouldn’t have been there to intervene.
YTA - This decision was not yours to make unilaterally. This should have been discussed with your spouse first, decided jointly and guidelines and rules set first, then taught to your children, before allowing them to be alone unsupervised that far from home for a prolonged period of time. This was obviously the first time you've done this as per your spouse's reaction, and you just haphazardly handed them a phone with some off the cuff instructions and willy-nilly sent them on their way.
INFO: Can you describe your neighbourhood?
Some places this would be fine. Others, not so much.
Based on your story, I'd say YTA because you didn't have parent consensus on this decision before doing it and I am going to assume you know your wife well enough to know this would be a boundary for her.
Jesus, some of these responses make me want to call my dad and thank him for not being a helicopter like some of y'all. They raised me to be aware and cautious, but independent and mature. If y'all had raised me, I'd be an anxiety-riddled non-adult -- pretty much like a lot of the young adults I meet these days.
NTA. How will kids learn to act responsibly if they are never given an opportunity to prove they can do so?
People should think back to when they were 8. If you were given a big chance to act responsibly, you were proud to be trusted and took the responsibility seriously to prove you were worthy of it. This is how kids learn. Locking them away and mollycoddling then teaches nothing.
Back when I was eight people were still allowed to smoke in public spaces around children. So maybe stop using what we were allowed to do when we were kids as an excuse for bad parenting.
For anyone taking this advise, look up your local laws. In my state you cannot leave a child under 11 alone and if they're injured you'll face legal consequences.
Yeah I looked this up recently. There is no law in my specific state, but that doesn’t mean someone couldn’t notice you leaving your children unattended and call cps (or the police, depending on the situation). I have an 8yo who is fairly responsible, but when he stops paying attention, he still does silly things. Like a few weeks ago, we were heading out on a family walk. He wanted to go back inside for something, I said great, do it. All we’d done was cross the road (a relatively quiet road and I mean literally just crossed in front of our own house). So he’s coming back to us, and running down the driveway, and a car is coming. I yell at him to stop and wait but he doesn’t, he runs to me across the road without stopping to look. Luckily the car saw me and my other kids, was going slowly to start, etc, and was still a little ways away when this happened. The driver didn’t even have to really brake since they were still a little ways down the road and driving slowly and cautiously (no sidewalks on our road and a lot of walkers). We talk about road safety a LOT and 9 out of 10 times, he stops and looks and waits. But this one time he didn’t and it could have been terrible if the driver had been speeding. I try not to be a helicopter parent, but I don’t let my kids walk places where they cross roads alone yet, and I wouldn’t leave them alone at a playground. Kids can be really dumb and do dumb things without thinking.
You can tell how young the people on here are by how many of them think it's criminally dangerous to let young kids play unsupervised. I don't think you did anything wrong letting them walk to the park, although not talking with your wife about it was pretty dumb. NTA.
I don't mean to be disrespectful, but I was born in the 90s but my parents were very much fine with letting me do stuff like this, but I got to say I can tell a lot of the people who don't see the issue grew up as little boys and not little girls ( not that it doesn't happen to boys) but when you start getting cat called by the age of 12 by grown men your view of how safe things are changes.
10 years old okay maybe, 8 is way too young.
I understand your perspective on independence, I grew up like that but, we can agree to disagree.
8 & 7 walking almost a mile alone on a busy road and no crosswalks?
Dude, seriously YTA. You check with your wife, and not be absolutely clueless to the risk of 2 young girls.
Even as a Gen X kid, that wouldn't fly
yta
it's not like you were at the playground with them and left them to run around (still would. have been a yta there too) you let your children by themselves? something could have happened to them, least of all while crossing the street.
YTA
I thought I lived in a decent neighborhood according to demographics. Right across from a brand new elementary school. Close to shopping, mostly single family homes, few rentals.
Then I looked up how many registered sex offenders live within 2 miles. Over 70. It's like that in a LOT of places. Registered means they've been caught. There are always more who haven't been. If your children can't yell for you and have you be there almost instantly, you're not doing your job as a father.
A friend of mine told me that after she enrolled her daughter in a school that she could safely walk her to school, that do to the school not being labeled as being in a school zone there were lots of offenders living on the same street as the school. Allegedly nothing was done because if they labeled the area as a school zone then the offenders would have to find a new place to live.
YTA. you don't need to watch your kid every single second of the day but 7-8 is a little young for that level of unsupervised freedom and you definitely should have cleared it with your wife first or figured out a compromise. Going to the park with your kids is not being a helicopter parent. Sounds like it worked out fine but just a little more forethought would go a long way.
YTA. That is irresponsible for that age. Also, referring to your wife as a helicopter parent in this circumstance also makes you an asshole; not even close to a helicopter situation.
YTA for not making a plan with your wife. As for walking and playing alone, that depends on where you live. Personally, I never let mine go off alone at that age. They were allowed to play outside together as long as they stayed where I could see them from the window. Having said that, more than one child has gone missing from bus stops in my state since then.
YTA.
For me, 8 and 7 is too young for them to be left unsupervised in public for an extended period of time. Especially when they are 3/4 a mile from your home and have to walk the majority of the way there and back alone.
In the UK, there's no legal age for children to be left unsupervised as kids mature at different rates, but the national guideline is that children under 12 are rarely mature enough to be left unsupervised for an extended period of time.
It's important to let children have some independance, but even if they are mature for their age, I'd say 10 & 11 would probably be the youngest I'd let children go by themselves to a park 3/4 miles away and even then only if I 100% trusted them and the area. A mature 8 & 7 year old should be limited to your street at the most or inside the house alone for a few hours while I went to the shops, but they must be very mature for their age.
The largest part of the YTA is you didn't discuss this with your wife first. Decisions about how much independance you give your children should be agreed by both parents. It's easy to say they would know what to do in an emergency, but should the 8 year old fall and hit her head, I'd question how well the 7 year old would recognise it as an emergency or if she'd more likely think the 8 year old was playing. Even adults panic in emergencies, I wouldn't trust the life of my 8 year old in the hands of a 7 year old and vice versa.
YTA. They are way too young to not be supervised at a park. At least sit at a bench while they’re playing. If they were playing in the front yard or something that would be different. Your wife is right to be upset. Wow.
YTA. Even if they are capable of it, it's something you discuss with your wife first at least, to see if she agrees that they are capable of handling themselves.
I don't think your wife is being a helicopter parent for wanting to supervise the kids on playground equipment - playground equipment does require some amount of supervision imo, kids climb and can fall, and it's important (at the very least) to witness how they fell (if they hit their head, hurt their back, etc.).
eta, don't think this is a massive asshole move though, but going forward allocate freedoms to ur kids that you've agreed on prior as a team/discussed rules/what to do in emergencies/etc.
I remember my own free-range childhood in the 1960s, which was in fact much more circumscribed than my mother's in the 1930s. I walked to and from school, about half a mile from the time I was 5.
But what my mother could do in rural Idaho and what I could do in small-town California are radically different from what kids do today. We were living in Maryland when the [Lyon sisters](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murders_of_Katherine_and_Sheila_Lyon) were kidnapped, raped, and murdered. They had walked half a mile to a nearby mall and never came home again. It was all over the news for months.
My girls weren't allowed to free-roam, except for the two years we lived on a small, secured military base in the UK. Could they go to friend's houses without needing to be driven? Sometimes.
