What from your childhood would be UNTHINKABLE today?

[Savonarola]

I had forgotten the greatest game ever:



Jarts!  They just don't make games like that anymore.

[Malthus]

I had forgotten the greatest game ever:



Jarts!  They just don't make games like that anymore.

That they don't. 

Know that soft spot in a child's skull - the part that doesn't fuse until puberty ... ?

[Grey Fox]

Also there was the shooting BB's out of a crack in the garage door.

We had pellet gun fights.  Nobody actually lost an eye so no harm.  These days people wuss out and wear full face protection while shooting paint at eachother.

We do but a 300fps ball of paint in one eye makes the other pop out, rendering you...blind.

Wimp.

It's the world we live in. 

[crazy canuck]

It's the world we live in. 

Thats the whole point.  Back in the day our parents bought us pellet guns and pellets and told us to run off and have fun.  The only rule was to be back by dinner and for heavens sake if you must shoot at someone, dont take out their eyes.

Simpler times.

[saskganesh]

we got to bodycheck in 8 and under hockey. we played guns. we played cowboys and indians. we were "allowed" to fight in the schoolyard. we could be "unsupervised" all day in the summer and weekends. I also walked to school alone.

[Grey Fox]

I plan on letting my children do all that.

Fuck society.

[crazy canuck]

I plan on letting my children do all that.

Fuck society.

Your kids will grow up to be well adjusted just like.....  never mind.

[Malthus]

we got to bodycheck in 8 and under hockey. we played guns. we played cowboys and indians. we were "allowed" to fight in the schoolyard. we could be "unsupervised" all day in the summer and weekends. I also walked to school alone.

Oh yeah the guns thing. Carl has taken to playing shooting type imagination games - pretending he's shooting "monsters" with a stick, for example. My wife fretted mildly about that but I put my foot down - he can play such stuff if he wants to in my opinion.

[The Brain]

She doesn't want him to play at all?

[Berkut]

I plan on letting my children do all that.

Fuck society.

You know, I thought that too.

Then I had kids, and realized that there was no fucking way I could handle something happening to them. I still cannot really relax when the younger one (almost 6) is outside playing and we are not out there keeping an eye on her. And we live in a extremely safe, friendly, and middle class neighborhood.

I don't think I am over-protective, but at the same time, I think some of the things my parents let me do was simply stupid.

My son will not be walking two miles each way across a shitload of traffic to 5th grade for example.

[crazy canuck]

Oh yeah the guns thing. Carl has taken to playing shooting type imagination games - pretending he's shooting "monsters" with a stick, for example. My wife fretted mildly about that but I put my foot down - he can play such stuff if he wants to in my opinion.

Funny thing about boys, even when their mothers try their best to keep anything remotely resembling a gun away from their child a boy will always find a way around that.

[Malthus]

Oh yeah the guns thing. Carl has taken to playing shooting type imagination games - pretending he's shooting "monsters" with a stick, for example. My wife fretted mildly about that but I put my foot down - he can play such stuff if he wants to in my opinion.

Funny thing about boys, even when their mothers try their best to keep anything remotely resembling a gun away from their child a boy will always find a way around that.

Heh pointing out the impossibility of stopping him was one of my arguments. 

In general it seems better not to attempt to enforce stuff you can't enforce.

[garbon]

Funny thing about boys, even when their mothers try their best to keep anything remotely resembling a gun away from their child a boy will always find a way around that.

I don't ever remember wanting to play with guns except for when visiting my male cousins.  I generally stuck to my action figures.

Of course, I also played house and barbies with my sisters.

[Barrister]

My son will not be walking two miles each way across a shitload of traffic to 5th grade for example.

I would ride my bike 4 miles to school as much as the weather would allow it, starting in grade 5.  I loved having that freedom.

[Martinus]

My son will not be walking two miles each way across a shitload of traffic to 5th grade for example.

You need to make sure it's always through the snowstorm, and uphill. Both ways.