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The following is an opinion contribution and reflects the author’s views alone.
Families exist as a core building block our society. They intertwine multiple generations into a unit that not only works to preserve and better itself, but to project its values into the rest of the community and lift up neighbors and friends. Families are where we make our first bonds, and are hopefully places we can go for refuge during the hardest of times. Unfortunately, what should be a safe haven can become a nightmare when parents abdicate on their natural obligations and mistreat their children. Because of the reality that is child abuse and parental negligence, it is necessary that the government have a system in place that can hold accountable these parents who fail at their duties. However, if Child Protective Services (CPS) and the government at large is to have the power to remove children from homes, and to prosecute parents for their choices in how to raise and nurture their children, then it is critical that we have robust standards to check this power. We must prevent unnecessary infringements on families whenever possible, because their importance to a functioning community is best respected when they can achieve their goals on their own.
There are numerous regrettable instances of CPS overreaching into normal familial affairs, and of normal citizens taking it upon themselves to initiate this overreaching by contacting law enforcement over what should be quotidian acts of parenting. In September 2014, Texas mother Kari Anne Roy was letting her six year old son play outside by himself for several minutes, with the rule in place that he was not to walk beyond the hill nearby their home. Yet, by the end of the day a parent had dragged the child back to the home because he was by himself, and a police officer arrived at the door to investigate seemingly wholesome playtime excursion. Several days later, according to an interview with Roy, members of CPS came to ask her children questions such as “Have you taken drugs or alcohol? ‘Have you seen movies of naked people? Has anybody touched you?” This is just one of a plethora of easily searchable news stories involving government employees misusing the power intended to help children by instead traumatizing these kids for simple acts such as sitting 30 feet away from their mother while she had an interview in a food court. This is the example of Laura Browder, who was arrested for child abandonment. Her kids were 6 and 12 at the time.
There are two separate issues occurring in these abuses of power. One is the fact that certain government bureaucrats have a warped conception of what constitutes neglect or mistreatment of a child. The other is the fact that normal citizens are enabling this behavior by involving law enforcement in an arbitrary and ridiculous fashion. While there is no easy way to prevent people from attempting to misuse law enforcing resources by frivolously contacting them, Utah has already taken steps to prevent CPS and police from unnecessarily disrupting families in the event that a complaint is filed.
In 2018, Utah passed the nation’s first free-range parenting bill, designed to protect parents who are pushing back against the helicopter parenting which rose to prominence over the last few decades. The bill specifically allows for “a child, whose basic needs are met and who is of sufficient age and maturity to avoid harm or unreasonable risk of harm, to engage in independent activities.” The bill goes on to mention playing outside, staying home alone, staying in a car alone, or walking to school as examples of what constitutes a protected activity. This bill, had it been in place in the respective jurisdictions of Laura Browder and Kari Anne Roy, would have spared those mothers and children the trauma and feelings of violation that come from the government prying itself into one of the most intimate relations which a person can have: the relationship between a parent and child.
Without laws like that which passed in Utah, the government is encouraging parents around the country – especially those who are lacking in the means necessary to acquire adequate legal representation – to enter a state of mediocrity. Families have reason to fear returning to tried and true parenting techniques out of fear that the wrong individual will see some children playing unattended in a yard and will alert the authorities. Even if a family has the means to resist the encroachment by CPS, the investigations will no doubt scar the child. The government should be empowering parents to raise their children to be independent thinkers who the community at large can trust to later take on critical roles.
It does not only harm families when CPS is willing to make such egregious overreaches, it also harms our nation at large. The overcorrecting seen by helicopter parenting promotes a culture of fear in which familial units will be reluctant to rely on their local government – including law enforcement – if they have to worry that even the most benign choice in a child’s playtime activity can lead to the family’s destruction. This panic has the potential to dilute trust amongst neighbors, as they are the ones who would be most likely to see children doing activities amongst themselves. If there is a lack of trust in neighborhoods, then children may be at risk of losing access to one of the societal units that they should be able to trust in the most. All of this has the chance to occur simply because some people get unjustifiably anxious at the thought of children being unsupervised even for a few minutes, and because certain bureaucrats enable this fear through their incompetence.
More states should choose to adopt laws like the one found in Utah. This will improve the relationships between law enforcement and citizens, the relationships between neighbors, and the relationships between children and their parents. If we are to believe that families are the core unit of a nation, then they must receive the utmost support and respect, and this means trusting in their capacity to raise responsible children who can do tasks as simple as bike down the street unattended.
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