Sabrina Carpenter Holding This Dog In Her Underwear Will Drive Kirk Herbstreit Crazy, Earl's Meat & The DCC!
Wait until Kirk sees Sabrina's Golden Retriever puppy.
Why aren't more parents using ‘Free-range parenting’ skills like back in the 70s, 80s and 90s when kids roamed free at all hours of the day?
I had plenty of Boomers and Gen Xers saying how they roamed all summer back in their days after mom and dad locked them out of the house and/or left them at home alone all summer.
Yes, I get it, I was one of those kids.
The question is: What changed? Why aren't kids being free-ranged like how you were raised?
I asked many of the emailers who told me all about their childhoods to answer the ‘What’s changed' question.
— Chris A. writes:
Definitely the well-publicized kidnappings of kids in the 70s and 80s. Around DC, there was the kidnapping and murder of the Lyon sisters when they went, unaccompanied, to a local shopping center to get ice cream. They were 10 and 12 at the time. Their dad, John, was a big radio personality in DC in the 70s, and the whole region immediately became terrified that the same thing could happen to their kids. From that point on, at least around here, kids were tethered to their parents, because they didn't know who did it until several years ago.
— Anonymous shares his recent experience that has him thinking about both sides of the free-range parenting idea:
I am currently 44. Until age 8, I lived in an apartment complex whose parking lot abutted the town park. From as early as I can remember, I would go to the town park by myself and throw sticks into the creek, play on the playground, etcetera. I'm not sure how much permission I needed (i.e., I probably told my mom before I went over there, just so she knew where I was), but I was definitely alone at least some of the time. We then moved into a house out in the sticks, and so I would just invent games in my yard or in my basement, so I was pretty much on our property at all times, and then it all became moot.
I don't remember the year exactly, but in my area of the country, a big story for several years on the local news was the disappearance of Sarah Anne Wood, probably when I was about 10 years old. If memory serves, she was abducted and subsequently murdered while riding her bike home from school. It was the worst-case scenario. In talking to other Gen-Xers from all over the country, everyone always remembers the 'milk-carton kids'. So those kinds of events have definitely shaped the psyches of modern parents.
I'm torn on the issue. My house abuts the property of our elementary school, so there's an acre at least of fields and playgrounds that my kids can go play on at any time. I encourage them to go over there. However, I want them to either go with a friend or one of their siblings, mostly in case someone gets hurt and needs an adult to help them, but also because a subset of my neighbors do not share my views on this topic. A couple of weeks ago, my 7 year-old daughter left the house without telling me to go for a walk, approximately at dusk. As I'm doing the dishes, she comes running into the house via the side door in a panic that somebody was following her. About 10 seconds later, I hear a loud, frantic knock on my front door. I open the door, and there's a teenager with a spooked expression on his face. He begins to explain to me that a car had been following my daughter closely, so this teenager and his friend decide that they should start following him. And, the guy in the car that was following my daughter was parked outside my house. So at this point, I've got three cars parked on the street outside my house.
Now, if this person who had been following my daughter had nefarious intentions, he surely wouldn't have stopped and parked outside my house. So, figuring this was a misunderstanding, I walk down to talk to the guy. Out of the car pops the former mayor of our city, who happens to live in my neighborhood. He said he saw my daughter walking alone in the evening hours and thought it was strange, so he called 911 and decided to follow her. I said, 'thank you for your concern', but also that nothing was wrong. Anyways, I guess he called 911 back to report my address. About 10 minutes later, a local police officer knocks on the door. I think he may have been on my front stoop for a maximum of 30 seconds; he couldn't have been better about the situation. He just asked if everything was okay, I said that it was, and he was on his way. I had a small conversation with my daughter about leaving the house without telling me, and given that the police showed up at our house, I think the message got through.
