Fuck Cars
A place to discuss problems of car centric infrastructure or how it hurts us all. Let's explore the bad world of Cars!
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I am currently babysitting a 13 year old boy almost every day. Why? Because CPS says he can’t be alone.
He’s mature. He’s smart. He’s quiet. He is COMPLETELY capable of taking care of himself. His dad works 6 hour shifts at most.
The issue is, his dad went to jail for drugs. He’s been sober, he’s been working, he’s been fighting like hell to provide a decent life for his kids.
He’s not allowed to have his girlfriend around them, so he’s paying for two apartments and they can only spend time together coming up when the boy is in school.
I mean, sure, the dad hasn’t been a saint. But man oh man, they’re doing everything the can to make sure he fails.
He was taking suboxone, got the shot instead, realized he wasn’t experiencing withdrawal and dropped that. Well, now he has to prove that he will have detectable amounts in his system for up to a year, and then they’re going to MAKE him go back on suboxone to keep his son.
It’s madness the hoops some people have to jump through, meanwhile a childhood friend was starved and beaten regularly and they wouldn’t remove him from the home until his parents burned down a neighbor’s house and went to prison for arson.
When we were kids and we’d discuss what we wanted to be when we grew up, his answer was, “my mom’s murderer.”
When she did pass, he cried his eyes out for never reaching out to her and was one of the pallbearers.
I don’t get why things have to be such a mess.
Wait what? That's a thing?
😨
The War on Drugs isn't about helping people stop using. It's about feeding the prison industry and all the parasites that bleed parolees dry.
What bullshit. I was told by CPS in Oklahoma after my boys had to move in with me after their mom had a mental health crisis and couldn't stay with her anymore. The guy had to check out our house make sure it was suitable. He told me that if kid can make food in the microwave that at 10 they can be home alone.
Also, say what you want about Oklahoma, but my kids been walking to the store by themselves since they were 8 and 6. I am sick of the fucking nanny state motherfuckers. Like that mother years ago in Florida her kids playing in THEIR front yard. She goes to jail because she wasn't watching them. By the way that woman was white so its not all a race thing. This has been a slow build for the fascist police state.
We need to fucking change the fucking laws and make cities and small towns safe for our kids to walk in. Not to mention that kids are safer now then when I was a child. At least my kids have phones. I have Life 360 on all their devices. Hell when I was a kid they had to run ads at 10pm asking "Do you know where your kids are?" Because parents didn't pay attention to what we were doing. Shit I roam the whole town of Sulphur Springs Texas and not once did anyone stop and ask what we were doing. And trust me their were times that I was up to no good. Plus you were more likely to be snatched up then compared to now.
My kids walk the streets and sometimes might be outside past dark. And we have shit for sidewalks. They don't even have sidewalks leading to the schools. But every school year tons of little kids are walking to school. It's up to the drivers to pay attention. Example there is a Daylight Donuts right across the street from the school. Also a red light. You have to be careful because these kids are dumb and will just start crossing the road not looking at all. I at least told my kids. The cemetery is full of people who had the right away.
I am sick of nosey people that won't let kids be kids. I like to blame boomers but they're Genxers that have that mentality to.
I’m an older millennial. My gen x mom let me go wherever I wanted. If I wasn’t back when she said to be, she’d come find me and beat my ass.
I fortunately grew up in a neighborhood with sidewalks, but we went well beyond our neighborhood.
Shit, I walked 10 miles to a gas station along the railroad tracks to meet girls and steal beer when I was 12 years old. Eventually one was built right in front of my house and I didn’t have to go that far anymore, thank goodness.
I wouldn’t have learned to navigate people if I hadn’t had such freedom. I can see trouble coming from a mile away. I would imagine inexperience will make for some naive people when it comes to knowing danger.
