I Know My First Name Is Steven : Why was a 7 year old and then a 5 year old walking around the streets?

Unsupervised?

Horrible parenting led to these kids getting abducted.

It wasn't a big deal back then. I used to walk home from school a mile away when I was 7 and nobody thought anything about it.

It was a different time. Kids weren't at risk like they are now. I grew up in a small town and my parents NEVER drove me anywhere, no matter how bad the weather was. We walked or rode our bikes.

All typos are hereby blamed on my iPad.

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Kids weren't at risk like they are now

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Bull! The only thing that's changed is that kidnappings and such started getting plastered all over the news in the late '80s and early '90s.

Please back your disagreement with the necessary facts. As a child of the 70s I roamed everywhere without adult supervision as did all of my classmates. In a town of 8000 people I rode my Big Wheel 8 blocks to the library. As soon as I was old enough to tell time, my mother let me wander the mall by myself in the state capital. My grandpa was a US Marshall and worked in the same building as the FBI, somehow he never had a problem with either event.

All typos are hereby blamed on my iPad.

Statistics do not exist for "stranger abductions" on the national scale before the year 1999.

Yeah, surethats why I simple google search found several different articles about statistics from the 1980s. Time to ignore, you're just a troll.

All typos are hereby blamed on my iPad.

Agreed! I used to ride my powder puff bike to the local Mini Mart and by my dad's cigarettes for him with just a note! Times were definitely different back then. My friends and I would hop on the bus uptown and spend the day at the mall. Stranger Danger didn't really hit the main stream until the late '80's, even then people weren't as concerned as they should've been. And imagine, we did all this without cell phones!

There aren't any more child molesters roaming the streets today than there were 30 years ago. The only difference between now and 30 or 40 years ago is the media exposure that child molesters get which then makes parents think that society is more unsafe today than it was decades ago.

Wrong there are child molesters still roaming the street today


Lara Croft Himiko! The First Sun Queen! This is Yamatai.

Agree with everyone else in this thread; it was a different time.
I remember on Saturdays I would get on my bike and be gone for most of the day. I was at the neighbor's house, or my friend's house, or some other friend's house, or we would ride our bikes to the playground or to the school or to the store. And my mom had no idea where I was. I just knew I had to be back before it got dark out. But me and the kids in the neighborhood (and I am talking about a suburb of Boston) were all over the place on our bikes. And we didn't wear stinking helmets either!

Because back then, we could. This has only changed in recent times when parents began fearing their own shadows and bubble wrapping their children.

Yes, sh|+ happened back then, but with all the media coverage and fear mongering today, parents fear everything now more than they did then.

It was a different time. Because of cases like this kids aren't allowed to play alone today. It would be nice to let kids have fun, but child molesters ruin everything.

The child molester urban legend. The media propagated something that has been part of our society since its inception. Blame the media scare tactics versus the false information there is a child molester around every corner, even lower numbers for actual kidnappings.

Child molesters are still out there roaming out the street or neighbor looking for victims


Lara Croft Himiko! The First Sun Queen! This is Yamatai.

WHat is up with the ridiculous posts on this thread?. Children should NOT be left alone in the street, unsupervised. It's DANGEROUS ffs. Yes, that doesn't mean every child is going to get abducted not anything, but some will, and why exactly do you think we should take the chance?.

Guess what, most people who drive while drunk don't crush their cars. Doesn't mean they should do it.

Indeed, back in the 80's and before children just roamed free unsupervised a lot of the time. It doesn't happen now because people have become more aware of the dangers, due to cases like this, and so many others. That's not fear mongering nor paranoia. There doesn't need to be a sicko in every corner for this to be a real problem.

It'd be great if the world was a better place and there were not sickos who want to kidnap and rape children (and sometimes kill them). But that's not the world we live in.

I think people are just pointing out that perception was different back then and many kids were allowed to walk places alone and play outside unsupervised.

