15 year old traveling alone

[Green Maned Lion]

Youths are generally a step dumber than the parents that raise them. It's a natural progression.

 

[Palmland]

Times have changed. Long ago as a 12 year old my parents sent me on an 18 hour journey involving 2 railroads and a change from thru sleeper to coach for the last couple hours. The porter kept tabs on me and as a 'seasoned' traveler I was never concerned.

 

[MikefromCrete]

We live in a lawsuit-happy society and often judges and juries have no common sense.

Especially when it comes to children. I tend to believe that children who do really stupid things and injure themselves because of it should suffer the consequences 'cause it's their own damn fault. But that's not how our courts have leaned in recent years."Free range children" is a reference to this: http://www.freerangekids.com/ And the book: http://www.amazon.com/Free-Range-Raise-Self-Reliant-Children-Without/dp/0470574755/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&tag=derivstratmag-20&qid=1342367313 For God's sake, I was wandering through fields by myself at 6, and trusted to be left alone within buildings by 8, and my parents were frankly overprotective. By middle school I could go anywhere I wanted alone. Massive restrictions on kids under 16 ?!? Seriously, 16 ?!?

In some ways kids today are more worldly than ever. If they are so inclined they can research millions of potentially life changing topics at the speed of light. Yet in other areas kids today are even less aware of the world they live in than the generation which preceded them. Our desire to protect our offspring at all costs is an understandable emotional reaction to the horrible events that befall a relatively tiny number of children but attract the vast majority of our media's attention.

Unfortunately if we take it too far our protection can become counterproductive. The more you insulate and isolate children the longer it can take them to advance beyond thinking like a child. The mistakes and mishaps you and I were able to make and learn from at a young age are no longer possible for many youths today. Meaningful adult role models and mature viewpoints beyond those of the immediate family unit are becoming fewer and farther between.

Have you ever spent much time with an adult who was home schooled as a child? Their level of understanding is often impressibly strong in some areas but mind bogglingly weak it others. Rote memorization like geography and math can be amazingly sharp while more nuanced topics like world history and the scientific method are often poorly understood. References to popular culture in their youth are easily missed while street smarts can be almost entirely absent. Exploring other cultures and interacting with folks from other backgrounds is often avoided. If their parent didn't know and care about something the child generally has no knowledge or concern of it either.

Can you imagine learning most of what you knew from a single person who had never studied to become a teacher or traveled beyond their immediate area, or interacted with people outside of their social and economic status? In some ways Amtrak is melting pot, and that's a good thing, but if it's one of your first experiences outside of an overly protective familial cocoon then you might not quite be ready for it. I'm guessing that's where Amtrak policy may be coming from. The way things are going now you may need to be seventeen or eighteen to ride Amtrak in the future due to the unnaturally persistent ignorance we're inadvertently forcing upon our youth.

Anyway that's just one man's take on modern life so feel free to take it with a grain of salt.

A post from the Devil's Advocate that I actually agree with!

 

[neroden]

Devil's Advocate, thanks for your thoughtful post, and I agree with most of it. I suppose part of the cause of this is the media; extremely rare bad events happen, and the media blows them up out of all proportion, and parents mistakenly think that they're common and become overprotective. This was happening already in the 1980s with the completely absurd scares about kidnappings by strangers; these are incredibly rare, probably less common than being struck by lightning, but you would have thought it was happening every 5 minutes from the way the media were acting.

 

[Ryan]

Yep.

Just another symptom of the lack of real news and the 24 hour infotainment industry.

 

[andersone]

My daughter, in the second week of Kindergarten asked to walk home from school. We thought she meant from the bus stop at the top of hill, maybe a half mile. When my wife called me at work in a panic when she didn't make it home, I rushed home. By the time I got there she had made it home, walking the entire three miles (and crossing a four lane highway). Afterwards she was permitted to walk home from the bus stop.

 

[George Harris]

While I will not argue about the rarity of stranger kidnapping, dealing with the wild and wierd on Amtrak and elsewhere, and have seen how my children acted and grandchildren have acted in their 13 through highschool age ranges, sometimes you have to think the story of the lion and the gazelle:

If the lion loses, he loses a meal. If the gazelle loses he loses his life. That is, if the gazelle loses once it is over.

I do not want them to lose like the gazelle. That having been said, for my children when they were in this age range we were living in a city and country where crimes against children simply were not tolerated, so any such criminal usually did not live to commit another. That unfortunately is far from the case in the US, so my grandchildren do not get the same level of wandering despite being able to handle themselves well in public transportation and other public situation.

