https://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle/whats-hot/a-state-just-made-it-legal-to-leave-your-kids-home-alone/ar-BBKIG3y?ocid=spartandhp

I was a "free range" kid growing up in Utah. I guess kids are like chickens and cattle there.

To be honest I've been embarrassed for my association to my home state. But it was mostly Mormon-related. This takes the cake. It reduces children to a burden that I felt I was growing up there.

What a backwards barbaric regression to something like Monty Python's "Every Sperm is Sacred" hoards of free ranging Catholic kids.

What a terrible thing to tie up legislation. I thought all the porn circling the State Capitol drain dome was an embarrassing sink of tax dollars but this is absolutely unbelievable in the 21st Century. Now my home state has validated my unloving and neglectful rearing in "Zion." Now I know what people in Utah care about - making "free range" babies to ignore and forcing sperm donors away from their computers and stopping their sins of Onan to make more of these "free range" babies.

Many years ago, I visited Provo for three months. I had been accepted at BYU and was also hoping to settle in Utah as my residence. I was a new convert and thought that Provo would be close to being in Zion. Boy, was I wrong! I decided not to attend BYU as I realized that I hated Utah, especially Provo. The townspeople tended to be snarly and rude.

Throughout my life, I have noticed that women who have more kids than they can handle (especially Mormons but not only them), they will do anything, rationalize in any way they can, to get out of the house and have a little freedom. They will dump their kids on anyone possible, and be gone for longer than they are supposed to. As soon as they think it might be safe, they try leaving them alone. The oldest kid is handed a HUGE burden.

brigidbarnes Wrote:
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> The oldest kid is handed a HUGE burden.

Two of my three older sisters (I call evil stepsisters though they are genetically related to me) loathed this added burden to their lives. The only sister who didn't is now a polygamist.

brigidbarnes Wrote:
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>
> Throughout my life, I have noticed that women who
> have more kids than they can handle (especially
> Mormons but not only them), they will do anything,
> rationalize in any way they can, to get out of the
> house and have a little freedom. They will dump
> their kids on anyone possible, and be gone for
> longer than they are supposed to. As soon as they
> think it might be safe, they try leaving them
> alone. The oldest kid is handed a HUGE burden.


You just described my TBM neighbor to a ‘T’. She has 7 kids and her hubby travels a lot for work. Their oldest is now 12, so they regurlarly leave him in charge. He is only 12, but already a pompous ass that won’t smile at anyone who isn’t Mo (ie., me, as I’m an evil apostate lol). Yea, he’s a good one to leave in charge! This neighbor of mine is constantly traveling on girls trips to meet up with her TBM sisters who all have just as many kids. Whenever I learn through social media that she’s gone again I always think gee who’s watching those kids now? She could give the kids my phone number as an emergency contact, but she doesn’t. And about a year ago my husband was out walking our dog when he found their 1 year old out wandering the street in just a diaper. When he brought the child to their house she was a frazzled mess and didn’t even know he was missing. We are in California btw.


As to being from Utah, I’m thankful I’m not. Whenever I hear someone say they were from Utah I always have to wonder if they are/were Mormon.

I had the same experience in SE Idaho. Baby was in the middle of the road with diaper around his ankles. Frazzled Mo Mom was not even aware he was missing and was none too enthusiastic about thanking me for bringing him home.

momjeans Wrote:
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> I had the same experience in SE Idaho. Baby was
> in the middle of the road with diaper around his
> ankles. Frazzled Mo Mom was not even aware he was
> missing and was none too enthusiastic about
> thanking me for bringing him home.


An LDS doctor who practices at the hospital where the bulk of my practice takes place has six children. The oldest looks to be around eleven; I know he's young enough that he hasn't yet been ordained.

The LDS doctor was laughing it up with two LDS nurses about CPS showing up on their doorstep because the wife left the kids alone and the youngest, who is about eighteen months, was found sitting in the street by a driver, who pulled off to the side of the road and was standing at the side of the road with the baby. The street wasn't a thoroughfare, but neither was it a cul de sac, and the child shouldn't even have been in a cul de sac. One of the kids happened to look out the window and see their little sister, and after the kids argued for several minutes about who had to go out and retrieve the baby, one of them went out to get her. The driver gave the baby to the child, who told her what they had been trained to tell any adult who inquired, which was that their mother was in the bathroom. The woman called CPS afterward. CPS is quite busy, and there's not enough available foster care for the children who are being beaten; a simple case of neglect isn't likely to warrant much action from CPS around here.

