WTF is this person's problem!?

[conuly]

DEAR HARRIETTE: I've been feeling concerned about my teenage daughter lately. She's started spending time with a new group of friends who are really into extreme sports like skateboarding and parkour. This is a big shift from the activities we've always encouraged, such as volunteering and participating in community events. Last night she mentioned planning a parkour session at an old factory, and it made me uneasy. I'm worried about the risks involved and how this new interest might pull her away from the values we've worked hard to instill. I know that today's generation seems to have different sensitivities compared to ours, and I'm reluctant to simply forbid her from pursuing her interests. I want to discuss my concerns with her, but I'm not sure how to approach the conversation without pushing her away. How can I express my worries while remaining supportive and keeping our lines of communication open? -- Concerned Parent

DEAR CONCERNED PARENT: Rather than forbidding her from these activities, learn about them alongside her. Encourage your daughter to use the proper safety gear and to be careful. Telling her she can't do something would likely lead to her doing it without informing you. I recommend supporting her exploration of these sports with caution while also remembering community service. Participate in volunteer opportunities as a family while encouraging her to tell you about her extreme sports activities.

Link

Comments

[conuly]

I guess Harriette decided not to even address the absolutely bizarre concern that having a hobby would detract from charitable deeds. And, fair, I'm not sure what you can say to that.

(Does LW think that these "extreme" sports involve joining a gang!? That's about all I can figure.)

[melannen]

I strongly suspect that the "new friends" include people who are the "wrong sort", yes.

If LW was concerned her kid was taking dangerous risks and breaking the law to trespass, I would sympathize, but she doesn't even seem to be concerned her kid might fall off a roof and break her neck and get tetanus in a condemned building, just that she might develop "the wrong values"...

[lilysea]

LW

your daughter is not base-jumping

or using cocaine

she's SKATEBOARDING.

Be thankful and grow a sense of proportion.

[petra]

Sometimes I have no response except to sing On Children.

[dissectionist]

Having spent time in the ER after my kid had a 16-foot fall during parkour, and having gotten dinner-plate-sized bruises myself, I can confirm that it’s dangerous. (The kid in question did continue lessons after that.) Find a local parkour gym where she can learn proper skills and how to do it as safely as possible, then cross your fingers and hope for the best. Sometimes kids get into dangerous activities and that’s just how it is; they’ll do it whether you want them to or not, so go for a harm-reduction approach.

[conuly]

If LW had only focused on the potential physical risk I would not be so weirded out by the letter.

[dissectionist]

I feel like most of the letter was code for “she’s hanging out with PEOPLE BEYOND OUR FAMILY and I don’t like her having other influences”, but that’s not something LW can be helped with until she realizes it’s a problem. Helping to keep a kid safer during parkour, I know something about. :P But I’ve never understood or been able to empathize with parents who are terrified of their kids becoming their own people.

[full_metal_ox]

Another missing lede: the “volunteering” and “community activities” LW would prefer their daughter to engage in are unspecified.

[nineveh_uk]

I would bet they are connected with a religious organisation.

[dissectionist]

I think I automatically assumed that was [church] volunteering and [Christian] community events, but I could be wrong.

[full_metal_ox]

So we could be talking anything from picking up litter along a local stretch of highway to rallying about how Vice-President Harris was spotted at the Devil’s Sabbath.

[melannen]

Yeah, same, this feels strongly to me like someone trying not to say "She's doing things that don't have a Youth Pastor in charge and I'm afraid she's being lured away from the Church"

[fox]

Parkour pulls kids away from their parents' values?

[adrian_turtle]

I can very easily imagine an LW who would not have written this way about their son, but who is sincerely concerned about their daughter shifting away from her parents' values. I'm not saying their concern is right. I'm saying it could be sincerely felt. The girl is probably hanging out with boys. Wearing trousers. Listening to rebellious music. Skateboarding isn't only a sport; there's art and a whole subculture attached. (That subculture is no longer entirely punk, but the punk is not very dilute either.) And parkour looks like what criminals do in movies.

[fox]

I guess. The place where my kid took parkour in kindergarten looked way more like gymnastics.

[azurelunatic]

Gym parkour and "old factory" parkour seem like different things, even though they're using the same skills. I would not encourage my (now adult) daughter to do old factory parkour without first having developed skills in gym parkour.

[conuly]

Well, a structured and adult-led activity for early elementary kids is likely to be very different from a more spontaneous teen-led activity for their peers.

[watersword]

I have recently been thinking about my own teenage/young adult years and realizing how hard it must have been for my mom to watch me struggle and do stuff beyond her experience, and how well she handled it, but my mom has always taken the attitude that she was raising people to be adults, and somehow this LW does not inspire confidence that her (I assume) parenting is focused on that goal.

[mrissa]

I would love to hear more about the different sensitivities compared to ours, I am very "chin in my hands, bucket of popcorn" about what that could possibly mean about [checks notes] skateboarding. I'm 46, I'm roughly the age people who have a teenager are, older than some and younger than others. Did every middle-aged person not have friends and acquaintances they cheerfully and non-derisively described as "skate punks"? I feel like skate punks are now eternal. When I drive past a skate park and there are teenagers there, my reaction is, "awwwww!" What sensitivities do da yoots have that are different from this?

[full_metal_ox]

Precisely: Tony Hawk(1) is now old enough to qualify for some senior discounts. LW reminds me of this earlier LW fretting about their “hippie” niece: their concept of New (And Unfamiliar, And Therefore Scary!) Youth Subculture is running on a couple generations’ delay. (Before you know it, skateboarding and parkour will lead to…rock and roll!)

https://agonyaunt.dreamwidth.org/728205.html

(1) Who has done a fair amount of charitable work of his own, including endowing
skateparks to give kids a place to do something more wholesome than gangbanging, in a designated environment constructed for the purpose.