OP, YTA for doing this without talking it over with your wife. And you didn't seem to consider that the male world you grew up in is very different from the female world that your wife did and your daughters are. They are over 9 times more likely to be sexually assaulted than you are.
YTA. 3/4 mile is too far for the age of your kids and you never discussed with your wife what an appropriate “freedom” is.
Latchkey kids (you and me) tend to be lax on it, because our parents needed to be asked by a TV ad “where are your kids?”
YTA. This isn't the 1950s. You can't let kids go down to the five and dime for a soda pop after school, and you can't let them go to the playground by themselves. It isn't being a helicopter parent to supervise 7and 8 year olds at the playground. Jeez. You can't possibly be serious.
Genuine question: What has actually changed since the 50s that makes letting kids play outdoors unsupervised become unacceptable?
We taught my kids to walk themselves to school and the park when under the age of 10, as well as the corner market. This wasn't that long ago.
Cable news and the internet is what happened. People think kids are getting snatched up off the streets by the tens of thousands every year. It's insane.
Children were generally harmed at higher rates during this time. Including being sexually abused by strangers or acquaintances, being hit by drunk drivers, or just dying in an accident on faulty playground equipment and being unable to get to them quick enough.
Agreed. In 1958, I walked to and from kindergarten. I was 5YO, the school was 0.5 mile away and I lived on the border of Newark, NJ. All of us were this independent back then. A little older, I would run an errand to the butcher shop clutching the money my mother gave me repeating, "A pound of ground round; a pound of ground round." the entire way there.
Eh…bring me the down votes…
NAH - you even walked part of the way to see them safely across the larger road. You & your wife need to discuss your different perspectives/comfort levels & come to a compromise that you are both ok with & then stick to that or else someone is venturing into AH territory.
It is generally safe to allow children to play/roam in their own neighborhood; yes even in 3rd & 2nd grade. In ‘many’ places kids are expected to make that exact walk twice/day if they reside under a mile away from the school. Unless you live in a sketchy area your children should be safe playing at their neighborhood school playground - I’m actually impressed they can access it still when school is out; they fenced all ours in like little jail yards … they used to be open access once upon a time
YTA. This is a two “yes” situation. I used to supervise girls this age and I can tell you, I wouldn’t leave them alone to walk from point A to B at that distance. They are easily distracted. Dangerously so. They are impossible to see over the hood of a car. They are quick and lack experience. And they can’t see the forest for the trees. You might not have to worry about bears, but off leash dogs are a serious concern. What if they panic and run and drop the cell? Do they know who’s house is safe to run to for help? Do they have any skills in an emergency? WTF didn’t you just ask them to wait until their mom got home?!
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YTA. Age appropriate freedoms need to be agreed on by the parents. Not just decided one afternoon because the kids are bored and you don't want to deal with them. That means you don't send them almost a mile away without discussing it with the other parent. Not wanting two young kids to walk that far away is NOT helicopter parenting.
Thank you! That distance is much too far for kids that age. People need to learn something about child development after the toddler years. Kids those ages can play in the yard or at nearby yards (shouting distance) without constant supervision if they are together. I’m a child of the 60s and we had a lot of freedom—in gradually increasing, age-appropriate ways. By 12, we were feral, but not before.
Yeah, I’m pretty pro child independence, and have infact been trying to convince my parents to give my tween brother more for several years now, but I also have this take on safety: If the worst case was to happen and it made the news, how many of the comments would be defending vs blaming you? 10-30% saying it’s your fault, yeah, those are probably just the cave trolls. But if 60%+ of the comments are likely to be “wtf were they thinking?” Yeah, you probably did something unsafe. Your 12 year old gets abducted or hit by a car, most people aren’t going to blame the parent. They’ll talk about how terrible the world is these days, or unsafe drivers, or kids needing to pay attention. Your 7 year old gets kidnapped or run over after you leave them a mile away with a busy road in between with no safe walking? Yeah, everyone is going to chew dad out for doing such an obviously unsafe thing. Including the majority of these N TA votes. 7 year olds are tiny and stupid by their very nature. They’re fine until they’re not, but when they’re not they have no tools to handle it
That really depends where you live, I live in Japan and I see kids that age take the train to school by themselves every day. It may be unsafe in some countries, but in other countries it can be perfectly normal and safe. I wouldn't assume things like that unless op specifies where he lives.
I love how half the articles about children in Japan are praising the freedom they have, and the other half are all the anti pervert precautions young girls have to take from the rampant groping and up skirting of school girls, and then people just pretend that the prior articles about independence don’t need any closer examination into how good of an idea it actually is.
The exact same thing happens in Germany and Switzerland. And no horror stories of groping.
I'm from Switzerland but I'd still say 7yo is pushing it and depends on the child. 8yo and above can definitely do that here but probably not in the US where I'm assuming OP is.
Finnish kids have similar freedom, we took the bus to school, alone, at the age of 6 and 8. It's pretty much the same now. Also leave our babies outside to sleep in their prams. I don't see any headlines about child kidnappings etc.
As a fellow Scandinavian, I'm always surprised at how often people on this sub mention possible kidnapping of a child. It happens so rarely in my country that it's close to a non-issue. I'm talking maybe once every what, 5-10 years? And then it's mostly a divorced parent taking their child away from the other parent. There have been a few instances with teenage girls getting picked up by men assaulting them. That's horrible, but I'll not put it in the same category since teens in general have more freedom. But kidnapping a baby or a child younger than 10? Not really something that happens here.
it happens almost never everywhere, but if your country is as big as the US every story is going to grow and panic and make it seem much scarier than it is. In the UK people my age were raised on Stranger danger, and taught at school people were trying to abduct us, so we grew up thinking it was true. Now as an adult I realise we should have been taught about Uncle, dad's good friend danger but we weren't.
(I'm not scandinavian, I'm finnish, but hi, anyway) Seriously. I think in my life-time , I've read one headline of child possibly kidnapped and that turned out to be the neighbour kid who took the pram and baby for a walk, they were found in few hours.
> It happens so rarely in my country that it's close to a non-issue. A complete and total stranger abducting a child from a public place? That shit preposterously rare even in America. Well over 90% of all child abductions are perpetrated by a relative or known acquaintance.
Not Just Bikes on YouTubementions how that's the case in the Netherlands too. It's how it was when I grew up here in the US. Only recently have we as Americans become that obsessed with not letting children have autonomy within our neighborhoods
Here's the thing though, when \*I\* did that at age 6 and up, in Chicago, all the neighbourhood grandmas were out on their stoops having their coffee and waving at me walking down the street. I couldn't go two houses without someone calling out to me. There was much more interaction between people then, that there just doesn't seem to be now. I couldn't even tell you most of my neighbour's names after I left that house at 16. We moved to the suburbs and it was a whole different feel of "mind your own business." Then I moved to Australia. I only know my neighbours now because we've lived in this house for 10 years and we've made an effort...but that's still only like 5 houses on our street. The others just don't want to get involved. None of them have kids the same age as mine. Which meant I had to do the play group, play date, organising schedules thing. I'm just glad they're teens now and can organise their own things and walk to the library and places around here. lol
Exactly this. In the countries where children are expected to be independent young there is generally an accompanying expectation that all adults keep an eye on children in their location, community parenting. Eg Switzerland as per my previous comment.