Both the father of these children and the two nurses, one of whom is the mother's visiting teacher, thought the whole matter was hilarious. "Who would have ever thought that CPS would be called on Melissa?" was what one of the nurses said between gales of laughter.

"What a hoot!" the other nurse said.

Then when the child is actually run over next time she plops herself in the middle of a street, they'll say things like "Heavenly Father must have needed her" or "You can't keep your eyes on them every second. Some accidents just can't be prevented."

Call me a helicopter parent if you wish, but except for the brief amount of time it takes my wife or me to use the bathroom and to wash our hands afterward (at which time our two- and three-year-old are either contained in our playroom or living room; loud alarms would sound if they managed to get safeguards off the doors and get the doors open) we DO keep our eyes on our two-year-old every second she is out of bed, and the three-year-old doesn't get much more than half a minute out of our sight.

I have relatives who have had a child killed in a scenario like this one.

> Throughout my life, I have noticed that women who
> have more kids than they can handle (especially
> Mormons but not only them), they will do anything,
> rationalize in any way they can, to get out of the
> house and have a little freedom. They will dump
> their kids on anyone possible, and be gone for
> longer than they are supposed to. As soon as they
> think it might be safe, they try leaving them
> alone. The oldest kid is handed a HUGE burden.

This is major with my 10 kid family. I, being the eldest girl, was given the "blessing" of raising the kids when mom was too tired to. Granted, she stayed up late and slept in a lot. I took care of them so much, I got turned off to the idea of ever having my own. I would rather adopt when and if I have the time and money to.

lazylizard Wrote:
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> > Throughout my life, I have noticed that women
> who
> > have more kids than they can handle (especially
> > Mormons but not only them), they will do
> anything,
> > rationalize in any way they can, to get out of
> the
> > house and have a little freedom. They will dump
> > their kids on anyone possible, and be gone for
> > longer than they are supposed to. As soon as
> they
> > think it might be safe, they try leaving them
> > alone. The oldest kid is handed a HUGE burden.
>
> This is major with my 10 kid family. I, being the
> eldest girl, was given the "blessing" of raising
> the kids when mom was too tired to. Granted, she
> stayed up late and slept in a lot. I took care of
> them so much, I got turned off to the idea of ever
> having my own. I would rather adopt when and if I
> have the time and money to.

One of my neighbors from my youth in Utah Valley was in the same position you were. She, too, elected not to birth any children after having already raised a family. She adopted an adolescent, I believe.

When I was a kid they called it "latch key" kid, which is what I was, for the most part. Walked home a few blocks from school, got home and watched TV, did homework or played in our yard 'til my mom got home (she was a teacher or a substitute teacher so it wasn't too long). I remember at age 10 walking from our old house to our new house (about a mile). Mom wasn't too happy about that, but I had ridden the route so many times while we were incrementally moving (parents were making updates/customizations to new house for about a month) I couldn't get lost. Many kids at 8 or 10 can do the latch key thing from school or the bus stop, and when I was growing up you could babysit someone else's kids at 12 or 13, so my older sister did that and also babysat me and our younger siblings, and then I did the same when I got that age.

although our mother scared the hell out of us about kidnappers, etc. My mother was more alert about the older children than when it got to child 6, but then child 5 had a lot of problems like a stroke at birth, drinking paint thinner, getting hit by a truck at age 5, so #6 was left pretty much to me, and I adored him. I have never seen taking care of him and #5 and also #4 sister as a burden. They were my best friends. My #6 brother is my rock, my hero. My younger siblings see me as a mother and I'm fine with that. I know all kids don't feel that way, but I loved babies and I always wanted 8. Got 2. Once they were my own, it was a whole different ballgame.

My kids weren't free range. There were a lot of neighborhood kids who would come to my house in the morning and play all day. I'd have to send them home. Mothers didn't even notice they were gone. This was before they were even in school. Now, my mother didn't let us be free range at that young of ages.

