A while back, I talked a little bit about the concept of helicopter parenting, and why I reject the concept as ill-advised, and generally not at all good for kids’ development.

What concerns me today isn’t the concept itself, but how it came about. Once again, I shall point to Lenore Skenazy over at free-range kids, the guru and general focal resource for this topic, for putting a focus on all this, and getting me thinking.

The question here is “Why have people shifted toward this kind of parenting today?” When previous generations were children, it was common for them to entertain themselves outside for hours, with the general direction of “come back home when the street lights come on.” People who were raised this way, or raised their own children this way, would not consider it proper for today’s kids to experience similar circumstances. Instead of giving kids a little bit of freedom to develop independently, they overschedule and over-structure, and “hover” (like helicopters!) over their kids at all times, in the fear that they’ll be abducted or wounded by playground equipment or mauled by a rabid raccoon or someting. They do so because they claim that things have changed; that the world is a more dangerous place now.

Of course, statistics don’t support this; the crime rate in the United States has been declining significantly since it’s peak in the late 1980s; in fact, “the streets” today are much safer (in terms of the violent crime rate) today than they were thoughout the 1970s and 1980s.

So, why are people today so convinced things are so much scarier and more dangerous than they were in decades past, even when they’re not?

Not surprisingly, I have a couple of ideas.

First of all, I would blame The Media. A lot of this helicopter stuff started after cable and satellite television became ubiquitous. With the advent of the twenty-four hour news cycle and several round-the-clock news channels, there’s a lot of time to fill, so there are more stories in general, including more stories about violent crime that the average viewer wouldn’t encounter on television 25 years ago.

Secondly, stories of violent crimes, sexual predators, and pretty missing blonde girls draw eyeballs, and with hundreds of channels competing for ratings, they run with the controversial stuff that will get them the biggest market share (this is why Nancy Grace has a television career) from a reasonably constant pool of viewers. Forced to compete with cable, network and local television has also upped the ante; Popular television dramas focus on the darkest crimes, local newscasts constantly tease danger: “Ten things in your kitchen that can kill your children – tonight at 11!”; there are even entire “news” programs dedicated to feeding into the controversy that your kid will be abducted/raped/killed by some unsavory stranger* the moment they step outside or turn on their computers.

Ah, computers and The Internet, as useful as the global data network is for allowing us to quickly share information, there’s an awful lot of useless or misleading information out there, and many of us are not particularly skilled consumers of said data.

Again, much of this information is legitimate and useful – say, offical product recall notices and such – however, most isn’t. Warnings abound about gang initiation rites, mall parking lot killers, and their ilk are passed along without a critical thought (honestly, all you really need is snopes to check these out), feeding further fear, uncertainty and doubt. Part of it is that even today, many people consider computers magical things, and don’t understand them. I sometimes help my neighbors out with their computer problems; those with kids always ask about how to keep predators away from their teens online. At worst, these kids are downloading some porn videos and pirating music (I generally tell the parents not to worry, and remind the kids to clear their browser cache and run AdAware regularly to keep the gremlins out).

Both of these previous elements merely feed a more underlying problem; The Culture of Fear that’s been steadily increasing its hold on the country. Sure, in the last fifteen years or so, there’ve been some legitimately harrowing events in America, and on some level are cause for worry. However, odds are still much likelier that a person will be killed in an auto accident than in a terrorist attack. Still, so many people are afraid that the moment they or their family steps outside onto the cul-de-sac in their gated community, they’ll be set upon by some differently-cultured Other bent on destroying the American way of life. For much of the last ten years, people in power have tacitly encouraged this, as they realize that a fearful populace is more easily swayed; swayed to purchase a certain product they associate with safety, support policies that go against their best interest in the name of “security.” It’s a shame, but it’s the way the world works, and people who are under the constant pressure of fear and anxiety aren’t the best critical thinkers; which is what the corporate and political powers that be are counting on in order to maintain their influence.

That last paragraph is quite possibly one of the most tin-foil hatted things I’ve ever written, but behind the conspiracy-mongering language, there’s a nugget of truth. So many parents and otherwise responsible adults have given up on critical thinking, and through their actions, are preventing their children from developing their own critical thinking skills. These parents mean well, but in meaning well they’re not equipping their children to be able to accurately judge and adapt to the information and challenges the world confronts them with. We’re raising a generation of people who simply won’t be equipped to handle life’s difficulties with logic, composure, and grace.

That’s not the future I want to give to my kids.

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* – in a significant blow to the concept of “stranger danger” and other illiterative threats, odds are much better that a kid is going to be abducted/raped/killed by someone they know than by a total stranger.