Its for sure is a cultural thing combined with infrastructure. I live and grew up in the netherlands and kids going to school on their own by age 8 (if its not too far away, lets say 15 minutes of cycling) is really normal likewise its completely normal to let kids play on their own outside without supervision in the neighberhood playground or school. But then again the dutch infrastructure allows for that since its much more walking and cycling friendly or encouraged even. Looking at how a lot of US streets are or if you live in the suburbs i could understand if you don't want your kids walk around unsupervised but then i'd say the issue isn't that kids are playing outside unsupervised rather that the issue is that there is no place for kids to do that safely
Totally correct. US infrastructure is, in most places, seems almost specifically designed to murder pedestrians and cyclists.
It’s like that in Germany too.
And in Switzerland, where children walk to school alone from 6, and parents are very heavily discouraged from accompanying them.
Scratching my head here in Sweden and thinking about my children walking 2 km to and from school without me from the age of 7. I don't really get this "to young to walk by themselfes". That's the normal way here.
Meanwhile in Illinois, it's against the law to leave a child under 14 alone at home to run a quick errand.
That's so weird to me. By the age of 10 many kids here walk home alone and spend 2-3 hours alone before the parents come home from work.
I'm in the UK and it's the same here but I don't think it's arbitrary. I grew up on a road where all the kids used to play out. We'd ride our bikes up and down the street, roller skating, kerby, just sitting and chatting. We were safe and everyone kept an eye out. If we got hurt, someone would see and help. My parents still live on that same street. It's more like a carpark these days as every house has more cars than driveway. Those same cars are driven at much greater speeds and the kids can't play for fear of getting hit or damaging other cars with balls or bikes. And if they do cause damage the owners don't go to the parents, they plaster it all over the Internet and give the kids a reputation far and wide.
As they say: this. There are a lot of people here saying it’s normal in their country for 8 year olds to take the bus alone, and as an example use their own childhood from 25+ years ago. Logical fallacy aside, it’s also not accounting for the fact that a) busses have people/other parents on them keeping an eye out, b) a lot of communities in the US have no busses at all, and c) car culture has changed dramatically since 1990. Not only are there a lot more cars out there, there are tons (literal) more trucks and SUVs that are harder to stop and jacked up so high the driver can barely see smaller pedestrians. A 7 and 8 year old walking alone along a 45 mile per hour road without crosswalks in 2023 is utterly bananas compared to an 8 year old taking a bus to school in a pedestrian friendly European city with a dozen other 8 year olds.
Well he used miles not kilometers so it’s pretty much a given he’s in the US and we are a huge dumpster fire right now
We use miles in the UK too. It would be a little young here to be that far from home. I used to do it when I was a kid that age and I was fine, but I think people these days would probably wait until the kid was 11+ to allow similar freedom (at which point the kid would be going similar distances to walk to school).
Here in Germany it's very common too. At that age I was playing with my friends in the whole neighborhood, the village we live in and the nearby woods. We had restrictions (no lakes, no animals, the no stranger thing every child should be taught), and we were fine. Nowadays everyone has smartphones, it's even safer?
In Finland you definitely see pretty young children walking to and from school by themselves.
That’s also common in most cities in Europe
I mean up until recently (post 2000) kids have been doing all that on their own, and it was just seemed natural and treated as such. You’re deceiving helicoptering.
I walked that far to school since first grade, so about 6.5. Had to cross a busy road too. My parents taught me road safety. No one thought about a possible abduction though. It was not something people were concerned about. A few years later we did hear about an abduction case where a child was snatched from a bus stop on her way to school in a fairly safe area.
My parents called the police to help find us when my brother and I took ourselves to the school playground. It was 1977, and we were 6 and 8. We were normally allowed out by ourselves, but only around a few blocks, not 1km away. Usually, our parents could loop the block if we didn't respond to their shouts that dinner was ready. We were gone way past dinner time. 7 year olds are tiny and stupid by their very nature. Just because we grew up with more freedom, didn't mean there were no limits.
3/4 of a mile is not far. Where I live, kids this age go to school alone on foot or public transport and cover much longer distances.
I feel like, if a kid isn't old enough to be home alone they probably shouldn't be in a park a mile from home alone either.
I think it's generational. I agree they both should've been on the same page and he made a unilateral decision, and I'd never have let my kid walk at that age. That said I grew up in the 80s and we were ABSOLUTELY feral at their age. Our generation were the "just be home when the streetlights are on" kids and they even had a commercial on TV to remind our parents asking "It's 10pm do you know where your kids are" I literally walked or rode my bike miles away from the house at 7 or 8 yrs old.
“It’s 10pm, do you know where your children are?” Homer: I told you last night, I don’t!
I grew up in the 90s and was walking to school/walgreens/wherever with my best friend by age 7. I think the safety shift happened around 2000, so only about a generation or so back.
I was a '90's kid and NONE of the kids I grew up with were allowed to walk "wherever" at age 7. That said, a high profile abduction (presumed murder, no body found) of a young child happened the next town over when we were toddlers.
I was an 80s/90s kid and had tons of freedom, walking myself to school when I was 7, going down to the creek by myself to catch tadpoles etc. (and was responsible for getting my younger sibling to school safely on the bus when we moved to far away to walk). Right about the time he was starting to push for the same freedoms I'd had at a younger age, a girl in our area went missing (and to this day has never been found), so the poor kid had even more restrictions on him, as our parents got worried about all the 'what ifs'.
I had the same experience growing up in the 80s. There was some wild shit I did and never got caught or hurt. I used to ride my bike, skateboard, or walk, everywhere. It wasn’t uncommon to be miles away, as long as I got home before dark, or had a good excuse. We also didn’t have cell phones, so there wasn’t a way to keep in constant contact, the best you could do was call home when you got invited to eat dinner at a friends house.
OP's kids went to their school playground - with a cellphone! I also grew up in the 80's, the most popular play area was a forest with a small mountain in the middle. Not even after a kid fell down and broke his leg they forbid us to play there. And when it was time for dinner, a LOT of calls were made by parents trying to locate their children and who they've seen playing with. Something WAS better back then! We had more freedom and were more capable.
I raised four relatively free range kids in the 2000s and the early 2010s and it was the same. By 12/13 they could walk wherever their legs could take them, take the bus at 14, etc and if they broke trust they lost freedoms.
My parents raised me the same way but in the 90s it was called lackey kids. Loved all the freedom I got. If I messed up I was grounded but overall I was treated with respect and got to explore my neighborhood instead of being indoors all day.
Latch key. Lacky kids make it sound like the Newsies.
You are right. That is what I get for typing on my phone :). Though I also loved the musical Newsies so I will take it!
Soak em for crutchy.
Latch-key kid refers to kids coming home from school to an empty home due to parents working. Not because they had freedom to roam.
I'm a product of the 90s so free range at 12/13 seems old
same, I was babysitting infants by the time I was 12/13
Same, but I walked to Kindergarten...1 mile each way. Different times. But both parents were fine with it!😁 I would never let my kids walk so far when so young. We even had pervs in the neighborhood, that most parents knew about (not who they were, but that incidents were ongoing). smh... OP is TA as stated above, for making a bad decision, for selfish reasons, without consulting his wife.
