Teach Your Children

Have I mentioned that I bike ride most every day (weather permitting)? It's the only form of exercise that I actually enjoy, and I try to get out every morning to do about a 6 1/2 mile course. Much of my route is in a local park, which has really nice walking/biking paths. The pavement is divided like a road with a yellow line down the center and there are mileposts marking distances throughout.

I normally ride in the morning and that generally means there are only a few people using the park, walking dogs, jogging, or just walking. It's pretty nice and everyone stays out of everyone else's way. Some days, my ride is delayed for one reason or another, and I don't get out for my ride until afternoon or early evening. Often, those rides are not so much fun.

Later in the day, when many more people are using the park, I'm finding many more people who don't have a clue how to use public spaces. It can be mothers with strollers, walking down the middle of the path, nearly blocking the way for joggers and bikers. Even worse, I often see two people pushing strollers down the path, side by side, completely blocking the path. Dog walkers with what seem to be 50 foot long leashes, with the walker on one side of the path and the dog about 25 feet off the path on the opposite side. With the leash blocking the path. That's not the dog's fault, it's the owners fault.

My biggest complaint about the clueless way people use public space (like parks) relates to children and they way they aren't getting much, if any, supervision or instruction. It's probably not surprising; if the parents are truly clueless about such things, why would anyone expect them to teach their children?

Today, there were hordes of small children on bikes and roller skates in the park. I'm talking mostly about kids in the 4-8 range on small two wheel bikes. They ride with their heads down, oblivious to what's in front of them, and wander back and forth across the path, not staying to one side or the other. My preference would be the general rules of the road which would suggest (in the U.S.) that you walk/ride on the right and pass on the left. I observed groups of 4-6 young kids scattered around the path, with no visible adult supervision. What supervision there was often was what appeared to be older siblings maybe a quarter mile behind the kids (which is to say there was no supervision).

More disturbingly, there was no education taking place (what President Obama calls "teachable moments"). No one appeared to be taking the time to explain to these young kids how to use the public space, how to share it with others, how to do it safely. It's sad to see this aspect of our community network failing so badly; it's not the schools' responsibility to do this, it's the family that should be teaching these behaviors.

Retired Supreme Court Justice David Souter just the other day gave a speech in which he lamented how little Americans understand about their government. One example is how few people can actually name the three branches of the Federal government. He attributes much of this to the lack of old-fashioned Civics classes in school. Perhaps what I've observed in the park is just a different aspect of what Justice Souter saw in court. Americans don't seem to have even a rudimentary grasp of what's going on around them and how people should interact with others in a socially acceptable and respectful way.

I suppose that if parents are clueless about yielding part of the park path to others, it's no surprise that many of them seem to drive cars the same way. This is just another aspect of what I already wrote about previously, but now it involves the cluelessness of the parents being passed on to their children. It's frustrating. Stephen Josephson talks about the need to "teach your children well," but again, if the parents are clueless, who can expect them to "model" the desired behaviors?

Once again, I have to return to that Ashleigh Brilliant quote: "I don't have any solution, but I certainly admire the problem."