Look, look, I know it's bait.
But I'm old, and I need y'all to just listen to me a second. Ten seconds maybe.
Twenty years ago, thirty years ago, there were kids outside. 40 years ago I was among Those Screaming Kids Outside.
Suddenly, kids being outside became a PROBLEM.
Some dumb fucks started suing parents when their kids got injured at their homes. They started calling CPS on kids who were "unattended" outside and levying abuse charges.
We went from It Takes a Village, to I'll call the cops on you if you hang out at the mall for too long without buying something.
It went from Hanging Out at The Park with Your Friends, to getting escorted home because a group of teens was automatically a Gang, and Gangs were terrible and awful and no one wanted their property values to go down because of hooligans.
No big kids outside. No one to watch over the littler kids, so no little kids outside. Less kids outside, more kids inside.
And hey, hey - Look At ME - I loved video games and computers and I was not a fan of "Outside". But I walked down to the Blockbuster than was 3 miles away from my house, and I rode my bike through parks and I played basketball in the street, and now that's gone.
Sure, kids carve out space here and there where they can, but as a general rule, it's all gone. It's paved over, under surveillance, with "This will be exhibit A" signs plastered all over the place.
The cacophony of loud, irritating, barely contained children missing from the day to day sounds of society were the first sign of its death, frankly. I don't know how it lined up to happen so fast, I'm sure someone smarter than me could point to the assholes that got the ball rolling in the wrong direction.
But it's really eerie to be at my desk, at work, during the summer months, and there's not a sound on my residential street. It's fucking creepy.