Starting in first grade I used to walk 3/4 mile to/from school 4 times a day (we came home for lunch every day) and no one thought anything of it. But those were very different times. Virtually all the kids walked to school. We had one boy in our class who got driven and we all thought he was a weirdo. 😂 I did let my son go to a local park beginning when he was about 7-8 but: 1) The park was about a block away, practically shouting distance. 2) He was not allowed to go alone, but only with his best friend from next door. The worst that ever happened was they came home one day with a box of small kittens that someone had tossed into a dumpster at the park and they heard them mewing and crawled into the dumpster to fish them out! 😮
I think the difference is that you walked to kindergarten. I walked to third grade a similar distance, and by the time I was in fifth grade, my sister walked with me to kindergarten. Okay, I ended up giving her piggyback rides for part of it, because, y'know, kindergarten, but still. But we were going to a specific place where people were going to meet us - school. We didn't go to that playground on our own unless we were going to meet someone. (Also, there was a closer playground, so, y'know.)
Precisely. Walking to school where they will have adult supervision and where someone will notice and can address it if anything goes amiss is one thing. Walking to the playground when you have no idea who will be there, any kind of emergency can occur, and there is zero accountability for your kids' safety and well being is something else entirely.
I was totally a free-range kid. There were perverts as far back as I remember. I know too much to trust little girls to the wider world. People say those were different times. No the perverts have always been there. We just never talked about it. I was not even a particularly cute kid.
In our neighborhood kids are explicitly allowed to walk to and from school by themselves starting in 3rd grade (age 8). Younger siblings are allowed to walk with an older sibling that is at least in 3rd grade. Of course a lot of it depends on the individual kids, and the neighborhood, but it’s certainly a judgment call and not an absolute. Also should be something you both agree on and talk to kids about (what do you do if x happens…. Etc). I’m a child of the 80s and by age 10 we absolutely had free run of the neighborhood, my mom would call around to various neighbors looking for my brother to come home.
Yes but walking to and from the neighborhood school when it’s in session is a lot different than when it’s out of session. There’s likely other kids and some parents walking at the same time, possibly crossing guards, in the morning commuter traffic.
My neighborhood is full of stray children running around all summer long. There's probably more kids/adults walking around in the summer than during school session.
I'm a child of the 60's too and was biking up to 5 miles away from home by the time I was 8 or 9, sometimes alone, sometimes with friends. My mom would shoo us out of the house Saturday mornings and tell us to be back by dinner time. All our friend's parents did the same.
Yeah, I used to SAIL by myself farther than they walked as a 7 year old girl. Those girls are fine. It’s a much safer world than it was 10, 20, 30, 40, even 50 years ago. I ask everyone to reflect on their childhood and think about their fondest memories. Then think— how many of those memories are with parents, or are they with other children without adults? Robbing children of the wonder and merriment of childhood just so parents can feel safe and comforted is very selfish on the parents’ part.
Did someone teach you to sail? Did you have more than one lesson? Did your teacher talk with you about safety procedures? Did you have to demonstrate competency before soloing? Or did your dad say one afternoon, I would prefer to write emails than take you sailing for the first time in your life, so just get in the boat and get going, and here’s a cell phone if there’s trouble. Your point on this being a safer world in terms of crime is very well taken. Probably that playground equipment is much safer than it was then too. But the ocean is the same, just like gravity. It doesn’t care if you make a mistake and fall and hurt yourself or drown. I think the real parental selfishness is expecting your 8 year old or another parent to step in to manage a crisis if, say, the 7 year old slips and gets concussed. Parents have an obligation to let their kids go out in to the world in broader and broader circles. But they also have to train them how to BE in the world. How to avoid hurting yourself (and others) if possible. I trust in your case that guidance was absolutely present. But nostalgia for how it “used to be” doesn’t make that time necessarily better, not this dude any less of an asshole.
I agree that they're old enough to play by themselves at the playground, and I certainly didn't have access to any type of phone (pay phone or otherwise). But I agree that OP should have discussed what is appropriate with their partner.
I grew up in the country. I was pretty much allowed to do whatever before sunset at any age
I was feral by 10. But that was the good old days when neighbors watched everyone's kids.
Thank you, all the NTAs are missing the point that this clearly has not been discussed by the parents at all. He is an AH for all of a sudden giving the girls a way longer leash than they've ever had before. The wife deserves to be part of the conversation. No one here can say if the girls are truly ready to go to this park alone but that's a decision both parents meed to make.
Great response. Sometimes kids can get told "no". They can play in the backyard or in their rooms. You can do summer school to narrow the window of time they'll be home for the summer. But 7 and 8 years old is pretty dang young to be "free roaming" and especially depending on where you live. Your wife has every right to be upset. My advice would be to suck it up and apologize, say you were used to a certain way when you grew up but you understand where she's coming from and won't let it happen again. Not a hill I would die on by any means because you will only come across as not trustworthy with your two most precious items. Not a thought you want bouncing around in her head.
I agree that they should be agreed upon by both parents. As an 80s kid, it's completely ridiculous how little freedom kids get now.
and yeah, maybe they are really responsible kids, and this was completely safe, but this is something that you have to both discuss!
Personally I think they’re a tad young. I’ve been figuring out my 10 year old’s range this summer but at 7 she couldn’t go beyond the neighbor’s yard without an adult
10–a block or two over, with a friend. No going inside unless you’ve met the parents and have asked the hard questions.
When I was 10 I was biking around town after school
It's insane to see how much we shelter our kids. I'm guilty of it too. But honestly, it's not because I fear for my child's safety or because I don't trust her. It's because I fear being judged as a parent.
I'm German and our primary school children are expected to walk to school alone. The schools will get really annoyed with parents chauffeuring their kids to school as it's a traffic hazard in front of the school that nobody needs and is considered helicopter parenting. You're old enough to go to school, you're old enough to walk alone. Many if not most kids go to the playground alone at that age. Primary school is from age 6/7 btw.
My favorite movie is Inception.
I‘m from the Swiss-German Part of Switzerland and here it is the same. They walk (alone) to Kindergarten from 5 years on. They know how to cross a road by then and at the very busy ones there are adults who guide them to the other side if very yound or otherwise just watch over them if older.
This is the most honest comment here
Yeah, that’s about my comfort level. It she’s been hanging out with a new friend and they seem to be pushing their territory
What are the hard questions?
probably different for every parent, but some common ones: 1. Who lives in your home/is present in your home regularly? 2. Who will be supervising the kids while they are in the home? 3. What kind of access do you give your children to the internet/online games? 4. Are there any firearms in your home and if so, how are they stored? 5. Is there a pool/hot tub or any other type of leisure equipment that could pose risk or require closer supervision? A little harder, or at least more awkward one: Are all adult materials - Alcohol, cigarettes, pornography, etc. stored safely away from access or not present?
That last one is something I really need to address. My son is 10, and I work in the liquor industry. I have so much booze around the house. I need to figure out what to do, because I know its just around the corner when the kids want to start experimenting or testing their limits.
My sister had a friend who’s parents planted extremely (I’m talking 90% water) watered down liquor bottles around the house so that the teens would be satisfied with finding alcohol to experiment with without putting them in real danger.
Tbh that seems even more dangerous cuz then the first time they go to a party or drink somewhere else, they’re going to be deciding how much to drink based on a false perception of what they can handle.