We would follow railroad tracks for miles, and explore the woods. I didn't get into alcohol, but I did sneak smokes. I had a habit of breaking into abandoned homes and exploring them. I quit that when we once broke into a home that had looked abandoned but clearly was lived in. Scared me straight for awhile. But we did rob an old warehouse that had left behind nails used for nailguns. We took those and built a tree house using them and wood we found outback. I still remember doing that as I imagined tbat maybe we would discover a warehouse that had every Nintendo game ever made. Of course never found such a place. But did love the hunt.
Man, I got into smoking too. Still have the habit.
We robbed a delivery truck and took several boxes of camel cigarettes. Our little clubhouse was amazing. We built it from old chicken pens and an old chicken coop. The walls were made from an old above ground swimming pool. The backside had a floor, the front was just dirt. We had a couch, a tv, an N64, and an extension cord we ran across the creek and hung from a tree to power it all.
We hid the cigarettes under the floorboards, along with a poorly dried pot plant we stole from the best grower in town (who eventually started putting signs in front of them, “don’t steal this one, don’t steal this one, steal this one”).
My god I’d love to go back for a little while.
I quit smoking almost 10 years ago. My club house was bad ass. We had an elevator and one part had this huge heavy duty fishing neat thar we "found" and made it a four person hammock. We play our own versions on D&D, since some older kids we knew wouldn't let us play. But one of them was kind enough to teach us just enough so we could create our own. I had lot of fun in the early 90's. One good thing is there wasn't all the social media around and camera either. You just lived in the moment. Riding our bikes and just living for the day. I too miss those times. Even my kids didn't get to experience life the way we did.
Man, the cameras and the constantly being connected to everyone has flipped the world upside down.
I get it. I just put cameras up because a neighbor came over to tell me that some man was peaking into my 16 year old daughter’s window.
I just wish we had done all of this differently.
I don’t know. Just getting old I guess. It’s hard to see this as better.
I’ve always thought about this comment that Kurt Cobain made, he was talking about going into thrift stores and finding little treasures, and after he became wealthy that was over for him. He was bored with getting whatever he wanted.
We now live in a time where even the rarest shit is just a click away. Nothing about the world seems special anymore.
I don’t know. I remember my grandparents talking about this kind of thing. Maybe I’m just getting old. I just wish my kids could have the freedom that I had, completely and totally.
Because control. It's all about control.
If i do t know it it must be bad. Ic i dont control it it must ve dangerous. Its like an elemental kernel level xenophobia.
If they're going to do tests, why not just check for the presence of illegal drugs?
Some people do abuse it. I didn’t get how for a long time. I’ve been taking it for a decade or better now and I swear I get nothing from it but avoiding withdrawal.
An old friend shot it up though and died from a heart infection because of it.
But then thry woukd just be observing, not coercing.
We need to allow children to immediately and easily emancipate themselves from their parents and go live in their own apartment w caregivers via assisted living.
Could I get a free apartment as well?
Everyone deserves housing. This is something ants and bees have mastered. I am as good as an ant - ofc I think you can have free housing
?
Do say more please. If nothing else, this is an interesting idea.
Children are legally a type of slave in the US, usually of their parents or guardians but sometimes of their spouse or the state. Of course this isn't explicitly called slavery like the 13th amendment, but when we look at their rights, we can see it's indeed how the legal process works for them. Addressing and reversing this would go a long way for abolitionism. Kids are almost never granted more power for themselves or more freedoms. Most “for the children” rhetoric tends to advocate for removing even more of their freedoms and power. It’s really really sad.
You are legally allowed to physically harm your child "within reason" (aka stopping short of whatever the law defines as child abuse in a jurisdiction). You are allowed to starve them a little, "within reason." You can deny them any privileges you want and lock them in your house - "within reason."
If the kid calls the police and it's not obvious child abuse that could result in death, the police inform the kid that parents can do as they please with their children for discipline and they leave the kids with those parents.
You can deny medical care (including abortions and birth control) - "within reason." You can force them to go to institutions and educational facilities.