 

[neroden]

Your grandchildren are far safer wandering around now in the US than they would have been during almost any era of history almost anywhere. Of course, people's perceptions about this are mostly wrong.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Yeah too bad we don't have mob justice and vigilantes to resolve our problems like other countries. I'm surprised it doesn't warm his heart that the US has some of the strictest punishments for an industrialized democracy. Other slightly more enlightened countries have been known to see our sad example as proof that implementing the death penalty is both prone to mistakes and a lousy deterrent.

 

[neroden]

In my experience, the most dangerous people your kids are likely to encounter are (a) other kids, and (b) authority figures, people in positions of power. Unfortunately, when people try to "protect their kids"... that's not who they try to protect them from. :sigh:

 

[Paulus]

Yeah too bad we don't have mob justice and vigilantes to resolve our problems like other countries. I'm surprised it doesn't warm his heart that the US has some of the strictest punishments for an industrialized democracy. Other slightly more enlightened countries have been known to see our sad example as proof that implementing the death penalty is both prone to mistakes and a lousy deterrent.

Deterrence is based on quick punishment rather than what the punishment is necessarily. As for being prone to mistakes, it's no more prone to mistakes than any other sentence; wrongful convictions are an indictment of the justice system as a whole, not of the death penalty in particular.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Yeah too bad we don't have mob justice and vigilantes to resolve our problems like other countries. I'm surprised it doesn't warm his heart that the US has some of the strictest punishments for an industrialized democracy. Other slightly more enlightened countries have been known to see our sad example as proof that implementing the death penalty is both prone to mistakes and a lousy deterrent.

Deterrence is based on quick punishment rather than what the punishment is necessarily. As for being prone to mistakes, it's no more prone to mistakes than any other sentence; wrongful convictions are an indictment of the justice system as a whole, not of the death penalty in particular.

If it's not an improved deterrent and it's just as prone to wrongful convictions as any other sentence then why bother keeping it around? As bad as it is sentence the wrong person to life in prison for a crime they didn't commit at least you're able to give them something back if and when there is evidence exonerating them. After you kill the wrong person there's simply no way to correct your mistake. I don't have a moral or ethical problem with the death penalty itself. I simply don't have anywhere near enough faith in our lopsided judicial system only kill people who actually deserve it. Mob justice and vigilantism are about as wise and intelligent as rolling dice to determine guilt and punishment.

 

[Ryan]

The difference is when you wrongly convince someone (it's gonna happen, people are human and make mistakes) and send them to prison, you can set the free and compensate them when you figure it out.

You can't exactly reanimate a corpse and send them on their way when you figure out you've screwed it up.

But we're probably way the heck off topic on this one. Hopefully the OP's gotten what they need by now.

 

[fillyjonk]

The policy is arbitrary. But of course, there has to be an arbitrary "no one unaccompanied below this age" policy, so you don't get parents sending six-year-olds on a train or something.

I've met plenty of fifteen year olds that would be able to deal with a cross-country Amtrak trip, complete with connections. But I've also known 30 year olds who couldn't handle it.

And even then, there's freaky stuff that can happen on Amtrak. (I am thinking of the time when I had some guy try to press his address on me; he wanted me to send him my pony tail if I ever cut it off. I was over 30 at the time and could deal with it by moving to the lounge car for the last couple hours of the trip and telling the Amtrak guy there "someone's bothering me in coach, I'm going to stay here because he'll probably leave me alone." But if the guy had been more than a pervy creeper, or if I had been a lot younger and meeker than I am? I don't know)

 

[VentureForth]

The policy is not arbitrary. It's specific. Perhaps the enforcement is arbitrary, but if you allow someone to break such a policy and something goes awry, you're done for.

Even as a white boy in Tokyo, I never had any problems riding the trains alone from around 12 years old. Had friends in Kindergarten ride the train alone to school. Long distance may be another issue, but there were no restrictions in Japan so far as I recall.

At least not in the 80's...

 

[Devil's Advocate]

The policy is not arbitrary. It's specific. Perhaps the enforcement is arbitrary, but if you allow someone to break such a policy and something goes awry, you're done for. Even as a white boy in Tokyo, I never had any problems riding the trains alone from around 12 years old. Had friends in Kindergarten ride the train alone to school. Long distance may be another issue, but there were no restrictions in Japan so far as I recall. At least not in the 80's...

Japan is a rather confusing paradox when it comes to issues such as this. Depending on how you're judging Japanese society it can either look extremely depraved (popular media) or incredibly safe (crime statistics). Is it the tactically distributed police force or the absurd 98% conviction rate that keeps people safe? Does the bizarre media play a role in giving perverts alternatives to attacking others? I have no idea what the answers are but Japan's unique situation sure makes for an unusual discussion.

