"Johann S." wrote:

Arpit Said:

"He's an 8-year-old child. He does not understand what the right of
way is," She said.

Then he has no business being outside alone.

-----
Gee, I wonder why this kid rides his bike in such an unsafe manner?

You Americans are crazy. (Probably the whole damn world is.) Where are
the days where a kid could just ride his bike and have fun without
worrying about helmets and **** like that? Maybe it's too crowded over
there.

No matter how uncrowded it is here it's too crowded. The helmet
question is irrelevant if your chest gets run over by a car and too much
red wet stuff squirts out.

When I was a kid, there wasn't any such thing as helmets, and I jumped
my BMX over many a dirt heap, sometimes over a dirt heap and into the
neighbours well manicured flowerbed. That was fun, but the neighbour
didn't think so.

The problem here is that the kid jumped out into traffic, not into your
neighbor's flowerbed. An 8-year-old ought to have more sense than that,
and giving up his savings and the rest of his allowance until the ticket
is paid off is an especially good way of acquiring some at a fairly low
price.

There's no hope for his mom, though, so I hope that somebody just slaps
her silly.

Had some close encounters with cars too, but those were mostly in my
skateboard days. (no helmet either).

Anyway, I'm very glad I'm not a kid today, and especially in the US
(it seems). Must be pretty boring. Maybe I would have decided to stuff
all these rules, and just play playstation. It's much more
fun than driving miss daisy with a bloody helmet on.

PS: I have nothing against helmets, I even own one. (Don't wear it
very often though) My point is with all the rules and regulations
these days, it must be boring to be a kid.

There's a general feeling that it's no longer safe for a kid to play
anywhere without an adult in close attendance. Damn shame, because kids
NEED to learn to be alone and unsupervised sometimes. You ride/drive
around in the suburbs and you never see kids out playing. You see lots
of gardeners, people jogging (sometimes pushing a sport-stroller with a
kid in it), and a few bicyclists.

It used to be neat to ride out Xmas morning and see all the kids with
their new bicycles. Been a long time since that happened.

--
Cheers,
Bev
************************************************** **********
"Let them eat ****."
-- Marcel Antoinette, Marie's little-known brother