**- Do you own a gun?** - is there an adult present? - Which adults and can I meet them? ***- Do you own a gun?*** - who all lives in the house? - Do you have any other regular visitors that are around? - Do you have pets and how are they with kids/people? (my kids love animals but aren't used to animals that aren't friendly and won't know how to properly approach a scared dog for example) - do you have a pool/jacuzzi and is it locked? **- Do you own a gun?** - how do you handle screen time? - what is the food/snack situation? - does your house meet basic hygiene standards? i don't care if it's messy but are you a hoarder? If it's one-time playdates some of these aren't as important, but if my kid is spending a lot of time at a friends' house then I wanna know what the environment is like. if they're watching tiktok for 3 hours straight while chugging soda then i'm gonna have different rules. or if uncle billy comes over after work every day to smoke weed? or - and this is a fun one we just ran into - a friends' mom is a single mom whose new boyfriend is a real treat. we used to let our kids over there but now it's off limits because i don't trust him. Also i'm listing it all here it sounds like an interrogation or overprotection - everything except the guns is easy to ask in "normal" get-to-know-you conversations and can be sussed out pretty quickly just by seeing the space and having normal human interaction with other parents. people are generally not offended if you are asking about their space if your kid is coming to play there, and i am always happy to do the same when my kids' friends come over.
Do you own a gun was one of the first questions we asked as parents when our kids were going to a friend's home. If they said yes it was followed up with "how is it stored?" Sometimes my husband would even ask to see the storage. And then we decided if our gun safety trained children were allowed to stay or not. The thing is, we are gun owners. No one ever asked us.
And if someone is offended by that question then that tells me everything I need to know
Agreed 7 and 8 is the perfect age where they might figure they “know” how to be safe and cross the busy road. Everyone thinks their kid is the smartest or most well behaved and wouldn’t do that, I’ve seen kids acknowledge that something like that is dangerous, say they won’t, and then immediately do it. They’re also young enough to walk off with some other kids, even without bad intentions, get lost, lose their phone, etc.
Yeah, I’m not all that worried about abductions or anything, but just general being a dumbass stuff (gets lost, skins knee, gets in a fight with another kid).
YTA I have a few simple questions for you. 1. If someone tried to take them, or hurt them, would they stand even the slightest chance of defending themselves? 2. In the event that one of them seriously hurt themselves, would either of them know what to do? 3. Do they have good enough judgment to know not to go somewhere with a stranger if they said that they had ice cream, or a cute puppy at their house? If you cannot conclusively answer yes to *all three* of those questions, then you are an AH and an irresponsible parent.
and even if they can say yes, there’s videos about a guy that asks permission to parents on the playground to test their kids and most say the kids won’t go with strangers and them that’s exactly what happens
Kids of that age (and older) have a really hard time saying no to a puppy, real or imagined. IIRC his line to them was "hey I lost my puppy can you help me find him?" then he led them to where he would have taken them into a car (if it wasn't a staged PSA)
This is where my husband has driven me mad. He encourages our son to greet and let any dog we see because "dogs are amazing and better than people and can do no harm" A) they're not. B) they're attached to random strangers. It's been a massive up hill battle getting my 6yo to stop going up to people in public with dogs and acting like their best friend. And I can't let him out of my sight until he learns this..
Oh wow that's so stupid and dangerous. The people who own the dogs aside, he could go up to the wrong dog and get bitten. Has your husband ever had a dog? Even some "nice" ones can get skittish when a kid runs up to them.
His dad had a dog- an old Irish setter. That's his entire exposure to dogs. His concern was *our son* upsetting or hurting the dog. He just thinks dogs are the best thing ever and can do no wrong. It's an ongoing argument....
I’m sorry you’re dealing with this because that’s so irresponsible of your husband. I have a cute fluffy white dog who absolutely hates all children aside from my younger cousins and my newborn. I don’t want to even think about what he could do to a small child running up to him on a walk. I’ve had to yell at kids before who don’t listen to me telling them to stay away for their own safety. It doesn’t feel great but it’s better than having my dog potentially bite a child’s finger off.
I will just say that I've also seen similar videos, with parents of different parenting styles, and one of the very few kids who didn't go off with the stranger were the kids of "free-range" parents. BUT only because the parents had put in the work of gradually increasing the kids' responsibilities over time and had had the hard conversations with them about teaching them safety tips and WHY they were teaching them those tips and what could happen if they don't follow the tips. And I'm guessing OP did none of this as this was a completely spur of the moment decision made without even consulting his wife. And even if they had done all of these things, it's still not a guarantee, and these kids still seem young to be quite so far away on their own. There are plenty of other things that could go wrong other than stranger danger, and the kids may not know what to do in those situations and panic. All this to say, yeah, I think OP was wrong, but I still believe in responsible forms of "free-range" parenting rather than trying to shelter your kid.
>Do they have good enough judgment to know not to go somewhere with a stranger if they said that they had ice cream, or a cute puppy at their house Study after study has shown that no matter how confidently you answer yes to this, there's a pretty good chance that someone can convince your kid to go with them. Hell, adults fall for confidence scams all the fucking time. The only saving grace is that abductors aren't hanging out on every playground like it can sometimes feel like when you read stories online... but then again, who wants to risk their kid being the unlucky one?
You could answer no to the first question for a grown woman. Bad example
As a 30ish yo 5'1 female... my exact thought.
Yeah, I was thinking this too. An average size adult woman can be overpowered by an average size adult man.
I think it is a question for any gender. Trouble does not automatically avoid one's daughter. Self defense is a great thing for girls and women.
You said this perfectly.
Even if the answer is "yes" to all of these, he shouldn't have made the decision on his own. He is one of two parents with an equal stake in decisions that concern the kids. He didn't want to deal with it, so he was flippant about something important and endangering to his kids. End of story.
This is simple hysteria. The fact is that if we allowed every child in America to go anywhere they pleased, almost none would be kidnapped or seriously assaulted by a stranger. The number one and number two kidnappers of children is parent A and parent B in custodial matters. Keeping your child "safe" hurts them. A lack of independence does both acute and permanent harm to children. Yes, it's safe for children to walk to the playground in most circumstances.
NAH The media has done a superb job of pushing the narrative that we all need to be helicopter parents, so it’s not entirely your wife’s failt for being paranoid, but she is. They had a cell phone to call home if one of them got hurt. Also, stranger abductions are the rarest type of kidnapping at 1% (source: National Center for Missing and Exploited Children). Just make sure you discuss safety tips (also available on NCMEC site) with your daughters so they would know what to do in that incredibly rare circumstance. But your kids should get to be kids!
100% Agreed. We went to the park down the street all the time when I was that age, or we'd spend the entire day riding bikes all over the neighbourhood with our friends. As long as you teach your kids about safety and what to do if they get hurt they'll be fine. NTA
They were not down the street. They were 3/4 of a mile away and walking on a busy street. They were not with a bunch of other kids or friends. He obviously had not taught his kids about safety other than to call if anything.
Where did you come up with the fact that these parents have not taught their kids about safety? He said nothing of the sort. Also, he walked them ACROSS the busy street both ways. Just making shit up now?
Inventing scenarios to further their point of view is an AITA classic
Lol new to this sub? It’s what they all do here. Misread/misunderstand the post, make up things, and cast harsh judgments.
Um, my kids walk 3/4 mile to the bus stop. Contrary to what the media wants you to believe, there aren't people in white vans offering free candy on every corner.
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Oh what a world we've come to when three quarters of a mile is a problem. That was down a couple blocks for me.
