CITIZENS Barbara's
Column Teach Caution but not Fear to Children No one warns us about the fear. No one warns little girls as they play with their baby dolls. No one warns young men when they fantasize about playing catch with their
firstborn. Gynecologists do not mention it when they confirm a first pregnancy, and
practitioners do not mention it during childbirth classes. Even future grandparents keep the secret. No one ever tells us that from the moment our first child is born until we parents
die, we will never again be free of fear. By the time we realize this, it is too late. From childbirth on, every time we hear of something terrible happening to a child
-- an accident, a natural disaster, an illness, an assault, a death -- we will feel not
only sympathy for the parents of that child, but terror that it could happen to ours. The greatest fear is the sexual predator. The thought of our child, torn from our
midst in a moment of inattention, alone and helpless in the hands of a sexual deviate, is
unendurable. Some of us deal with this fear by frightening our kids. We teach them that all
strangers, and maybe some relatives, are dangerous; these poor children grow up stunted
and terrified, running from anyone who smiles or talks to or tries to hug them. Some of us deal with the fear by pretending that the government will protect our
families. When judges let us down by setting sex offenders free, we urge our legislator to
create a sex offender registry so we at least know where they are. This, of course,
doesn't protect our children from the first-time offender who might live, unrecognized,
next door. And unless we plan to keep watch day and night, it doesn't really protect them
from the known offender either. The fact is, there is no safety, not on this earth, not in this life. Another fact is, that for most Americans at least, there isn't that much danger
either. Child abduction by sex offenders is so rare that it still makes the news. It's so
rare that we still feel outrage when it does happen. It's so rare that most of us don't
personally know any family that has experienced it. Almost all children grow to adulthood without any of the above-mentioned terrible
things happening to them. They grow up relatively fearless, fall in love with a stranger,
then go on to have a child of their own. Even after they discover the fear, some of them have more children, and become too
busy to dwell on it. Most of us, for that matter, are too busy to dwell on it. From what
I've read, most of us are too busy to even check the sex offender registry to see if
there's one in our neighborhood. There's nothing wrong with having a registry. If someone is convicted of a serious
sex crime, lifelong registration should be part of his sentence, to follow the prison
term. This serious crime, however, should be a real one that endangers children or
strangers, not just politically-incorrect harassment or the imaginary offenses that jailed
innocent people like the Amiraults of Malden during the daycare hysteria of the '80s. As parents, we have more to fear than fear itself. But fear itself can harm a
child, a family, and our quality of life. We should keep a reasonable eye on our children,
teach them what to do if they are improperly approached, then get on with enjoying our
lives and theirs. Barbara Anderson is executive
director of Citizens for Limited Taxation. Her syndicated columns appear in the
Salem Evening News, the Lowell Sun, the Tinytown Gazette and other publications around the
state. |