We spent a lot of our time on the farm anyway--20 miles from our home. I'd take taking care of kids over farm work ANY DAY.

What scares me is watching little kindergartners walking to school alone. Freaks me out. Who is aware if the kid got to school until school is out?

I'm a hovering mother and I think I drove my kids nuts.

I'm number 6 and my older polygamist sister was literally my savior many times.

Thanks. I also hate that she was the peacemaker and now is the matriarch of cultish people of whom are her own children.

cl2notloggedin (cussing) Wrote:
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>
> What scares me is watching little kindergartners
> walking to school alone. Freaks me out. Who is
> aware if the kid got to school until school is
> out?

Several years ago in my school district, before I lived here, a first-grader was abducted on his way to school. Our district now has an automated phone system that calls parents at a parent-designated number if a child is marked absent, but this happened before the district had that system. Phone calls were made the old-fashioned way, and with other business that secretaries had to attend to, it took a couple of hours before the parent was reached. (Sometimes voicemail was reached, which would have given an abductor even more time.) In this case, the kid was molested, was driven around for an hour or two, and then was dropped off about three towns down the freeway. He at least wasn't killed, but he'll live for the rest of his life with the trauma of what happened. He was found before he was even known to be missing.

If children are going to walk to school [particularly young children, but even older ones], it really should be in groups. The little boy didn't willingly go with the abductor, but the adult male was stronger and faster than the child, and no one heard the child's screams that he said he produced.

I am from Utah. I think it must be more embarrassing to be from Idaho.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/27/2018 12:18PM by rubi123.

Coeur d'Alene, Idaho is ok. Southern Idaho....maybe.

More toddlers will be drowned in the irrigations canals now.

Look at it this way: better to be FROM Utah that to be living there.

I agree. I always wanted to leave because of the people and not the place. I love the desert and would love to live in a place with beauty of such stark contrasts like green mountains and a desert basin.

But Mormonism makes the place some kind of awful conformist place where "the church" invades all aspects of living there. I love the green of the Midwest and the independent spirits here. No matter what you believe you make up a rich tapestry of living with a diversity of thoughts. Utah is so monocultural.

This afternoon, I sat and read the moving writings of transient souls who have no other forum but a bathroom wall. Some of my best friends use the toilet, but most don't actually read and re-read the lines that matter most, on our life's sojourn.

Today, The Ten Commandments share the same fate as these precious writings, thought by most to be equal dross.

But, truth be known, no one can enter the Kingdom until each and every scrawl has been memorized, inculcated and passed on to new butt wipers.

It is a solemn honor to be aware of bathroom graffiti. Of the places it held in places throughout the earth since time immemorial. It is the only thing worth preserving under the ash heap of empire collapses.

Pompeii bears silent witness to this truth.

And so do I.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIun5xGK86g&list=FLbeZbffma0Eq-WW050voicQ&index=5

I grew up free range in California: walked myself to/from school in kindergarten and all through elementary school. Nothing bad ever happened to me or my siblings while walking to/from school.

My parents left all 5 of their children without parental supervision on a Saturday when the oldest was about 9 and the youngest 3. When my parents came home they were shocked to see the living room soaked with water. We had pulled the garden hose from outside and into the living room and were squirting the neighborhood kids who had invaded our front yard. We thought it was a brilliant strategy to have the hose in the living room and squirt the kids through the open window. My parents were super pissed off when they came home and we were all punished. What did my parents expect, leaving a 9 year old in charge.

I think cell phones have changed the world. Before cell phones, we were all used to leaving our home and each other without being tethered to a phone. We knew how to walk away form our landlines and not worry about impending doom. Now with cell phones and texting, people panic if they're without a phone, unable to contact others for more than an hour. What will happen if there's an emergency? Jeez. And no one can make a decision without consulting google. We've become so dependent and paranoid. I'm glad "free range" is making a comeback. Independence is a good thing.

heartbroken Wrote:
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> We've become so
> dependent and paranoid. I'm glad "free range" is
> making a comeback. Independence is a good thing.

You can still be independent with a cell phone and Google. Neglect doesn't have to be tethering kids to technology. It is a poor association you've made in my opinion.