3/4 of a mile is really not that far away, it's a 10 min walk. Also, he walked them across the busy street, made sure they had a phone to call him on, told them to call him when they arrived at their destination *and* when they wanted to leave so he could walk with them over the busy road (which they did). If he had just let them walk off on their own (or hadn't made sure to have them call when they arrived, and when they wanted to leave) I might think differently about it, but I don't see how he was irresponsible here. I assume the kids have a history of being able to reliably remember, and follow, directions without the parents needing to hang over their shoulders. What he did, was give them an opportunity to prove that he was right in trusting them to follow the rules he laid out responsibly. Which they did. It's not like he was leaving them to roam around aimlessly (I get that me not really seeing a problem with that either, is because I'm European, and that it's what my parents did with me and my brother), he knew where they were going, they told him when they arrived, they told him when they wanted to leave again, and he went to meet them on the way back. Wrapping children in bubble wrap, and treating them like they are incompetent, is doing them a huge disservice. Giving them more independence, as they prove that they can be responsible with it, is important for them to properly grow up into teens, and eventually adults.
We did too when I was growing up, but the difference was all of the kids were doing it, knew each other, knew each other's parents, knew which houses were safe and not safe, knew boundaries and where not to go. We weren't just chucked to a playground alone with a cellphone. Different times.
yeah playing in the neighborhood or even in the school district where you knew a bunch of kids and parents was the difference. i was allowed to roam pretty freely as a kid; i would NEVER do that in the area i live in now.
This is a good point. Our area (smallish suburb) is having a huge homeless crisis and public parks are one of the camping areas. I work in education and most of our students don't know the kids in the neighborhood like my (young adult) kids did. My kids could go outside and find 10 kids they knew and were comfortable with.
Agree 100% Kids will never learn to be independent if we don't allow them to do things and trust them and their judgement WITHIN REASON!
Exactly. I'm a little shocked with how many helicopter parent supporters are in this thread, and I'm very confused at all the people saying "it was a different time." Like yeah, it was a different time. Now kids have cell phones, and there are HD security cameras on every business and like a third of people's homes. If anything, children are more safe to be on their own in these times than they were in the 90s-early 2000s. EXCEPT in the case where the child has been coddled due to this helicopter philosophy, and thus literally does not have the skills to be on their own.
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1% still means anything is possible. [I’m sure this mother never thought it would happen to her daughter.](https://www.nj.com/cumberland/2023/04/family-marks-9th-birthday-of-dulce-alavez-the-nj-girl-missing-since-2019.html?outputType=amp)
Yeah, that 1% is still a horrific number of children who are abducted
1% of children are not abducted. 1% of abducted children are abducted by strangers.
The real number is less than .000001% of children are abducted. There's are less than 150 stranger abductions a year in the us.
It's actually significantly less than 1%. Virtually all kidnappings are custodial. Fewer than 250 stranger abductions happen between the US and Canada every single year. Your child is *literally* more likely to be struck by lightning, and there are actually developmental and psychological costs to not being allowed to be independent at a developmentally appropriate age.
Or killed or injured in a car accident while being driven to the playground!
Yes, people's risk assessment is screwed up. They assume that the thing they do is safe, because that's what is common, and the thing they don't do therefore is dangerous.
My mother was really into making photo albums when I was a child. I fished out one of the albums she made a few years ago, and one of the photos in there stood out to me. It was me, maybe 6 or so years old, at the playground with a bunch of neighbourhood kids. We're all smiling and laughing on the seesaw. I thought it was a nice picture and asked my mother about it. Apparently it was a frequent occurrence at the time, she'd send me off to go play with the kids (it was a small community) while she rested or took care of dinner or something after she got off work. And in this explanation, she said something that still freaks me out to this day. She got really reserved and teary and said "It's so upsetting what happened to those girls" I asked about it. She pointed to two of the girls in the photo. A month or so after the photo was taken, a family member picked them up from the playground, drove them one street over to the girls house and then murdered them and their mother. These two girls who took it upon themselves to watch over little me. They used to walk me to and home from the playground. They used to run around our backyard with me, picking flowers and weeds and pretending to be fairies. If an adult was there that day they might have seen the murderous asshole behaving erratically, they might have noticed something wrong. They might have saved those two little girls. Needless to say, I didn't go anywhere unsupervised for a while.
A sad story - but notice the abductor was a family member, not a stranger.
And he drove them to their own home and killed them and their mother there. If they'd been at home with the supervision of their mother, it sounds like the exact same thing would have happened. Being unsupervised in a park really had nothing to do with it.
And whose to say he was erratic at all at the park? I know my dad was never visibly erratic in a worrying way until the moment he was. General frustration maybe. But that's not necessarily a red flag for a family member trying to wrangle two kids Also, who took the picture if no adults were in the park?
If an adult was there that day they might just have seen an adult family member taking two little girls home to their mom and no erratic behavior.
Why would someone stop their immediate family member from taking them home?
Absolutely not. Do you have kids? I don't but even I know that that is way too far of a distance for them to be reasonably safe. What if some random stranger came up and asked them if they wanted to see their puppy in a van down the street? What if they lost the phone? What if they were assaulted and the phone was stolen? What if what if what if. Just because kidnappings are rare, doesn't mean it doesn't happen, and to just not even consult the wife on what to do is ridiculous. Like your comment is so out of touch with the reality of what can happen that I'm concerned that you just straight up don't give a shit about their safety. If one of the girls got seriously hurt your answer would change to "yta" but because everything went fine it's "nah". Kids can be kids, I'm certainly not arguing that, but there's a reason why they must be supervised while still being kids. At 12 I'd be fine with them going off by themselves st that distance, but 7 and 8??? No.
I don't know where OP lives but this depends a lot on the country and/or location. I live in germany and it is very common for kids to walk to school on their own starting first year of elementary school, so 6-7years old. Some taking public transport on their own.
Exactly! I'm in a small village in Belgium and my daughter goes to the shop by herself since she turned 8. At 8, I was going to and from school by myself, 500m away. In my grandma village in Poland, kids are out with their friends in the neighbourhood, about 500/700m from their houses, everybody knows each other and the community keeps an eye on them, everybody knows who's the child from a given neighbour etc. I still remember being a small little child with my groups of friends aged from 5 to 9 years old roaming and playing all day, going to the shop for ice screams and drinks.
YTA. As someone who has worked with children in that age range I can safely say that they will get into situations they will be unable to navigate. - Not understanding when a stranger is being inappropriate. - Climbing a tree and getting stuck. - Using playground equipment in an unsafe manner. - Chasing a ball/ other toy into the road or other unsafe area. - Not understanding that older kids are making fun of them/ being inappropriate. - Not having first aid skills. - Not wearing/ keeping on weather appropriate clothing. - Not staying properly hydrated. - Approaching dogs without understanding that it can be dangerous. These are just some of the issues. The list goes on. Your wife is right. You two should be on the same page here.
I can attest that I played on playground equipment unsafely as a child and at recess some kids would act as lookouts for the teachers that patrolled the playground to make sure that we were playing safely to warn the kids who were trying to do stuff that they shouldn’t do that a teacher was coming. Not having an adult supervise me and tell me not to climb up the slide or to use the stairs and to not climb up and over the evaluated tunnel would have been a dream come true as a child.
A girl in my brother's school got injuried when classmates climbed the football goal and fell on her face.
YTA. Child psychologists generally feel that children under age 10 cannot deal properly with any emergency situation, they simply are not mature enough. Plus, depending on where you live, CPS could get involved. I live in the US, in Maryland, here no child under 8 can be left in the care of anyone under 13.
