Comments on: Walking to School

By: JRoth

JRoth — Fri, 06 Feb 2004 04:43:51 +0000

Boy, mary’s a bit touchy about this, isn’t she? Everyone here is acknowledging the role of physical developments in the US in this situation. It’s actually a great example of the unintended consequences (and unclaculated externalities) of modern suburban development. I think that the various sociological reasons – 2 car families, spoiled kid – tend to apply as well, but I suspect that what they’ve done is to reinforce the physical trends. 35 years ago, being a nice, close walk to an elementary school was a slam-dunk in housing marketability, Now, I wonder whether it even factors into sales prices? I think the allusion someone made to viewing schooling as achievement-driven got at something vital. Many (most?) middle-class and up parents in the states will give up almost everything else to put their kid in a perceived-better school, with no concern for economics, socialization, or simple things like exercise & autonomy. Why have junior walk 3 blocks to the good public school when there’s an excellent private school a mere 45 minute drive away?

By: John Smith

John Smith — Thu, 05 Feb 2004 23:55:12 +0000

Not to be patronising or anything. But an amazingly grown-up piece from Kieran (God, that is patronising…). The idea that chiselling pols would boost a tipping-point analysis because it tended to wipe away their responsibility as the causae causantes of social problems: more please! On the Jamie Bulger point (Glen Condell), I’ve never seen analysis why the Myra Hindley/Ian Brady Moors Murders did not have the same effect on British parenting. That was a huge story: perhaps the first big specifically tabloid story ever in British journalism. And yet I remember still (being around ten years old at the time of the publicity) being left to walk to school, travel to London on my own, play on the streets and so on. Why was there, for example, a moral panic in the 1950s about horror comics, but no similar panic about letting kids wander after Hindley?

By: rvman

rvman — Thu, 05 Feb 2004 17:42:49 +0000

We don’t do manual labor, either. We have machines to do a lot of that. We use chainsaws instead of handsaws in the yard, powered lawn mowers instead of push mowers, weedwhackers instead of bare hands. We are richer and more capital-intensive than we used to be, so we are using capital equipment (cars) rather than labor (walking) to do a task. It doesn’t take much social change – if the folks in ‘69 had been as rich as us, they would have driven, too. A tipping point has been reached in one way, though – bicycles used to be a common approach, now disused, due originally to increased theft, but now as much due to the lack of bike racks at many schools.

By: MWD

MWD — Thu, 05 Feb 2004 05:07:37 +0000

Not an assertion, but a question. Could part of the change be due to an increase in one child families? I would suggest this for two reasons: No older sibling to learn the routine from, and more protective behaviour from the parents. I don’t also wonder for US statistics, how much is due to single parent families for most of the same reasons as two car families mentioned above. Thanks

By: harry

harry — Thu, 05 Feb 2004 00:11:09 +0000

Sorry—I got so into this thread that I failed to notice that I didn’t start it and so have no obligation to say anything more. Still, I will say more later anyway.

By: Glenn Condell

Glenn Condell — Thu, 05 Feb 2004 00:05:58 +0000

Don’t discount heightened awareness (if not increased incidence) of abduction/molestation. I have a beautiful 7 year old girl. If you also have children and you have (1) seen that footage of Jamie Bulger being abducted prior to his murder and/or (2) read Ian McEwan’s Child in Time, you’ll know that the dread won’t permit you to take any chances whatsoever. Not on a daily basis anyway.

By: harry

harry — Thu, 05 Feb 2004 00:05:02 +0000

I’ll respond to other stuff later (ie tomorrow) because I have to get the kids dinner and put them to bed right now, then help my mother-in-law with… well.. But I have to congratulate Ophelia on her memory. The article is called ‘Inward Christian Soldiers’by Margaret Talbot. I promise I’ll post ont his theme soon (that is, on the theme about fundamentalists, lefties, and child-rearing, not Ophelia’s memory).

By: Amy Phillips

Amy Phillips — Wed, 04 Feb 2004 23:07:58 +0000

In one of the many articles floating around about why people are so obese, I remember reading that many newer neighborhoods, especially in housing developments and other planned communities, have been built without sidewalks. So if kids want to walk to school, they’d either have to trespass on their neighbors’ lawns or walk in the street. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t let a child walk to school under those circumstances.