I didn't say that giving a kid a smart phone was neglectful, but I do think that "free range" children, before cell phones, had more "street smarts" because when they left the house for the day, often before they were 12 years old, they were used to making decision/solving little problems on their own without calling home. I think it built a stronger character and made them more independent knowing they could walk out the door without clinging to their phone. Most people today go into panic mode if they don't have their phones with them 24/7. I call that dependance, maybe even addiction - - actually, studies are now proving that people are addicted to their "smart" phones. I think that kids would be better off if they had to go without their smartphones for a month. They would learn that they are capable of figuring out a lot on their own and also learn how to communicate - how to enjoy the company of their friends without ignoring each other in favor of looking down at their cellphones.

As far as neglect goes, I think that technology enables parental neglect now more than ever before. Parents everywhere are ignoring their kids because they are glued to their cellphones. In restaurants I see parents and their children focused on their phones, no one looking or talking to each other. When I see parents with their children around town or at the park, almost 90% of the time parents are ignoring their kids in favor of looking down at their phone. A call or text takes priority over communicating with/paying attention to their child. I think that children are feeling more ignored and neglected now than when I grew up because their parents are glued to their smartphones everywhere they go.

Neglect isn't letting your kids be on their own without parental supervision, if they've been taught how to take care of themselves. Neglect is ignoring your child because you are too busy texting.

heartbroken Wrote:
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> Neglect is
> ignoring your child because you are too busy
> texting.

Or reading a book. Or, or, or...

You are blaming the tech instead of looking at behaviors. Does technology play a part in increasing neglect? I don't think so. It has given people more things to be distracted with in my opinion. As for building character in roaming the streets to get those smarts, I would have preferred more emotional support from my parents and less neglect. I wasn't allowed much beyond the confines of my yard. I was allowed to roam more than I did my own children.

But to cause and effect this by placing blame on technological changes is just being a luddite in my opinion. Before smart phones and Google there was plenty to complain about in children and their rearing.

Making it law to allow parents to "free range" their children seems negligent in my opinion and tech isn't to blame for anything in this in my opinion. Getting children to text parents is sometimes hard. They are individuals. Not chickens and sheep.

heartbroken Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> My parents left all 5 of their children without
> parental supervision on a Saturday when the oldest
> was about 9 and the youngest 3. When my parents
> came home they were shocked to see the living room
> soaked with water. We had pulled the garden hose
> from outside and into the living room and were
> squirting the neighborhood kids who had invaded
> our front yard. We thought it was a brilliant
> strategy to have the hose in the living room and
> squirt the kids through the open window. My
> parents were super pissed off when they came home
> and we were all punished. What did my parents
> expect, leaving a 9 year old in charge.

When you and your siblings were left alone, you did something dumb that happened to cause a bit of property damage but wasn't a safety hazard. You and your siblings, as well as your parents, were very fortunate. If you were young enough to think bringing a hose into the house was a good idea, you might easily have done something that was not merely damaging to property but actually dangerous. your example is a good argument against free range parenting.

In general, the arguments in favor of free range parenting (not so much your particular argument) seem to go to extremes. Of course a ten-year-old without major developmental delays should be able to cross a street by himself. of course a thirteen-year-old should be able to walk a mile or so in most neighborhoods to visit a friend. Most people could agree on such things. a nine-year-old probably shouldn't be supervising five younger siblings for the better part of a day if at all, however, nor should a four-year-old be responsible for supervising anyone.

I was working an ER in a visiting clerkship (I didn't deal with the child; someone else pronounced him dead) when a two-year-old was brought in by ambulance. His mother was washing and vacuuming her car at a do-it-yourself car wash located too close to railroad tracks. The mother was all of twenty-three. She told her eight-year-old to watch her two-year-old while she vacuumed the car. The eight-year-old became absorbed in something he saw, and his mind wandered momentarily from his duty of supervising his little brother. That's all the time it took for the littler guy to make it to the railroad tracks. Neither the young mother nor the older boy, who was really quite little himself (much too little to have been given such a grave responsibility) will ever be the same.

on a flight to SLC. She was over stressed, had the vacant thousand metre stare, her "garments" were poking up behind her jeans and spoke with the stereotypical adult woman childlike baby accent.

Did she want this kind of life or was it imposed on her?

That's all I could think.

