Having outgoing kids can be a really fantastic thing. Especially when you're waiting in a long line and your chatty three-year-old makes friends with everyone and people chill out. Both of my kids are super friendly, which I love since I was a very shy kid myself. We can't go to the grocery store or the auto body shop without my son or daughter making a new friend and gathering information along the way. In fact, my daughter once got a free blow-out at a hair salon because she so totally charmed the woman doing my hair.
What I'm saying is being friendly to strangers has its advantages. But a series of incidents with strangers that set off my mom alarm made me realize that my kids don't have a filter yet. They really can't figure out who is a nice check-out lady, and what guy should probably not be allowed to work around children, if his creep-tastic leer is any indication. And I have no idea how to inject that information into their two- and five-year-old brains.
I tried after one encounter to explain that "You don't have to talk to strangers," only to have my daughter say, "But he was funny." Yeah, he was funny. If you think an inappropriate interest in toddler swim class protocol is funny. Still, I was there to protect my daughter and a little bit of bizarre conversation in my presence did not harm her in the slightest. But if I'm not around, I don't want my kids thinking they can open up to any weirdo on the street.
Granted, I would be hard-pressed to think of a time my kids would be unattended and talking to random people in public. It would be nice, however, to trust that they have any instincts when it comes to weeding out potential dangerous adults from the majority of people in the world. As small as those numbers might be, it's not unrealistic to think they could encounter one such adult. We did twice in a row at the grocery store and then the coffee shop.
I don't worry about my children being abducted. I think the odds are in my favor as I don't have an ex-husband with custody issues, nor a weird cousin who believes these kids are really hers. I just want my kids to "get" when someone is off. And there's nothing in their experience thus far that can serve as a reference. We don't have a neighborhood drunk to avoid, or "that crazy Uncle Charlie" who usually stays in his mother's attic.
I'm simply hoping that this friendliness is someday tempered with self-preservation. After all, there will surely be a time they go to the grocery store without me. Right?
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Comments 51
I feel ya. My kids are the same way. They will just run off and start talking to anyone! We have had the stranger danger talk a few times.But my kiddos really do enjoy meeting new people and I am hoping it will aid them later in life. I too was a shy kid so its interesting that I produced such outgoing boys.
I think the thing to remember is that that "radar" comes with age and experience and is just not something such young ones are capable of understanding. It will come, but it is scary in the meantime.
LittleManMama is right... and we can help that Radar along a little. Bear with me, because I'm about to be VERY un-PC.
We live in a world where we are taught that anything less than being "tolerant" of every person's personal quirks - regardless of our own feelings on any issue. That homeless guy? He's just a nice guy who fell on hard times. And to think that he might be mentally unbalanced, a drug addict, an alcoholic, or anything else unpleasant is being "bigoted" or intolerant in some other way.
That black guy who is staring at you, watching every move you make? He's just observant. Maybe he's an artist who likes the shape of your face. If you're uncomfortable, you're a racist.
Every single day, we are told that our internal radar is wrong. That WE are the problem, that if our radar goes off, we're intolerant of this group or that person. So we have learned to ignore that radar. And so we pass it on to our kids.
continued...
YES, absolutely, we must teach our kids that just because a person has a different skin color than ours, he is not less than we are. We must teach our kids that some homeless people have just fallen on hard times. But the harsh reality is... there are bad folks out there. And we have an internal system that we need to develop. But we need to develop it in ourselves, first. And stop overriding it (without examiniation) every single time it goes off.
So the next time it DOES go off, ask yourself why, and push beyond "i'm feeding into a stereotype" or "I'm just being racist." Because maybe there's a reason for it. And figure out how it feels so you can describe it to your kids. Let them in on it... "there's something about that person that doesn't feel right to me. Let's keep moving." It's not teaching them to be intolerant. It's teaching them to trust their instincts. We don't have to like everybody.
If you think about it, it starts in preschool. Billy pushes Susie, and Susie is not allowed to push Billy back, because that's "fighting". Billy continues to push other kids around, because there are no consequences. Yeah, Billy is becoming a bully. But at the same time, those other kids are being told to be friends with Billy, because "he just needs a friend, and then everything will be ok. Maybe he's just lonely. Maybe YOU can show him how to be nice!"
All through school, Billy is handled with kid gloves, because we're supposed to "talk things out". The kids who don't want to deal with Billy are told that they should play with him - against their personal wishes, and ignoring that internal radar that says, "Stay away, this guy is bad news." It happens every day, all the way into adulthood. If you don't like our current president, it's because you're a racist, not because your internal radar says, "this guy is bad news, stay away."
Let your kids pick their own friends. If they say, "I just don't like him/her," accept that as a good reason to stay away. As soon as your school allows kids to have their own birthday parties the way they want - without inviting the whole class so nobody feels left out - let them. They're developing that radar.
Trust them. And they'll trust themselves. And that radar will develop sooner than you think. There will be plenty of time to teach the subtle nuances of "tolerance" later, when they can understand them.
Exactly what pony chaser said... we have a saying at our house.."there is a difference between being judgemental and using good judgement" Animals are born with instinct and so are we..dont kill it in your kid.
In fact, white guys are 70% more likely to want your kids than black guys.
I think Kristian1 and ashley are both missing the point. The fact is some black guys are bad, and some white guys are bad, and maybe they DO want your kid. The point is that we don't know who these people are just by looking at them, so that internal sensor needs to be listened to instead of being pushed aside for fear of sounding like a bigot.
Kristian and Stephanie, Ponychaser was just using that as a for instance. She just as easily could have said Asian or Middle Eastern or American Indian. You completely miss the point.
I agree with Ponychaser 1000%. Very well said!
I also make sure my kids know to be leery of anyone bearing religious tracts...