At the end of everything, I was torn. On the one hand, it felt good that there were several people who saw someone they thought was vulnerable and kept an eye on them to make sure everything was ok. On the other hand, it saddens me that the childhood that I grew up with doesn't exist at the moment because everyone is up in everybody else's business. The freedom to roam and screw up from time to time is gone. I'm doing what I can to bring it back a little bit, but it's definitely a fight against the tide.
— Toledo grad Michael F. checks in:
My two cents: we lost "community", we knew our neighbors and they knew us. The lady across the street didn’t hesitate to discipline any of the neighborhood kids if they were being truant or disrespectful. We looked out for each other and didn’t want to besmirch the family reputation.
— Scott in Rocky Point, NY says:
Without stating the obvious I would say that everyone (parents, friends, family, neighbors, us) didn't have the constant "bad news" bombarding on on a daily (or minute) basis as it is today. TV shows and movies scared us a bit, but that was just entertainment. Instant bad news f'd us all up.
— Rick in Brentwood, TN shares:
My wife’s theory is that there is too much information available today for parents. Today, if a random child gets murdered or molested halfway across the country, we usually hear about it. That makes parents apprehensive about their child’s safety.
Fifty years ago, if it wasn’t in the local paper we probably didn’t hear about it at all. Also, phones with the ability track have given parents the irresistible ability to know where their kids are at all times.
My theory is that in my family my dad was in charge, period. If we screwed up, we had to answer to him. He gave us all the freedom we wanted in exchange for being good. The last thing I wanted to do, all the way into adulthood and beyond, was to let him down.
Men of today have been emasculated to a great degree and the father-son relationship is different than it was so long ago. Boys still love their fathers and vice versa, but the fear/respect aspect is not what it once was.
Kinsey:
That's an interesting observation from Rick, especially what I made bold. It echoes much of what I've tried to instill in our boys: Go explore, be kids, play hard, don't be a jerkoff when you're at friends' houses, use some sense and watch out for each other, and check in with us from time to time.
We're not locking the door on them, but we're also not creating Zoom meetings to set up play dates at the park where there will be a vegetarian option for the picnic lunch.
Do I have data to back up the theory that America has a problem with weak fathers? I don't, but you are free to look around and see how fathers are parenting their children. You can come up with your own conclusions.
My theory is that men fall into these categories:
- They let the wife handle everything because they're weak
- They let the wife handle everything because they picked the wrong wife & the husband is afraid she's going to divorce his ass and take everything he owns
- They let the wife handle the kids because it frees them up to go jerk around on video games, they're weak & he's been warned by the mama bear that she will turn into an angry mama bear if he doesn't do as she says
- They actually do parent the kids
Am I wrong?
EMAIL: JOE.KINSEY@OUTKICK.COM OR USE MY PERSONAL GMAIL
This was posted by a satire account. AGAIN, the Twitter account is SATIRE, the TikTok mom is a real mama bear.
Will I reconsider our house in 15 more years?
— Mike from Centerville, OH checks in:
Congrats on your 15th anniversary!
I'm happy (delighted) you and your misses are raising 2 young good boys. Family values matter and it's apparent you two instill family values that have expectations and require responsibility and accountability. In this day and age, unfortunately, that's not so often the case.
So, Congrats to your 15th wedding anniversary and a BIGGER CONGRATS to raising two good young boys!
But I do have a question about the house. Maybe you did strike gold in 2010 and will stay to your dying breath. If so, GREAT for you!
Me and the misses live in a great neighborhood down in Centerville, but we're talking about moving in the next 3 to 5 years. Now, we're both older than you and your misses (we're upper 50's), but the steps are starting to get to us. She still plays tennis (3.5) and I played a lot of baseball and basketball (golf, too) in my younger days and the steps aren't fun on the knees anymore and sometimes no fun on the hip.
The bedrooms are upstairs, along with our offices, but the laundry room is in the basement along with the deep freeze and major pantry storage area.
I hope you struck gold with the house and once again Congrats of 15 years!
