The world WAS a safer place when I was a kid (at least it was in the area WHERE I was a kid). In my neighborhood there was a sort of unspoken cooperative among parents that everybody looked out for everybody else's kids, too, as in "ALL you kids get out of there, there might be snakes!" Nowdays somebody would pop out of their house and say "don't tell MY kid what to do!" Back then, mom would say "You heard Mrs. Smith -- get out of there like she told you to."
And back then, somebody else could help you if you fell off your bike and hurt yourself -- they could patch you up and take you home without fear of being accused of child abduction or pedophilia.
We walked to school everyday in groups, without parental supervision. I saw in the news yesterday where a mother got in trouble with the authorities for "making" her children walk to school because they had fooled around and missed the schoolbus -- not far, either, and she was following along behind them in the car. My sister and I walked to school every day from grade school on up, and it didn't damage us any.
If we had demanded that we have the latest doodad because "everyone else" had one, my dad would have laughed himself silly.
Many (if not most) parents are way too soft on their kids today, and coddle them to a point where they grow up to be self-entitled and don't know how to manage on their own. From my parents I learned how to be responsible, accept the consequences of my actions, take care of myself, respect others, and to work for what I wanted, not expect it to be handed to me on a platter. Those lessons have served me well.
