This was in the late 1960s, when crime was already in full swing, but nothing ever happened to me except that I learned my way around. I learned to swim, in other words, in the turbulent city we lived in. It s a paradox of modern parenting that everyone is obsessed with child safety but few parents seem worried that by swaddling our children in Volvos and soccer camps we render them all the more vulnerable to the untidy realities they sooner or later must face. Even the so-called experts are starting to recognize this. Deaths from disease have also fallen sharply.
Strangers are virtually no threat at all.
Your children are safe from abduction, too, unless it s your spouse doing the kidnapping. This is not to say that sensible measures like bicycle helmets and infant car seats haven t helped. Drowning, in fact, is a leading cause of childhood death, so making sure your kids can swim is smart. But many measures we take to protect children aren t so sensible. Now she wants to get him a cellular phone.