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Comment by tlear | Hacker News Reader

This is hilarious. While we lived in Japan my 7 year old was walking to school alone meeting up with friends on the way. 25mins one way.

In Canada same 7 year old is not allowed to walk home 8 mins away. With friends, over 1 intersection that has a crossing guard. Wtf

Half the people in the class would get in trouble with the family services(fucking joke) because we allow kids to play in park unsupervised.

It is not just people’s perception it is also idiotic bureaucrats and politicians creating more regulations to grow the beast

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99% Invisible just did an episode about this.

https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/first-errand/

I'm from foreign yugoslavia, then slovenia, and we did just the same as you guys did... if you had to take the bus, your parents would go with you the first few days, so you'd remember where to get off the bus, and after that, you'd be on your own. Also, it was not unusual for kids to get home at 12, and parents at 17h (5pm for americans), and we just either watched tv at home, or went out with other kids.

In Japan my then 2.5 year-old daughter climbed on monkey bars that were twice my height, and she climbed all the way to the top.

It's probably been since the 50s that you can't find such playground equipment in the U.S.

Curious: what actually disallows the Canadian 7 year old? Is it the parents, or the school, or a government restriction, or something else?

School that has to obey idiotic laws. After couple grades depending on school and teacher will look the other way but grade 1-2 no.

I like teachers in our school I think most know how stupid this is, but do they want to lose their job and career over it..?

Of course there are also idiotic parents but they are minority.

Like the ones that don’t allow their kids to use matches when they are 9.. or use sharp knife at same age poor kid had his eye pop out when he saw my younger daughter(6) cut a steak with a knife. Blows my mind.

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