Kinsey:
To be honest, Mike, I really haven't thought much about going up and down the steps. We have neighbors all around us in their 60s, 70s, 80s and we even have a man down the street who is in his upper 90s who still mows his lawn, takes out his trash, maintains his property and has a two-story house.
I guess if life happens and we can't make it up the steps, then we'll have to make a decision, but, based on these old-timers around me and how they're hoofing it up and down stairs, I'm not about to show weakness.
The key for us: The laundry is on the first floor and we have a garage fridge preventing multiple trips to the basement outside of Mrs. Screencaps going down there for her grow op and me to the man cave.
‘Beef prices are going through the roof’
Yes, I stole that from the comment section.
That said, don't read the comment section of the series of videos that were posted. You'll see a bunch of TikTok Stanley-succin' mama bears commenting on how the ranchers should've handled the situation.
Screencaps reader shows appreciation for Luis from Venezuela who doesn't want to be lumped in with the No Mow May Venezuelan crack house-looking properties I've been railing about for the last two weeks
— Mark in Tucson writes in:
I'd like to applaud Luis from Venezuela for his spot-on email and welcome him to Screencaps nation. My mother is a Guatemalan immigrant and became a US citizen in 1979. She's hardworking, law abiding, and defiantly patriotic. She loves the US so much she legally changed her middle name to America when she became a naturalized citizen. The open border mess from Brandon makes her (and me) insane, and unfortunately, honest law-abiding legal immigrants get caught in the crossfire.
Bidets are a game changer. The argument I always use for skeptics is stepping in dog poop: You would never clean your shoe with paper, but would use a hose on full blast. If your shoe can't be cleaned without water, how can your butt?
I'd send you pics from our Santa Fe vacation last week, but the pics are all on my wife's phone. That said, me and Jim T in San Diego might need to reconsider our respective Mexican food supremacy battle: The Mexican food in Santa Fe was mind-blowing.
Kinsey:
As the son of a mother and stepfather who lived in New Mexico on and off for what felt like 15 years, I can agree with Mark here on the food in Santa Fe. I can also attest to getting a New Mexico burrito Christmas-style with the red and green chilis.
I do miss that food.
And, as my mother would say, do yourself a favor and head on north to Taos where she lived for so long. I used to call it the Key West of the Southwest. I need to get back into that region with my boys in the near future. I think they'd be amazed by all the action they could get into.
— Guy G. in western New York shares:
I’ve been following the Tyler story, and was thinking about it last night. We have acres of elderberries on the farm, and it’s been a super wet spring. (cold too!) I didn’t have a choice but to No Mow May. Zero Turn got stuck a few times, and even the tractor was rutting everything up. Last night was the first opportunity to get it cut down, and try and dry it out.
It sucked! The berries hate the tall grass around it, the tractor used extra fuel to spin faster to not leave piles everywhere, and it took twice as long to do! We keep bees in the fields, and they didn’t seem too concerned with me mowing. They were all humming this morning.
And as I sat on the deck last night, enjoying a late coffee and cigar, the turkeys popped out to enjoy the freshly cut and newly exposed food source.
To make sure that I’m not completely blackballed from TNML, my lawn, while slightly overgrown due to wetness, is cut and does not look like a third world fent house.
Show us your MEAT
— Mike T. cooked up a spread for Mrs. T.:
Sausages 30 minutes
Jalapeño 1 1/2 hours
Onions 2-3 hours
Ham 5 hours
Pork Butt 12 hours
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And that's it for this first Friday of June. It's cloudy, rainy, nasty, cold, winds off the lake. But, we must go on with life. It's also the 81st anniversary of D-Day.
Never forget how lucky we are to live in this country where we can go at each other, debate, speak our minds and call out people for living like they're Guatamalean fentanyl dealers in No Mow May houses.
We're beyond lucky.
Have a great weekend.
Email: joe.kinsey@outkick.com or use my personal Gmail