God-cursed nannies strike again

Heading out to take care of some things this morning I heard one of the most irritating, scare-mongering commercials ever on the radio.

Some clown was speaking of the horrors of playgrounds. "In too many playgrounds there are sharp corners, there are hard surfaces to fall on, THERE IS NO ADULT SUPERVISION!!" and so on.

This is one of the kinds of BS that Acidman used to go off about. There are people out there with budgets to do radio campaigns- and probably tv in some places- about how playgrounds must be redone and ALWAYS have an adult around. Generation after generation grew up using playgrounds without a smothering adult watching over them, with dirt and grass to fall on, and they survived, but no, that's no longer good enough. Childhood must be made without risk, or it will scar the little children, emotionally if not physically.

This is such a load of crap it's scary. And these clowns would have had shrieking fits if they'd seen how I grew up, and my kids for that matter. Out in the woods, at the park, in the yard with tools and dogs and cats and dirt. When they were about 8 and 6 they decided they wanted to be elves, and elves needed spears. So I made two spears(throwing darts for adults) and they used them in the yard, and carried them when in the woods and had a ball. Nobody died or bled, but of course that doesn't count; such things shouldn't be allowed for children(and preferably not for adults according to the nannies).

This did lead to interesting things, like the time when daughter was thirteen and, at Med Fair, said she was going to wander around, picked up my spear(seven feet long and sharp) and headed out. Some guy asked me if I really allowed her to carry that, and I replied that I trusted her not to stick it in somebody unless they really needed it. The look on his face was priceless; he couldn't decide if I was serious or kidding and was horrified either way.

She doesn't carry a spear for everyday, of course; a 9mm and Gold Dots is much easier to carry around for general use.