Kids work and guess who legally can access their paychecks and all their money? Their parents/owners (see: Honey Boo Boo's finances, Aaron Carter's finances with his parents). Parents can and do withhold capital and money from their children to coerce behaviors from them. Kids work and pay income tax, yet cannot vote or run for office.
Parents can allow them to be married in MANY US states. An adult having sexual relations with their spouse who is a minor is EXEMPT from statutory rape laws (and let's acknowledge the human trafficking element of this). A child in a marriage contract often then belongs to their spouse instead of their parent and must similarly ask their spouse for help and permission. Because marriage contracts are contracts, kids have a hard time divorcing as minors due to this, let alone accessing legal representation itself.
Kids have almost no capital or power by design. Until kids can get rights, this country will be fucked up. We cannot raise humans in a slave environment and then expect them to not have learned helplessness and issues. Kids should be able to emancipate themselves immediately and easily to live in their own apartment with social workers (wearing bodycams, subject to randim audit or audit based on reports) who check on them as appropriate for their age. Parents should have VERY limited rights to their children compared to present day, and CHILDREN instead should be granted rights to their parents which they can waive, or be compensated for if the parent is unable to fulfill their obligations. Obviously child marriage should be illegal.
Children should NOT be their parent's property. Children should belong to themselves.
This would also help with fostering/"adoption", which is kinda human trafficking (and I've had family be adopted, so I am familiar that the adoptive parents don't see it like this) and which trades the child around like they have no rights at all and like they are property. If a child had rights to their birth parents (or to emancipate themselves), they can then leave bad adoptive parents.
The entire adoption system is actually wild if you think about it - eg antiabortion clinics convince poor women to adopt out through a sister agency which explicitly is also Christian and adopts these kids into Christian homes (a requirement by the agency). The adoptive parents pay the agency, which takes a cut of that money and then gives a little to the birth mom for medical expenses. It's just converting children to Christianity (often white Christians taking Native American/Latino indigenous American's babies) via making everyone poor, not giving the bio parents or child charity directly, and denying medical access unless they sell their kid.
Give children rights.
Also, giving kids the right to vote would be a start in the right direction. No taxation without representation, and we have child actors and performers paying millions in taxes. They deserve representation. Maybe they’d vote to change the laws so their parents (owners) weren’t legally entitled to their money or bodies.
Bonus policy idea regarding education: https://lemmy.world/post/19553029/12277181
Ok, alright. This is one of the most interesting things I’ve ever read in my life.
I don’t know that I agree with you 100%, and even though some of what you said gave me pause, A lot of what you said made me think.
I mean, kids are easily manipulated. The wrong kind of people could take advantage of things, and even if you think you have all of your bases covered, people will surprise you.
I mean, this is definitely worth thinking about. I knew abused kids when I was growing up that had no power. The friend that I mentioned in one of the comments above, he lived In constant hell, had no one seriously advocating for him, and would have been trapped in that situation if his parents hadn’t been put in prison.
I don’t know that I agree that children should be able to vote. When I was a child, if I had been able to vote, I didn’t know a damn thing about politics, and I didn’t fucking care, but my parents sure as shit did. I believed that I was a little warrior for Jesus and I’m an atheist now. I would seriously regret any votes that I would’ve made as a child.
I don’t know, I wish that the person who downvoted you hadn’t downvoted you, I wish they had shared their views on the matter.
This is a very interesting subject
Thank you! I have thought about this topic a lot because of many homeless people, former foster kids, former adopted kids, and former abused kids I have spoken with.
Most kids are fine being around even shitty caregivers. It takes a LOT for a kid to even desire to want to leave, and when we factor in legal consequences for their parents and the legal process, they are not able to leave, and their parents have reasons to block it. If we just had apartments for them that they could go to, no judgement, no hassle, no worries that they will send their mom and dad to jail for 10 years, it would prevent a lot of pain. And ofc they can always deal with the legal stuff later if they want to. Asking an abused kid actively being abused to make these huge legal decisions to escape abuse is too much, they should be able to just leave safely - and return safely per their own judgement.