I disagree with people who say it's more dangerous these days. I'm so tired of people saying this. It's not. It was just as dangerous then, we just didn't have the awareness we do now. We didn't have a website that would just instantly show our parents where convicted sex offenders live. We didn't have communication from one county to the next or one state to the next. You heard about kidnappings if they were in the main stream media like the Adam Walsh or Jacob Wetterling cases.

I was walking home from school in the first grade. My friends and I would spend all day outside alone and walk/ride bikes all over town. It was common but doesn't mean it's a great idea. There were actually several occasions when I was approached by men in cars who were clearly up to no good. I was fortunate enough to know to run, ride my bike away, go to a neighbor I knew or go into a public store to tell someone what was going on. Thankfully I was never in a secluded enough situation where someone was able to get away with grabbing me and throwing me into their car.

Now we have more sense not to allow our kids to be out alone. I don't think it was bad parenting back then, it was just lack of true knowledge of how risky it was. We WERE taught about strangers though and it saved me on numerous occasions.

I don't even let my daughter walk behind me when we're in public. She's 4 and I tell her I have to be able to see her because people will take kids away from their parents in a heartbeat, even at the grocery store. Some people I know think I shouldn't say things like that but I'm not sorry. It's the truth.

It took me three hours to figure out that FU was Felix Ungar.

I'm from a different country, with a different background.
Born and raised under a cruel right-wing military dictatorship, my parents NEVER leave us alone. My brother, who's older than me, was born in 1977, and I remember he was allowed to ride his bike with his friends in the neighbourhood at age 7, in daylight, but one day one kid, older than my brother, was assaulted and the guy didn't hurt him, but steal his bike. My mom changed the ways then, until my brother turned out like 11.
All this under military dictatorship.
I started walking with classmates back home from school at agge 11, but then we faced a pedophile and we were scared to death, But that was in the early 90's.

I know my grandparents used to walk long distances by themselves being young kids, but there were a lot of child abuse back then in the 40's, no one talked about it of course, in small rural towns.

Please excuse my terrible redaction, english is not my native language IMDb = Catch-22

This may be a shock to you but at one time kids were allowed to be independent a whole generation called Generation X. also known as the latch key generation, gasp we were even of all horrors left alone in the house, by ourselves. We walked back & forth too school without supervision, we went to parks without parents, we even rode backs without HELMETs. How evil kneviel of us. We were even told to stay outside & play until DARK. at anyone even asking this silly question. Most of us weren't kidnapped, even as we ran through the streets like wide animals. Parents let the media scare them, I call it bogey man facts. Modern parents TBH aren't smart enough to figure out there isn't a kidnapper around every corner. In fact they run a bigger chance of molestation happening from a family member or acquaintance versus a total stranger. Not using common sense at all about it.

Nope idiot. That sick, determined scumbag who can't control his urges led to these boys getting kidnapped. I walked home all the time from school without trouble and my parents are the greatest. Steven's parents could have done a little better about making him aware of stranger danger but they were still good parents unaware that a dangerous man has been watching him. As for Timmy, it was obvious that he had good parents who totally made him aware i.e "I don't know him, I'm not supposed to go with strangers" but unfortunately the kidnappers had to resort to force. Also, try reading a little more before you rush to judgment, in the book it stated that Timmy usually walked home with some girl until he arrived at his babysitter's house while the parents were both at work. Bad parents wouldn't care to warn their kids about the dangers of talking with strangers.

I wouldnt call them bad parents. There are just bad people who will take advantage of any situation. At the time, Steven's parents were just parents who did the best they could at a time where it was the norm to let your kids be free because it appeared their world was safe. It actually wasnt but still is it any different. In some way parents today will let their kids do stuff under the idea that its safe or wont hurt anything or even does not hurt something. Parenting then and now isnt perfect. Im sure the parenting of today will likely be criticized due to our over diligence, overindulgence, ignorance or maybe even lack of knowledge dealing with our kids. One which future generation will probably have better knowledg on. Reaplly it really not worth crozing because the times and information was different or unknown.