Careless parents

Mrs. Bright isn't so bright after all! She should be trying to figure out more than how the kids managed to step on the gas! :-(

I can just imagine - one at the wheel and stepping down on the other's back, the other pressing down on the gas with his hands...

I have a 3 and 5 year old and would not anticipate that they would take my keys, get in my car, and drive it down the road. I leave my keys where it is convenient for me. I'd like to think that I would notice right away if they were doing something like this, but I do not watch my children like a hawk every waking moment of the day.

Clearly Mrs. Bright has learned that her children are capable of more than she thought and will take precautions to prevent this from happening again. What good would filing charges do?

From before the time that an infant learns to crawl, a parent must "baby proof" a house. Whether it is putting locks on cabinets that contain cleaning solutions, or drawers with medications, one never knows what trouble a little one can get into.

I am happy that the incident turned out happily. It could have been a tragedy of major proportions. Parents beware. Little kids are very adept at doing things one might never expect.



Unless this incident was part of a history of neglect, I can't see why. Would putting the parents in jail help these children? I would mark the whole thing up to stupidity on the part of the parents. I think that they have learned a hard lesson.

Maybe I'm a careless parent. I never baby-proofed my house with the exception of putting poisonous substances in the cabinet over the fridge rather than the low one under the sink. I guess I think there is a certain amount of risk we have to accept. I'm also glad no-one was hurt by the joyride.

Perhaps, but, like you say, there was no accidents. Fortunately, no one was injured and no property damage occurred. At a minimum, I would have expected a stern warning from police.

If this had turned out differently, the parents would have been liable, right?

Maybe if someone sued. I don't know that leaving keys where children can get them is a criminal offense. There are cases where it did turn out badly and I don't know what the final result was regarding charges.

Oh, I'm sure the parents would have been liable, but you can't anticipate everything and you can't control every move your kids make.

Okay, I suppose you could. Do you want a bunch of wimpy brats that didn't learn to ride bikes because they might, just might have gotten hurt.

Hmm, methinks this is a bit different. My concern would have been that they not only could have hurt themselves, but other innocent bystanders, or people in cars.

Sure, that's a valid concern. But I agree with FreeDuck, roger and others that you can only be so vigilant, and if you are, that has its own drawbacks.

If something like this happens AGAIN, that'd be a different story, but I don't think charges are necessary or helpful now.

Reyn- I think that life is full of big and little pitfalls. I would bet that a number of negative things that have happened to us over the years could be traced to outright stupidity and neglect of some other person. It does not mean that we need to exact retribution for every thoughtless act that culminated in unwanted consequences. Hey, that's the price that we pay for being alive. Life means risk!

They certainly could have, and I agree that the parents would be liable, but I still think roger has a point. We can't lock kids down because they might get hurt, or hurt someone else. Believe me, I'd be freaked if something like this happened. But can't kids hurt others in other ways? What about the kid who doesn't look before crossing a street and causes an auto accident. What about the kid that leaves his toys out and someone trips over them and breaks an ankle.

It's important to teach kids about their actions and possible consequences, but short of living their lives for them, I don't know how we can keep them from hurting themselves and others.

I agree with the last 3 posts, but if there were follow-up incidents where it appears the parents were indeed being careless, I think more should be done other than a warning - whatever that would entail.

I agree with freeduck. I leave my keys where the kids can get them (2 and 6 years old) and would never dream, they would drive a car. I wouldn't even expect them to walk out of the house on their own either, forget about grabbing the keys - knowing which car they go to and to understand to put the key in the ignition and then to shift the car, even work the pedals.

The only thing I can think of is that the parents in this case has shown or explained to the kids how the car works. Even that is not farfetched if the kids asked. One thing I can say for the kids, they are pretty clever.

As freeduck said, I didn't babyproof to the extent that most parents do - probably because my first baby was not adventurous and rarely got into things, but until they got older I do not leave them alone (but at age 3 and 5 they are old enough to be left in another room alone for short periods of time. I don't think you are careless freeduck - if you saw that your child got into certain things - you would probably lock up cabinets or move things from them they could harm themselves with - you access the risk depending on the child.

Another note on childproofing dependent on the child - I have a friend whose child when a toddler would try to get out to the house. She had to put a chain lock, near the top of the door to prevent his escapes. The little devil was then caught with a broom trying to undo the lock! My youngest brother was like this and had to be watched like a hawk. One time in a matter of a few minutes, we noticed he was gone! He escaped with the door locked - we found him walking down the street in his diapers.

Definitely, I've heard lots of escape artist stories. Eek.

Totally agree on assessing the the risk based on the child. My kids will not go outside without my knowledge at this point, but if the time came when I didn't feel comfortably sure that they wouldn't, I might take different precautions, possible including locking my car (so they won't play in it) and keeping the keys out of sight.

Kind of another subject, but related: one thing I did notice with both my kids was that the more I reacted to their getting into things and tried to keep them away from things, the more they worked at doing it. I remember my son would wander away from me, but always look back to see if I followed. If I did follow, he'd break into a run (or a toddle). I started thinking about what would happen if he wandered in the direction of traffic -- and I pursued. So I stopped following, and he didn't wander very far after that. Similar things happened if there were places I tried to keep him from. I'm not sure what I'm getting at here, only maybe re-iterating what we've already said about assessing the risk and not being overly protective/cautious.

Basically I think what you are saying freeduck is that every child is different. What works with yours, that not chasing thing, may not work with another (my monster brother). Although I know what you mean, if you make something seem so off limits it becomes much inviting to them; makes them more curious.

As far as the running thing - they way you handle it worked great with my older daughter, but my more adventurous younger daughter - no way. She would keep going whether I chased her or not. Believe me - I tried and spent a good amount of time searching through the library stacks to find her.

That's too true, and your younger daughter sounds a lot like my daughter -- it didn't work for her either. I even used to follow her but hide so that she wouldn't know I was there, just to see how far she would go. She never looked back. I can't remember if we actually solved this problem or if she just grew out of it.

But yeah, every kid is different and there's no need to put your house on lockdown because somebody else's kids drove a car down the street. I think that's what I'm getting at.