One time when I was biking home from middle school the office got suspicious that I was biking instead of riding home in a car, and they had to keep me in the office and call my parents
this post was submitted on 20 Jun 2026
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Like malls, parks, the skate park?
arcades, bowling alleys and skating rinks.
coffee shops, record stores, hobby shops.
These places kind of still exist, just they all require that you spend money. The landlords have gotten out of control so no one can afford to not constantly be charging money for these kinds of spaces, so they just keep going out of business
Rec centers, pools, and under 18 clubs.
I don't want to fix anyone's social media addiction. I want to bitch about kids on social media and feel like a genius
I went to a Nerf tournament and humans vs. zombies game at a college campus a while back. The Nerf hobby has some interesting intersections. On the one hand, there are some legitimately competitive teams who drill and practice and have standardized uniforms and blasters and everything, so there's some organized sports types in there. On the other hand, it overlaps with the gun hobby, seeing as it's playing at being a gun fight, and it uses a lot of the same accessories. On the other other hand, it seems to be a very queer-friendly hobby; definitely a lot of flags being represented that weekend.
All of these disparate groups had a great time with each other. Huge range of demographics, all having good wholesome fun, making new friends, using their bodies and their minds, expressing themselves while also respecting the rules and structures of the game and the college campus. It was beautiful.
At the end of the weekend, the college Nerf club, which had been running these events on campus for years, came out and tearfully announced that this would be the last such event, because the college administration had announced there would be no further blaster events permitted on campus. Nobody got hurt that weekend, but presumably the administration was afraid of getting sued if someone did.
And just like that, a beautiful mechanism for bringing together lots of strangers and making them into friends and comrades disappeared in a whiff of imaginary liability for a theoretical accident that hadn't actually happened.
And we wonder why young people are addicted to social media and video games.
I work at a museum and our director has started using the term third space to justify a finacialization of our non-profit. Be mindful of how the term is being used by capitalists to extract more resources.
Just, giving them a future to believe in might help too.
Bring back unsupervised third spaces that you don’t tell your parents about.
That’s where you build character.
And find porn.
The very concept of unsupervised kids is so anathema to society today. Kids need spaces to just be kids.
Summer camp - the overnight, week or two long kind, is a great middle ground. Yes, kids are "supervised". But... Mostly, just by bigger kids. Who are there, mostly to have fun too. Run, play, swim, learn about themselves and other people. My boys both spent every summer for 12+ years at camp. And they always grew, so, so much while they were there.
And burn things. And explode things.
When I through that lighter at the wall of the empty foundation of a house that was never built in the woods behind my house and it exploded, I finally felt like myself for the first time
And do sick jumps on your bike
And smoke a little weed then stress reeeeaaaal hard for a few hours
They don't have "a little weed" anymore, it's all weapons grade real drugs you plug it in to smoke it or you use a blow torch and if you're so inclined you will have a psychotic episode if you smoke too much. (And by inclined I mean any family history of mental health issues or just shit luck of the draw)
The Fear
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As a kid growing up in the 2010s, I remember when there used to be PS1 kiosks in the middle of the joint, all 4 in a row playing Crash Bandicoot. The kiosks even looked the part with artificial grass and green and sandy beige paint. I don't remember where I saw them though, it might've been a Maccas, Hungry Jacks or some random resturant. But these kiosks weren't that busy since most of the other kids were busy playing in the playground. And I think that speaks measures about how much things has changed since the 2010s vs 2020s in terms of hope for our children and the hope children have in themselves. You can absolutely be sure there'd be 4 or 5 more kiosks for these kids playing Fortnite or some other F2P game, while the resturant completely rids of the play area (or it just gets underutilized by the kids).
The majority of kids nowadays have been raised with the notion that nothing is more entertaining than an iPad. They spend time alone with an internet connection and flashing lights, and even if they go to a park, they'll still prefer to be alone with flashing lights rather than socialize with the other kids. This obviously stunts their social abilities and willingness to become friends with everyone, which is the same whimsy we've all had when we were kids, me included.
These kids have almost nothing to make friends out of, with the removal of third places and parents not knowing how to raise them, as well as all of them being basically identical since they watch the same content as every other kid instead of doing other endeavours like painting or bike riding. But ay, world's changing and giving mega corps every facet of our children's lives was definitely a good call.
It's not completely lost on the kids though, as I see they're still making friends on the odd occasion. A family friend of ours have kids that go to soccer practice, play with all sorts of tools in the yard and even helps out their parents while they're gardening and doing housework. These kids, ironically, are being raised the same way we were, with old game consoles and limited access to the internet. Thus their boredom turns into curiousity, like what most parents should be doing instead of handing the phone to a screaming child.
I've been watching too much bullshit about Gen Alpha being a tragic generation and I could go on and on but I'll save people's ear from me lol
The shit kids have to go through to attempt to be social nowadays is nuts though. Social media, cyber bullying. Everything being recorded. Helicopter parenting. Plus nobody else to play with.
Best option, mandatory organized sports or some other disconnected activities.
Makes me very happy a family of screen restricted kids moved in near us the end of last year. Their kids and mine have fast become friends.
They ride around on thier bikdes in the neighborhood, know everyone, and generally have fun being kids. There are so few kids out these days, the elder folks are actually all smiles to see them, its fantastic.
I fear that everything being recorded affects us adults too, since part of our fear of meeting someone new might make us "cringe-worthy" if it gets posted to social media, something that previous generations of kids and teens didn't get to experience. I was raised in the cusp of that shifting period and it affected my social life during high school and still affects me today.
I think mandates for kid actvities would be great, but the parents would have to guarantee that it's free and ensure that their work won't call them up during that time. This could easily be done by allowing a 4 day work week for parents exclusively and a day that they spend all for their kids, whether or not it's a little home schooling or going to an activity. But in the current landscape of slavery-with-extra-steps and how the ruling class views us working class, when will that ever happen??
There's the other thing about parents, they don't have enough time to spend on their kids. I probably shouldn't have been so quick to judge the parents and it's not the onus on them. Parents nowadays are burnt out from work while they're in the workplace and also have to face the burden of always being available for work, i.e. work calling them for an extra shift or remote work during the weekends. It's getting harder and harder for parents to tend to their kids, which makes the iPad the ideal babysitter since it's mostly a pay once item and can keep the kids busy while they're slaving away working. This makes both the kids and parents have a miserable experience as they grow, and dare I say the younger generation might realise this as they grow older and become radicalized over workplace reforms and such.
It's also beccoming increasingly expensive to raise kids nowadays. It's especially hard keeping one person up on their feet nowadays, imagine having to pay for daipers at one point and paying for toys and accessories the other for 18 years straight. I mean fark, I'm not thinking of having kids until shit gets stable enough and I'm not even thinking of paying a Wi-Fi plan when I get my own place. Capitalism is a great system with no flaws.
I would also really like to see a governmental permit office that distributes permit numbers on demand which can be used for age verification without revealing ANY information about the person verifying to ANY private entities.
I want to see this in a bunch of countries.
yeah there's three organizations that could provide these permits: government, companies, or non-profit organizations. you can just start your own if you have the technical know-how, just to do a proof-of-concept and to show others how it could be done.
No. Private ID Verification Companies should not be allowed. Companies can't even be trusted to handle fucking credit scores or train tickets.
Government office or no verification, that is where I stand.
Yeah, I think you're correct, even if a private company was started with the idea not to sell the data collected for this endeavor, or even not to collect identifying information. It would still end up eventually collecting the data and eventually selling the information. And if somehow it didn't then someone else would compete with that company and then that company would do so.
But where will I park my car and how will those places make money, that's America today
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