I'm from Utah. As in born there and left.
That's better than being IN Utah, IMHO :)

I don't ever want to have more than 3 kids. And I even think 3 is a lot. I don't want my kids raising their siblings. I hate when parents give older kids unreasonable duties related to their younger siblings. I want my kids enjoy their childhood.

goldrose Wrote:
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> I hate when parents give
> older kids unreasonable duties related to their
> younger siblings.

There were at least 5 families of 10 or more in my neck of the Orem woods back in the 80s. In each except my own I saw the pattern of "little mothers" in the oldest female children acting as a mother to the younger children.

In my family my mother is an extreme narcissist. She never wanted to appear to do this so she gathered us around her and never let us spread out and have the little mothers acting like sheep dogs.

But at home she was more than okay letting the older take care of the younger and neglecting most of us. But she always compared us to each other and sowed seeds of discontent to make us dependent upon her for approval. She never wanted her daughters to get any credit for raising us. It was insane. She is obsessed with being seen as a super mom though she was very neglectful and filled her home life with tv, reading, hobbies and taking trips with my father and without us.

She even cajoled my younger brother to submit her name for mother of the year one year and got honorable mention.

I can agree with a lot of the points here in favor of free-range parenting (though I tend to be more of a hoverer myself); however, if you aren’t watching two and three year olds most of the time, or are leaving them in charge of eight-and-nine year olds frequently, you are toying with disaster. I have a TBM friend with five kids who has let her young children (two year old twins, for example) play unsupervised in some genuinely dangerous situations in which I was freaked out and had to step in—and frankly, compared to a lot of mothers I know, I am on the mellow side of parenting g despite my own tendency to hover. I have even witnessed complete strangers do things like pulling one of my TBM friend’s other young kids away from a busy steeet at rush hour as the child was about to try to cross the street—-at which time I was occupied chasing after her twins who were headed in the other direction toward a reservoir with very steep, sloping sides. I have lost track of my own kids before at a park, but the difference is that I was relieved and grateful when my little one was found by a nice stranger who brought him to me, whereas my TBM pal’s reaction in these situations has always been more like “Oh, thanks...whatever.” This is in CA, not Utah.

In truth, though, as others have mentioned, you tend to see this kind of “extreme free range” parenting with any parents, not only Mormons, who are simply overwhelmed with a lot of kids. One of my brothers used to live in a predominantly poor Latino neighborhood in Southern California, and he would sometimes complain how many neighbors seemed utterly unconcerned that their very young kids (including diaper-wearing age) were out wandering the neighborhood at all hours, many times nearly hit by cars. He was always terrified when backing out of his driveway that he’d kill a young child (which nearly happened to him a couple of tunes). It’s just disturbing to see such a lack of concern from parents.

I'd be embarrassed too. Sorry.

We may have a problem! My sister has been doing that to her kids for years, and she's from UTAH. She's been making her eldest raise her children from the tender age of around 11 (he's 16 now, I think). He has two younger siblings, both a sister and a brother. His sister is about 5 years younger than him, and younger brother about 3 years younger. Sorry, I'm not sure about ages, as I'm not close to my sister They have a loving father but is out of the house much of the time working as an electrician, and 'mommy' is out playing, or doing whatever she wants.
The problem? Now living in Canada, big brother has been arrested, is living in a group home, they all have to have family therapy. I have no clue what he did, as my sister is so tight-lipped, she makes Tight-lipped Nick from the Simpsons look like a squealer!
Now, the funny thing is, my zealot MORmON mother thinks he was looking at porn. I'm pretty sure the folks in Canada aren't going to arrest a teenager for looking at porn.

Porn is always the answer

Politicians are stupid everywhere. Not just Utah. Since when is this a concern of the government? My parents left me alone a lot and I loved it!

While the law was stupid to pass (at least to me), I too wish to say that I grew up as a free range child.

I am in my early 60's now. I rode the bus or WALKED to school at four different elementary schools during grades 1 thru 6. Two we rode the bus (or could ride it), and two we had to walk. All of us did this. Each school was approximately a one mile radius from my home. We all survived! I think part of the problem with kids nowadays is that mommy and daddy ferry them to school every damn day.

As I said, the reasoning given in passing this law is stupid. The reasons given that make people think it is needed are even more stupid.