> We played tag at building sites, jumping gaps meter wide and five deep, made explosives out of match sticks

As someone who thinks kids should have freedom, like kids in Germany or Japan have, I hate it when ridiculous arguments like these show up.

Look, if you was regularly doing all that, you probably should not have all that freedom. But, most kids are actually more reasonable, if raised right.

▲ wartywhoa23 6 hours ago | parent [-]

What problem with me as I am now would you solve if you had any power to prevent me from being a kid and doing pretty common things kids were doing then?

See, neither me nor any of my friends became terrorist bombers, heck, there is not even a single stuntman around us! On the contrary, that unimaginably dangerous activity in our childhood raised responsibility in us better than any supervision. We knew what we did. No amount of nannying will fix kids who lack the touch with the harsh reality, as it takes feeling some pain sometimes to be responsible and not inflict pain on others.

▲ pixl97 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Cool, stop everyone else from being a nanny then. You pull the stuff you and I did as kids in most places now and you'll have the police and CPS show up.

▲ robocat 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Also nothing says survivor bias as statements like:

  And yet every single one of my friends managed to survive this now-impossible freedom

It is nonsense to use your own example and imply it was safe, because you are mostly blind to the failure modes of the counterhistorical damaged or dead.

However, I agree with you. Kids raised in dangerous rural areas do learn. I had my fair share of close calls as a child in my city! I feel lucky to have had so much freedom. 30 years later I was told one guy I knew as a child was convicted of pedophilia: I still remember his awesome basement but I don't recall any bad close call with him (perhaps I was ugly : sorry sicko).

We don't notice many dangerous close calls. Hopefully we learn from from other close calls we did notice... I remember hammering a blank gun cartridge (ramset) until it exploded and thinking I shouldn't do that again. I also did a lot things with fire that I shouldn't have!

Some high risk activities are difficult to learn from. Philip K Dick writing about the dangers of the drugs he took: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29642422

▲ PunchyHamster 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

till you are with that kid that is a bit too brave and a bit too eager and they do drop in some hole and break a leg or worse. That's what parents are afraid of, they remember some "close" accident in their childhood and want to make their kids not get chance to do a mistake.

Now ideally parents would just keep an eye on them, teach the kids, and maybe even "help" in potentially dangerous-yet-fun-for-kid stuff to make it not dangerous

...but parents now don't want to spend time just like parents back then didn't wanted to spend time and let kids alone to their own devices. Only difference before parents kicked kids outside while now parents give them ipad...

	▲	wartywhoa23 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		In no way was I a neglected kid. Parents still spent a huge deal of time with me, dad taught me drawing, astronomy, English, played guitar for me, we listened to music together, played games, walked together, printed photos, rode snow slegde downhill in the winter. Me being allowed to spend time outdoors with my friends was perfectly a part of their caring, not an attempt to get rid of me. This is in stark contrast with the way parents want their children to be near and observed, but separated with black mirrors. Now, please don't think that I blame every modern parent out there. There are enough good parents around even today. What I talk about are the trends in general.

▲ watwut 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> On the contrary, that unimaginably dangerous activity in our childhood raised responsibility in us better than any supervision.

I have no reason to believe that. The issue with 2 out of 3 activities you listed is also the danger or damage to OTHERS and their property. Which you do not even noticed, clocked or cared about. The only thing you care about is you feeling some pain, presumably.