Conference quark::human_relations-v1

    Ken,
    
    Kids often do not pick up on what is meant by a stranger, i.e. if
    the person you are with knows the person, then it is not a stranger,
    or another kid near them in age such as this case, couldn't be
    dangerous.
    
    I recall when I saw my son (then about 16) talking to two very
    unsavory looking characters who were in a car out in front of
    our house. I went out and spoke to them and they said they
    were looking for houses for sale. (I called the cops and it
    turned out they were drug dealers looking for isolated or
    abandoned buildings). Yet we often have lost people stopping
    on our rural road and asking directions. It was just these
    two gave me an immediate case of the creeps. 
    
    We talked after wards about trusting ones hunches, and that if
    someone made the kids at all nervous to clear out fast.
    
    Have you considered also entering this note in the parenting notes
    file (terza::parenting)?
    
    Bonnie

    
    I gave up on the "stranger" routine...
    
    The rule is...
    
    "You don't ride with ANYONE unless Mom or Dad said you could.
    Period. End_discussion. Under any circumstances. Walking will most
    likely not kill you....
    
    It has lead to one [I thought amusing] occurance when Eric refused a
    ride from the local minister. The Minister was appalled....I was
    pleased. Eric got rewarded...after all, The Reverencd was not on my
    list of folks that its OK to ride with.
    
    ...I'ld-a been scared to death too....but STRANGER is such an
    ambivilent term...I just trashed it all together. *I* had trouble
    defining it sifficiently without relying on my ADULT judgement [as
    Bonnie was saying...the "creeps"]...so I felt I could not expect Eric
    to successfully do so.
    
    FWIW...
    
    hugs
    
    Mel

    re - .2
    
    My dad did the same thing to me, after I geve him the same type of
    scare as .0's daughter when I was 10.  I was walking home from the
    corner store and this man in uniform offered to give me ride home.
    He asked me my name and I told him.  He told me his name and that he 
    knew my father so I accepted the ride.  I was *very* lucky to get
    home without incident.  My dad had *never* heard of the guy.  From 
    then on, I was forbidden under penalty of death or worse (no TV) to
    accept rides from anyone unless my parents gave explicit permission
    before hand.
    
    This definitely impressed me deeply!  When I was in my last year of 
    high school, I was walking home with a friend when a pick-up truck
    stopped and the driver yelled "C'mon!  We'll give you a ride!"  My
    friend started to get in the truck bed.  I was appalled and told her,
    loud enough so the driver and his friends could hear, "We can't accept
    a ride from a stranger!"
    
    She gave me an odd look and said "Get in!  He's my brother!"
    
    But I still don't ride with strangers.
    
    Carol
    

    
    When my children were young, I made rules with for them that weren't
    complicated. Never get into anyones car, never open the door to
    any one. My kids were alone a lot because I was a single parent,
    but I lived in a three decker in the city and my land lady was always
    home and kept an eye out for them. One day my mother came to visit
    before I got home and my daughter wouldn't let her in. The rule
    was "don't let any one in no matter who they said they were, even
    if they said it's mom. " My mother understood the rule and went
    and sat in the car and waited for me. My kids were school aged.
    what today they call "latch key kids". This was in the days before
    all the publicity about child abduction and abuse. 
    
    When making rules for kids, keep them simple and don't make a lot
    of exceptions. Most parents make rules and then (usually for there
    own convience) start making exceptions. It's right down to the simple
    things like "no sweets within a specified time before dinner" this
    only works if you are consistent with "no", the first time you give
    the kid a cookie because you are tired and you can't stand the
    whinning, you have made an exception, the kid has changed the rule
    and now is in control. This is one reason why kids sometimes have
    a problem following rules.     

    I know when I was a kid, my mom and dad warned us about taking rides
    from strangers, because they told us what the CONSEQUENSES could be if
    we did.  Yep, it scared the living daylights out of my brother and I.
    
    Lynne 

    It has been statistically shown that most child molesters are known to
    the child when the molester first approaches a child for sex.

    While the warnings about taking rides, etc., from strangers are still
    good advise, children should also be told to tell a trusted adult
    (a parent in most cases.   If a parent is not available/is the
    instigator, a teacher or police officer.) of various forms of
    uncomfortable touching.  Friends and neighbors can harm or kill a child
    

    Beth