By: Ophelia Benson

Ophelia Benson — Wed, 04 Feb 2004 20:19:50 +0000

“And I think (perhaps quirkily) that the fundamentalist Christians are right about a lot of things they belive in and do vis a vis childrearing, and that the left shuld pay them some respectful attention.” You know, that really, really interests me. There was an article in the NY Times magazine a longish time ago – two years maybe, or more – about a pair of Xian fundamentalists and how they were raising their children – and I was surprised and very interested to find that some of it (by no means all, for instance not the trad sex role stuff) was highly appealing to me. Especially the total ignoring of tv and popular culture – the acting as if it did not exist. Sure, there are some drawbacks to that, but there are some pretty big drawbacks to the total immersion that’s ‘normal’ too.

By: Ken C.

Ken C. — Wed, 04 Feb 2004 19:36:42 +0000

Another possible contributing factor: fewer sidewalks. I think new developments typically have no sidewalks, and that’s been true for awhile.

By: Russell Arben Fox

Russell Arben Fox — Wed, 04 Feb 2004 19:16:14 +0000

Harry, I knew you were just adding additional possible explanations; my apologies if my post implied otherwise. Glad to know we’re on the same page here (we also are single-car-owning, strict-bedtimes types). And I wholly sympathize with your point about collective action. It’s not as though individual actors can greatly affect socioeconomic trends. “My kids could go and play in the street…but it would be with each other” sounds exactly like a mournful comment I’ve often heard from my wife when we’ve discussed these issues, and what is to be done? It’s chicken-or-the-egg: which came first, the conscious creation of a cultural attitude, with attendant material results (empty suburban streets, with both parents working and kids at day care and/or busily being shuttled from one after-school program to another), or the material demands (declining wages, affordable homes built miles from school houses) that gave rise to cultural adaptations? And either way, one’s own personal material allocations or cultural decisions probably won’t be enough to resurrect street hockey. Anyway, you do what you can. Glad you liked the post. And I don’t think you’re being quirky at all to think that certain fundamentalist Christians have understood better than many leftists the real obstacles to child-rearing today. As you recognized in your excellent post on conservatives and gay marriage yesterday, there are situations, especially in regards to the family, where policies really should reflect “some limited assumptions about what constitutes a flourishing human life.” Traditionalists, at least in this case, have done a good job holding onto those assumptions, while many others—distracted by, perhaps, equally important issues—have often let any positive vision of child-rearing be undermined by other priorities.

By: Harry

Harry — Wed, 04 Feb 2004 18:02:05 +0000

Russell, I meant my comments as explanation, not defence, honest. Thanks for the link—I agreed with what you said, and share the same sorts of concern. I am extremely conservative about children’s upbringings, in all the ways you suggest. And I think (perhaps quirkily) that the fundamentalist Christians are right about a lot of things they belive in and do vis a vis childrearing, and that the left shuld pay them some respectful attention. For us, owning a single car was exactly a choice about how to manage our family life, as is the choice about strict bedtimes: I think its very important for my daughters to be up and lively and enjoy the time we have together in the morning as well as to make the most of (socially and academically) the school day, etc. Also, I agree about the importance of unscheduled time, freedom from parental control etc. I have a promise out to blog about our TV policy, which I shall deliver on soon. But there is a big collective action issue here. Neighbourhoods in the US are designed for cars, not for children; and parents maintain strict control over their children’s use of time and space. Lots of parents simply keep their children couped up in cars for a great deal of the free time in the day. My kids could go and play in the street… but it would be with each other. ON the cold—maybe Washington State is better. It was below zero (F) again this morning here, and my elder girl is a dawdler (part of what makes her such a delight actually, but not good for walking to school). We haven’t had to face the issue yet, since she is bussed to a school 4 miles away for intergation purposes. Next year she goes to a school 0.9 miles away. She’ll walk.

By: brayden

brayden — Wed, 04 Feb 2004 17:31:20 +0000

“Similarly, social movements that successfully propagate ideas or initiate collective action tend not to rely on contagion but are usually very well organized.” True, but social movement organizational forms and tactics often spread as a result of contagion effects.

By: mary

mary — Wed, 04 Feb 2004 16:41:49 +0000

I live less than a mile from our elementary school. Between our house and the school is a busy 45mph road with no sidewalks or signals. Should I be sending my kindergartener across that road?

By: Stentor

Stentor — Wed, 04 Feb 2004 15:57:49 +0000

Being less than a mile from school doesn’t necessarily mean distance isn’t an issue. It’s all a matter of perception. I used to walk half a mile or so uphill to school every day. Then, for reasons I don’t recall, my dad started driving me in the morning. (Driving was actually longer distance-wise, because there was a shortcut up over Stony Ridge that you could take on foot, but to drive you had to go all the way around.) On the few days when he couldn’t drive me, walking seemed far more arduous than it had when I did it routinely. Once you get used to driving short distances, you get stuck in that rut. Which is one reason I still walk to the grocery store even though I have a car.