Don't Touch My Child
Finished up a great weekend volunteering at ScotFest here in Tulsa Oklahoma. I met some amazing people and beautiful children. Worked the children's area, lots of jumpy houses, art, and other fun activities. Not enough vollenteers though, so I pulled double shifts and got a good sunburn making sure the kids didn't kill themselves or someone else in the jumpy structures.
I've been taking care of babies since I was ten. I am the oldest out of my cousins and babysat since I was 13 years old, did some nanny gigs in-between paralegal jobs as well.
One of my duties this weekend was to make sure the kids hands were stamped and their parents paid $5.00 for a weekend access to the play area. Usually I just grabbed the child's hand to check for a stamp before they started playing. No stamp, I would send them off to their guardians and that was it.
One lady took exception and told me not to touch her child or anyone's child for that matter! All weekend I've been wrangling kids and keeping them in order, pulling them off or out of situations, making sure they waited their turn, parents stood back and took pictures. Sometimes I'd take the wee ones up the slides and go down with them, when they were to frightened to go by themselves.
I apologized to the conserned parent and said I would not touch her child again. "But we come from different cultures", I gently told her. "Where I came from there is no problem picking up a kid or telling them to behave, everyone helps out," I tried to reason with her. She said, " I didn't sound sorry." Big warning sign there!
Thank goodness I was wearing sunglasses, she might of seen I was trying not to laugh at a behavior I'd never witnessed before! That would of esculated a potentially volital situation . She did state, she did not know I was a volunteer, but I think she was fibbing. I wore a purple shirt that said volunteer on it. I kept my mouth shut though, by that time her voice was getting an edge to it. The woman had a weird effected lisp to her voice, almost valley-girlish, she was in her late 30s and her child was around 9 or 10 years old. I think she as from the East Coast, maybe the New York area, defiantly not California.
After the incident I asked all parents if I could touch their child during their playtime. Everyone said yes and were very friendly too! I can learn and adjust to changing times without conflict or resentment.
Times are changing with "stranger danger," I respect that, but usually a relative or friend is the person who is going to harm your child. I never see kids playing outside anymore, there seems to be fear everywhere. Here are some stats on child abduction The Polly Klaas Foundation.
99.8% of the children who go missing do come home.
- Nearly 90% of missing children have simply misunderstood directions or miscommunicated their plans, are lost, or have run away.
9% are kidnapped by a family member in a custody dispute.
3% are abducted by non-family members, usually during the commission of a crime such as robbery or sexual assault. The kidnapper is often someone the child knows.
Only about 100 children (a fraction of 1%) are kidnapped each year in the stereotypical stranger abductions you hear about in the news.
About half of these 100 children come home.
It was in the high 90s all weekend, I am so glad to be home! I was so busy I didn't have much time to get pictures of the handsome men in kilts or rugby players, wonderful Scottish dancers, and the Scottish games. I took a few and will post tomorrow.
I noticed that as well with kids not playing in the playground for the last 10 years. I remember when my parents keep me in the house on the weekends it was a punishment but not for this generation. In a few cities there changing the playground by adding themes' like castles. You look amazing and its great people like you who make the world better.
Thank you! I'll be 60 years old in four years, I feel like I am still ten years old. I've read people never let their kids out except for structured play dates and school events. No more free ranging kids like when you and I grew up. I think we are living on a reservation, just like my cousins. Native children were often taken by the state if found roaming the Rez. I've read articles on parents letting their kids play in their front or backyard and had their children taken by the child protection service. Strange times we are living in...
Yes - people can be out of control with the desire to "control" what does and doesn't happen with their child. When I was a kid you went out an played all day running around the neighborhood and your parents didn't think twice unless you were late for dinner. Then the worry or concern kicked in, times are different. The media portrays that small % of evil on TV so people think it's the norm. Safety vs. Paranoia - its a fine line.
I almost feel like we are being conditioned, to instal fear in us....we don't want freedom anymore, we want safety.
That woman sounds like a jerk, but I can see both sides of this issue. Of course you might need to touch children in a situation like that, especially since the parents weren't helping control things.
On the other hand, I think if children are taught that they have to accept anyone's touch, they are in more danger of being molested. You are right that the danger is more likely to be from friends and relatives. The statistics on sexual abuse of children tell us this is not an isolated problem.
I grew up in the fifties and sixties; the kids in the neighborhood ran wild when we weren't doing chores. But that lack of supervision made it easier for a relative to molest me.
When I was doing healing work around childhood sexual abuse, I learned to ask permission before touching someone, and I appreciated being asked the same.
I am now in a culture where people kiss and hug you when they first meet you--or even without meeting you!--so I try to go with the flow. I've also had to adjust to a lot less personal space, especially on Nicaragua buses when we lived in that country.
Because we now live in Guatemala, where some children have been kidnapped by foreigners, we are acutely aware of not doing anything to alarm parents. We moved slowly in interacting with our caretaker's children, who are totally adorable.
I read a discussion of this issue on an Ecuador expats forum. One person was talking about being out with her child and running into a teacher who hugged her child. The woman liked that it was okay for the teacher to do that and that she wasn't living in such a paranoid culture.
On the other hand, when people such as teachers are bad people, they go through a progression of grooming that starts very small, with little touches and lots of affection. How do you teach children to accept good touch and avoid bad touch? It's a sticky issue, and I definitely don't know the answers.
My stepfather molested me, it takes a long time to groom a child, and many children like me refuse the grooming. So I totally get the cautionary behavior...however this was a different setting, just a few moments of a play day, I will never see these people again. We are so trusting with authority, institutions taking our kids, like our educational system. Parents now only see their children a few hours a day, with work, activities, and digital time. We don't really care for our kids anymore, the system does, there lies my real fear and need to protect my children. All the violence and sex they see in media is the real molester and we become further distanced from our community and support system that has been part of the human condition since we have been sentient, self knowing humans.
Since I was raised in a home where touch was not safe, my quest has been to be able to touch with kindness and care. My fear is we all will only let digital data touch us and it is so violent in so many ways.
We must protect our children but how we do this on an individual and community level when our society is in flux, traditions and culture with rules are all in flux has left me grasping at straws. I don't have any answers except to not give up reaching out and trying to make contact with others with kindness and wisdom. The concerned parent was my teacher today. Thank you for the excellent feedback. More food for thought!