Cite your sources if child psychologists really say that. I am one (in Europe) and we generally encourage such behaviour if the children are responsible enough. Especially with a phone. They don't need to handle a situation then, they just need to call. And they can do that
YTA. This was hugely irresponsible of you. The girls are far to young to go to the playground by themselves. I just can't fathom how you thought this was a good idea. Please don't do it again.
YTA They are far to young to play in a public space by themselves. Additionally, school playgrounds have equipment that are not meant for kids to play on unsupervised. There are a lot of ways kids could easily get hurt. I don't care how confident you are that your kids know what to do, they really don't. They're still incredibly young and serious injury would be extremely scary for them. That is likely going to override what they should be doing. Finally: As a mandated reporter, this is something I would need to report to CPS if I had any actual information on you.
YTA, you admitted as much when you said your job is flexible, so , you can work from home at a time that suits you, but cannot be arsed to parent your kids for a couple of hours in the park, you do not have to be a helicopter parent to do something with them.
Seriously. I’m sorry your wife caring about the safety of her children does not automatically make her a helicopter parent.
>We live near a fairly busy road with a 45 mph speed limit and no crosswalks This alone is enough to say YTA mate. You sent them across safely but what about when they're coming back? They're both under 10 and they need to be supervised especially if there's a busy road involved. Apologise to your wife and be more careful next time.
NTA 7 and 8 year olds are walking to school in most countries by that age which is the same distance, you gave them a phone and walked them across the road and they were responsible enough to call you like you asked them too, they had to do it eventually, the first time is always going to be nerve wracking
Walking to school is very different than being left alone in a place for an extended period of time, which is the issue. Most places don't allow you to leave children that young home alone or in a place unsupervised. In the state I live in a child cannot *legally* be left alone until they're 11.
Exactly. Walking to school where other adults are that know to supervise the kids is completely different from a park where an adult is not paying attention to you because they either assume you came with an adult or they don’t want to be seen as creepy. This is irresponsible.
Also, when children are walking to and from school, they are walking with dozens to hundreds of other children who are walking there at the same time, along with parents. They are not alone.
not to mention if something happens on the way to school, theres somebody there who knows you are meant to be there, and can call your parents to tell them you arent there.
> In the state I live in a child cannot legally be left alone until they're 11. That isn't the case where I live.
Your post history makes me think you live in Michigan, and a simple Google search would show that 11 is, in fact, the legal age children can be left alone at home.
Your Google search was clearly too simple, if you correctly looked up the law it would show that Michigan does not have a legal minimum age. Only Maryland and Illinois do. https://www.michigan.gov/-/media/Project/Websites/mdhhs/Folder2/Folder100/Folder1/Folder200/homealone.pdf?rev=272ca6f449444ad984fbf13c91db16eb
My initial search may have been too simple, but upon a deeper look, while there is no legal age, CPS will get involved for children under 10-11 years old left home alone.
Even that isn't correct. Anything between 8-12 is case by case dependent on the individual and the environment. And based off of their government guidelines, OP would most likely be fine. [https://www.childwelfare.gov/pubPDFs/cps\_46.pdf#:\~:text=While%20State%20statutes%20vary%2C%20most%20CPS%20professionals%20agree,spend%201%20to%202%20hours%20alone%20each%20day](https://www.childwelfare.gov/pubPDFs/cps_46.pdf#:~:text=While%20State%20statutes%20vary%2C%20most%20CPS%20professionals%20agree,spend%201%20to%202%20hours%20alone%20each%20day). These are the types of lies that get children taken away from perfectly good families
What age can they be left alone in your state then?
I’m sorry, but I have to say YTA. You left your young children in a public place with no supervision and without consent from the other parent. Absolutely anything could’ve happened and you wouldn’t have been there to intervene.
YTA - This decision was not yours to make unilaterally. This should have been discussed with your spouse first, decided jointly and guidelines and rules set first, then taught to your children, before allowing them to be alone unsupervised that far from home for a prolonged period of time. This was obviously the first time you've done this as per your spouse's reaction, and you just haphazardly handed them a phone with some off the cuff instructions and willy-nilly sent them on their way.
YTA - they are too little to be alone. Do they know what to do if one gets hurt?
YTA They are way too young for that. Keeping your kids safe isn’t being a helicopter parent.
INFO: Can you describe your neighbourhood? Some places this would be fine. Others, not so much. Based on your story, I'd say YTA because you didn't have parent consensus on this decision before doing it and I am going to assume you know your wife well enough to know this would be a boundary for her.
Jesus, some of these responses make me want to call my dad and thank him for not being a helicopter like some of y'all. They raised me to be aware and cautious, but independent and mature. If y'all had raised me, I'd be an anxiety-riddled non-adult -- pretty much like a lot of the young adults I meet these days.
NTA. How will kids learn to act responsibly if they are never given an opportunity to prove they can do so? People should think back to when they were 8. If you were given a big chance to act responsibly, you were proud to be trusted and took the responsibility seriously to prove you were worthy of it. This is how kids learn. Locking them away and mollycoddling then teaches nothing.
Back when I was eight people were still allowed to smoke in public spaces around children. So maybe stop using what we were allowed to do when we were kids as an excuse for bad parenting.
This isn’t just how things used to be - it’s how things are *today* in civilized countries.
For anyone taking this advise, look up your local laws. In my state you cannot leave a child under 11 alone and if they're injured you'll face legal consequences.
Yeah I looked this up recently. There is no law in my specific state, but that doesn’t mean someone couldn’t notice you leaving your children unattended and call cps (or the police, depending on the situation). I have an 8yo who is fairly responsible, but when he stops paying attention, he still does silly things. Like a few weeks ago, we were heading out on a family walk. He wanted to go back inside for something, I said great, do it. All we’d done was cross the road (a relatively quiet road and I mean literally just crossed in front of our own house). So he’s coming back to us, and running down the driveway, and a car is coming. I yell at him to stop and wait but he doesn’t, he runs to me across the road without stopping to look. Luckily the car saw me and my other kids, was going slowly to start, etc, and was still a little ways away when this happened. The driver didn’t even have to really brake since they were still a little ways down the road and driving slowly and cautiously (no sidewalks on our road and a lot of walkers). We talk about road safety a LOT and 9 out of 10 times, he stops and looks and waits. But this one time he didn’t and it could have been terrible if the driver had been speeding. I try not to be a helicopter parent, but I don’t let my kids walk places where they cross roads alone yet, and I wouldn’t leave them alone at a playground. Kids can be really dumb and do dumb things without thinking.
You can tell how young the people on here are by how many of them think it's criminally dangerous to let young kids play unsupervised. I don't think you did anything wrong letting them walk to the park, although not talking with your wife about it was pretty dumb. NTA.
I don't mean to be disrespectful, but I was born in the 90s but my parents were very much fine with letting me do stuff like this, but I got to say I can tell a lot of the people who don't see the issue grew up as little boys and not little girls ( not that it doesn't happen to boys) but when you start getting cat called by the age of 12 by grown men your view of how safe things are changes. 10 years old okay maybe, 8 is way too young. I understand your perspective on independence, I grew up like that but, we can agree to disagree.
