Senior Community

Being a parent has to be the toughest job in the world.

I must admit that I am not speaking from experience here, I haven’t had any children of my own but I doubt I’ll find very many parents who disagree with me. It’s not often you see someone pushing around a stroller saying, “What, this? Nah, this is a piece of cake.”  Just the idea of being entirely responsible for the growth, development and safety of one person is terrifying to me, and many families choose to have more than that. Parents deserve nothing if not our respect.

My parents always told me that their first job was to protect me, but their hardest job was to know when to let me make my own mistakes. When I was just a kid, the answer to that question seemed pretty obvious, “Just let me make my own mistakes all the time, I already know everything I need to know.” (Yeah, I was a pretty cocky kid). But the older I get, the more daunting that particular parental task seems. How do you know when to protect a kid from the world and when to let them learn their own lessons? What lessons will be too hard for them, or too dangerous? That question is almost never easy to answer, and it’s not one I look forward to having to ask myself as a parent every day.

That’s why when I read articles like this one I get pretty upset.

This article, posted by WebMD, lists seven, reportedly common, dangerous games that children play and parents should be aware of. Some of the list entries are pretty horrifying. One entry is a game called ‘the choking game’ where players will essentially strangle themselves in various ways in order to achieve a brief high. Another entries include ‘car surfing’, which involves standing on the hood of a moving vehicle, and ‘mumblety-peg’, which is the game where you spread out your fingers on a table and try to stab the spaces between with a knife. These games are undeniably dangerous, and parents should absolutely be aware if these are games that kids are playing.

The trouble is, your children probably aren’t playing these games.

The same WebMD article warning us against these ‘common’ games sites a study that analyzed 83 probable choking game deaths nationwide over the course of 12 years. That’s only about 6 deaths a year, a pretty far stretch from common for a game that involves choking yourself. Car surfing was even less common, siting 99 national injuries and deaths over the course of 18 years. That’s only about 5.5 a year. For mumblety-peg, the article doesn’t even bother to site any evidence to suggest that this is a game children play frequently. To put those numbers into perspective, vending machines kill about 2.18 people a year. Obviously these games are dangerous, but if they’re only causing a few more deaths annually than vending machines, I think it’s hard to make the case for them being common. Do parents really need to actively worry that their children are participating in these kinds of activities when they occur so infrequently? I know that even one death is too many, but let’s refrain from making it seem like these things are a craze sweeping the nation. The article only gets worse from there.

The rest of the entries include games like ‘chubby bunny,’ which is an innocent game that involves trying to say “chubby bunny” through a mouthful of marshmallows, and ‘the cinnamon challenge‘ or ‘trying to eat a tablespoon of cinnamon’ (which is nearly impossible). The article does say that in rare cases participants in either game could be hospitalized after inhaling the cinnamon or marshmallows, but admits that these are unlikely occurrences. Again, are these really the kinds of games that parents need to worry about? Sure, both games are pretty stupid, but they are also pretty harmless. If the most trouble your children are getting into is a game of chubby bunny, you’re probably doing a pretty good job as a parent.

The only valid entry on this list of seven dangerous games is one about huffing or dusting. Huffing is inhaling the fumes from common household products like glue to get high, and by 8th grade, 20% of children will have tried it. Huffing can be habit forming, and can cause brain damage. It’s a serious issue, and I think it should be taken seriously. So, if WebMD can recognize a truly dangerous thing like huffing, how did these other entries make this list? It seems to me that articles like this are just fear mongering, playing on parent’s sensibilities and trying to stir up some controversy where there really isn’t any.

That’s why I get frustrated.

Isn’t a parent’s job hard enough as it is without having to try and discern what warnings are valid and which are filler? This article wasn’t just from some random website either, it’s from WebMD, a usually reliable source. I think that parents and non-parents alike can agree that we shouldn’t do anything to make parenting in today’s society any more challenging.

My parents always taught me that if I was unsure about something my friends were doing, I should ask them about it. They always made me feel comfortable talking with them about anything, and whenever I asked them they gave me straightforward honest answers. Growing up, I absolutely got into some trouble, but when it came to the really stupid stuff like huffing, I knew better because of the open dialogue I had with my parents. I’m not going to try to tell anyone how to communicate with their own children, but my guess is that if you’re a decent parent, you don’t have worry about them getting into trouble playing these ‘dangerous’ games.

Your kids are probably doing all right.

If you like Chris’ entries, you can follow him on twitter here.

The Maryland Court of Appeals certainly thinks so. They recently ruled that the pit bull breed of dogs should be considered inherently dangerous when ruling for the plaintiff in a civil case about a dog attack.

I’m a dog lover and this makes no sense to me. Basically, this ruling means that it is going to be easier for people to take legal action against dog owners just because the person owns a pit bull. Before, a case for negligence that led to a dog attack had to be made in order to get any sort of settlement, now all the plaintiff has to prove is that the owner was aware that the dog was a pit bull breed or mix because of the ‘inherently dangerous’ classification.

I’m not going to ramble on about all of the legal ramifications but this definitely means that pit bulls are going to be a tough sell. It’s likely that many landlords will forbid the breed as a result, and in Maryland this will likely prevent future dog owners from choosing pit bulls due to the potential difficulties.

The case for dangerous can certainly be made, as pit bulls make up about 71% of fatal dog attacks around the country. The numbers are there and it’s hard to argue with the numbers. Pit bulls can be dangerous and there is no way around that.

That being said, I took care of a pit bull once and it was one of the most loving dogs I’ve ever had the pleasure to be around. That’s why I’m so upset. Pit bulls have a bad reputation for being violent, so people who are looking for mean dogs tend to buy pit bulls. Those people then raise their dogs as guard dogs and teach them to attack strangers. Is it really surprising that many of these dogs turn out like they do? Not at all. Were those dogs mean before they got into their owner’s hands? I seriously doubt it. It seems to me that the state of Maryland is painting with an overly broad brush.

Watch that video for 10 seconds and tell me if there is anything “inherently dangerous” about that pit bull. I owned a golden retriever, often hailed as the friendliest of dog breeds, who would have eaten those little ducks if given half the chance. It’s usually instinct for a dog to go after a bird like that, and this video proves that instinct does not always to dictate a dog’s behavior.

It’s true that dogs can be dangerous. If abused and mistreated they can turn into vicious and violent creatures, but is that the dog’s fault? No, it’s the owner’s. If a dog owner raises a dog to bite people, what else could you possibly expect from the dog? Should owners be punished legally if they are negligent in the care of their dogs? Absolutely. But I don’t think we need to do any more to give pit bulls a bad rap. Yes they are big, energetic dogs. If not trained properly they can be very hard to handle, but that doesn’t make them dangerous to the core, it just means you have to raise them right.

If you need further proof that pit bulls can be great dogs watch this video from CNN. It’s a story about a pit bull who saved a Boston Police Officer’s mother after she passed out on the train tracks in front of an oncoming train. The dog first tried to pull her away from danger, and then it got in the way of the train, taking the blow itself to save her and losing a leg in the process. The victim’s son had bought her the dog as a companion while she was struggling with alcoholism. That dog acted as that owner’s Medical Alert, only it also stood in front of a train for her. 

If that isn’t a sign of a pit bull’s devotion, I don’t know what is.

If you like reading Chris’s blog entries, you can check him out on Twitter here.