I don't know if it's the parent that is neurotic so much as that it only takes 1 of 1000 assholes, who now have their little snitch device in their pocket 24/7, to call the child snatchers (CPS). And the child snatchers are legally barred from revealing who your accuser is, so the anonymous cowards can fuck up your life for weeks at no cost to themselves and with the utmost convenience. This effectively means every single person who views your child, now has veto powers on your parenting. The end result of that is people parent in the most paranoid, liability averting way possible.

When I was a kid the Karens against childhood autonomy existed but it actually cost them time and money to rat us out since they would have to drive home to a telephone, so long as we didn't play near houses. If an asshole raised hell we were gone by the time they could call the authorities.

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watwut 2 hours ago | parent [-]

The actual threat of CPS 8s grossly exagerrated here. And the fear is one of the symptoms.

	▲	IcyWindows 43 minutes ago \| parent \| next [-]
		I've had CPS call me up and question me about about play someone observed through a window. It's a real thing.
	▲	mothballed 2 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Here's a few examples that's happened to me personally (1) I didn't personally appear at bus stop, thinking my kid would be able to just walk the short distance from the stop to our house. Nope, school did not let kid off bus, given a timer to show up at the transportation office before child services will be called. (2) Let my kid walk on our own property, someone drives up and starts interrogating them why they are "alone." Fortunately I was actually watching from further away and I managed to diffuse the situation before they alerted the authorities. (3) Took my kid to the park so they could have a nice time outside in public. Whoops, looks like my child is a difference race than me. That means I am a kidnapper. Karen (from bodycam, a passing yuppie looking cyclist) calls police, who arrive and scare the shit out of me and my kid and detain us for about an hour. Not released until a woman's voice comes on the phone (they literally did not check, just any female voice) says the man can let his child play at the park. They also contacted child services of both the city of the park, and my hometown -- fortunately even though the city of the park looked like they were ready to fuck with me my hometown CPS did tell them to kick rocks and since I left town there was nothing further they could do.