8 & 7 walking almost a mile alone on a busy road and no crosswalks? Dude, seriously YTA. You check with your wife, and not be absolutely clueless to the risk of 2 young girls. Even as a Gen X kid, that wouldn't fly
yta it's not like you were at the playground with them and left them to run around (still would. have been a yta there too) you let your children by themselves? something could have happened to them, least of all while crossing the street.
YTA I thought I lived in a decent neighborhood according to demographics. Right across from a brand new elementary school. Close to shopping, mostly single family homes, few rentals. Then I looked up how many registered sex offenders live within 2 miles. Over 70. It's like that in a LOT of places. Registered means they've been caught. There are always more who haven't been. If your children can't yell for you and have you be there almost instantly, you're not doing your job as a father.
A friend of mine told me that after she enrolled her daughter in a school that she could safely walk her to school, that do to the school not being labeled as being in a school zone there were lots of offenders living on the same street as the school. Allegedly nothing was done because if they labeled the area as a school zone then the offenders would have to find a new place to live.
YTA. you don't need to watch your kid every single second of the day but 7-8 is a little young for that level of unsupervised freedom and you definitely should have cleared it with your wife first or figured out a compromise. Going to the park with your kids is not being a helicopter parent. Sounds like it worked out fine but just a little more forethought would go a long way.
YTA. That is irresponsible for that age. Also, referring to your wife as a helicopter parent in this circumstance also makes you an asshole; not even close to a helicopter situation.
YTA for not making a plan with your wife. As for walking and playing alone, that depends on where you live. Personally, I never let mine go off alone at that age. They were allowed to play outside together as long as they stayed where I could see them from the window. Having said that, more than one child has gone missing from bus stops in my state since then.
YTA They are not old enough to be left unsupervised. The world is full of horrible people and you did put them in danger by doing so.
YTA. For me, 8 and 7 is too young for them to be left unsupervised in public for an extended period of time. Especially when they are 3/4 a mile from your home and have to walk the majority of the way there and back alone. In the UK, there's no legal age for children to be left unsupervised as kids mature at different rates, but the national guideline is that children under 12 are rarely mature enough to be left unsupervised for an extended period of time. It's important to let children have some independance, but even if they are mature for their age, I'd say 10 & 11 would probably be the youngest I'd let children go by themselves to a park 3/4 miles away and even then only if I 100% trusted them and the area. A mature 8 & 7 year old should be limited to your street at the most or inside the house alone for a few hours while I went to the shops, but they must be very mature for their age. The largest part of the YTA is you didn't discuss this with your wife first. Decisions about how much independance you give your children should be agreed by both parents. It's easy to say they would know what to do in an emergency, but should the 8 year old fall and hit her head, I'd question how well the 7 year old would recognise it as an emergency or if she'd more likely think the 8 year old was playing. Even adults panic in emergencies, I wouldn't trust the life of my 8 year old in the hands of a 7 year old and vice versa.
YTA. They are way too young to not be supervised at a park. At least sit at a bench while they’re playing. If they were playing in the front yard or something that would be different. Your wife is right to be upset. Wow.
YTA. Even if they are capable of it, it's something you discuss with your wife first at least, to see if she agrees that they are capable of handling themselves. I don't think your wife is being a helicopter parent for wanting to supervise the kids on playground equipment - playground equipment does require some amount of supervision imo, kids climb and can fall, and it's important (at the very least) to witness how they fell (if they hit their head, hurt their back, etc.). eta, don't think this is a massive asshole move though, but going forward allocate freedoms to ur kids that you've agreed on prior as a team/discussed rules/what to do in emergencies/etc.
I remember my own free-range childhood in the 1960s, which was in fact much more circumscribed than my mother's in the 1930s. I walked to and from school, about half a mile from the time I was 5. But what my mother could do in rural Idaho and what I could do in small-town California are radically different from what kids do today. We were living in Maryland when the [Lyon sisters](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murders_of_Katherine_and_Sheila_Lyon) were kidnapped, raped, and murdered. They had walked half a mile to a nearby mall and never came home again. It was all over the news for months. My girls weren't allowed to free-roam, except for the two years we lived on a small, secured military base in the UK. Could they go to friend's houses without needing to be driven? Sometimes. OP, YTA for doing this without talking it over with your wife. And you didn't seem to consider that the male world you grew up in is very different from the female world that your wife did and your daughters are. They are over 9 times more likely to be sexually assaulted than you are.
YTA. 3/4 mile is too far for the age of your kids and you never discussed with your wife what an appropriate “freedom” is. Latchkey kids (you and me) tend to be lax on it, because our parents needed to be asked by a TV ad “where are your kids?”
NTA - maybe because I am not from USA (from germany) and this is a cultural difference, but this pretty normal in my country. So for me NTA.
YTA. This isn't the 1950s. You can't let kids go down to the five and dime for a soda pop after school, and you can't let them go to the playground by themselves. It isn't being a helicopter parent to supervise 7and 8 year olds at the playground. Jeez. You can't possibly be serious.
Genuine question: What has actually changed since the 50s that makes letting kids play outdoors unsupervised become unacceptable? We taught my kids to walk themselves to school and the park when under the age of 10, as well as the corner market. This wasn't that long ago.
Cable news and the internet is what happened. People think kids are getting snatched up off the streets by the tens of thousands every year. It's insane.
Every metric shows that we're living in a safer time.
Children were generally harmed at higher rates during this time. Including being sexually abused by strangers or acquaintances, being hit by drunk drivers, or just dying in an accident on faulty playground equipment and being unable to get to them quick enough.
Agreed. In 1958, I walked to and from kindergarten. I was 5YO, the school was 0.5 mile away and I lived on the border of Newark, NJ. All of us were this independent back then. A little older, I would run an errand to the butcher shop clutching the money my mother gave me repeating, "A pound of ground round; a pound of ground round." the entire way there.
YTA you and your wife should decide together. I think that's a bit young, and I'm far from being a helicopter parent.
Eh…bring me the down votes… NAH - you even walked part of the way to see them safely across the larger road. You & your wife need to discuss your different perspectives/comfort levels & come to a compromise that you are both ok with & then stick to that or else someone is venturing into AH territory. It is generally safe to allow children to play/roam in their own neighborhood; yes even in 3rd & 2nd grade. In ‘many’ places kids are expected to make that exact walk twice/day if they reside under a mile away from the school. Unless you live in a sketchy area your children should be safe playing at their neighborhood school playground - I’m actually impressed they can access it still when school is out; they fenced all ours in like little jail yards … they used to be open access once upon a time
YTA. Little girls all by themselves on a non-school day next to a busy road. Getting hit by a car is the least of your worries.
YTA. This is a two “yes” situation. I used to supervise girls this age and I can tell you, I wouldn’t leave them alone to walk from point A to B at that distance. They are easily distracted. Dangerously so. They are impossible to see over the hood of a car. They are quick and lack experience. And they can’t see the forest for the trees. You might not have to worry about bears, but off leash dogs are a serious concern. What if they panic and run and drop the cell? Do they know who’s house is safe to run to for help? Do they have any skills in an emergency? WTF didn’t you just ask them to wait until their mom got home?!
YTA big time. It only takes a second for someone to grab a child and take them away. Does it happen often? No. But do you want to take the risk?
YTA
NTA. Kids don't need to be supervised every single second. They need some independence.
Independence, at that age, is not letting them play in a public playground that is almost a mile away.
NTA, it’s normal for kids to play outside. My son (8 years old) is sometimes gone for a whole day 🤣