 

[VentureForth]

Valid points. I would certainly have NOT felt as comfortable during my time there if I were female. I haven't ever discussed the issue with my sister. Wonder if she feels the same.

Just as I was leaving the country at the end of my high school years, they started the installation of women-only coaches on some of the highest demand trains.

As far as tactically distributed police force, in my 18 years there (6+ of riding transit), I have rarely seen police. In fact, I can say that I have never seen police in the train stations, nor on trains themselves. The only times I've seen them were in their little "Kobans" (little police boxes) that are near every major station, a couple of times during high speed chases (darn motorcyclists), and a few on regular patrol (oh, and one that came up on a bicycle when I was in a minor wreck).

 

[ehbowen]

The policy is arbitrary. But of course, there has to be an arbitrary "no one unaccompanied below this age" policy, so you don't get parents sending six-year-olds on a train or something.

Unaccompanied six-year-olds on trains used to be no big deal (personal anecdote at bottom of page).

 

[EB_OBS]

The policy is arbitrary. But of course, there has to be an arbitrary "no one unaccompanied below this age" policy, so you don't get parents sending six-year-olds on a train or something.

Unaccompanied six-year-olds on trains used to be no big deal (personal anecdote at bottom of page).

Nice story.

 

[BCL]

The policy is not arbitrary. It's specific. Perhaps the enforcement is arbitrary, but if you allow someone to break such a policy and something goes awry, you're done for. Even as a white boy in Tokyo, I never had any problems riding the trains alone from around 12 years old. Had friends in Kindergarten ride the train alone to school. Long distance may be another issue, but there were no restrictions in Japan so far as I recall. At least not in the 80's...

Japan is a rather confusing paradox when it comes to issues such as this. Depending on how you're judging Japanese society it can either look extremely depraved (popular media) or incredibly safe (crime statistics). Is it the tactically distributed police force or the absurd 98% conviction rate that keeps people safe? Does the bizarre media play a role in giving perverts alternatives to attacking others? I have no idea what the answers are but Japan's unique situation sure makes for an unusual discussion.

They have a huge issue with women being groped on crowded commuter trains. There's a certain amount of anonymity and less fear of being discovered and being able to disappear into a mass of people. And even when discovered, often the police would just ignore it and move on to what they thought were more pressing matters like petty theft.

I think they are taking it more seriously now, but most women riding trains report that they're still groped regularly and without consequences for the perpetrators.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

The policy is not arbitrary. It's specific. Perhaps the enforcement is arbitrary, but if you allow someone to break such a policy and something goes awry, you're done for. Even as a white boy in Tokyo, I never had any problems riding the trains alone from around 12 years old. Had friends in Kindergarten ride the train alone to school. Long distance may be another issue, but there were no restrictions in Japan so far as I recall. At least not in the 80's...

Japan is a rather confusing paradox when it comes to issues such as this. Depending on how you're judging Japanese society it can either look extremely depraved (popular media) or incredibly safe (crime statistics). Is it the tactically distributed police force or the absurd 98% conviction rate that keeps people safe? Does the bizarre media play a role in giving perverts alternatives to attacking others? I have no idea what the answers are but Japan's unique situation sure makes for an unusual discussion.

They have a huge issue with women being groped on crowded commuter trains. There's a certain amount of anonymity and less fear of being discovered and being able to disappear into a mass of people. And even when discovered, often the police would just ignore it and move on to what they thought were more pressing matters like petty theft. I think they are taking it more seriously now, but most women riding trains report that they're still groped regularly and without consequences for the perpetrators.

I believe this was a much larger problem in the past and was probably an indictment of social and cultural norms as much as it was the police. Japan has long been a chauvinist (and yet effeminate) culture that has taken a long time to catch up with other first world countries. In more recent times both groping and illicit photo taking have become major targets of protection both in the sense of prevention and punishment.

 

[ehbowen]

The policy is arbitrary. But of course, there has to be an arbitrary "no one unaccompanied below this age" policy, so you don't get parents sending six-year-olds on a train or something.

Unaccompanied six-year-olds on trains used to be no big deal (personal anecdote at bottom of page).

Nice story.

Heck, they even made a (short) movie about an unaccompanied minor on a long distance train trip....

 

[boxcarsyix]

The policy is arbitrary. But of course, there has to be an arbitrary "no one unaccompanied below this age" policy, so you don't get parents sending six-year-olds on a train or something.

Unaccompanied six-year-olds on trains used to be no big deal (personal anecdote at bottom of page).

Nice story.

Heck, they even made a (short) movie about an unaccompanied minor on a long distance train trip....

Note the uniformed gate dragon in Chicago