I was ruminating the other day on the explosion of school buses in the city of Toronto in the last decade or so and wondering just how molly coddled and thus unprepared for life kids are, and then today I heard a caller on the Bill Carroll show, a police officer talking about the kinds of calls for help that are coming in now to the police stations.

Bill Carroll was discussing a book by a British author and was focussing in on the author’s contention that we’re mixing up childhood spats with bullying. Real bullying occurs systematically by the strong to the weak. Throwing a cucumber at a classmate is not bullying (said cucumber thrower was arrested by British police apparently; nice to know it isn’t just the fear-averse North Americans panicking over normal kid behaviour but also the stiff-upper-lip Brits who perfected the art of enduring through anything). This mixing up is harming our children by not allowing them to learn to face and deal with adversity and by not allowing them to learn courage.

So this cop calls in. Apparently, 20-somethings are calling police stations to ask for help. What kind of help? Crime, you’re thinking, right? Well no, not the crime kind. No, the I-had-an-argument-with-my-parents and they-want-to-chuck-me-out, what-do-I-do, kind. What was that I was saying in my comments on October 17th about not teaching children the confidence of being competent in looking after themselves? How are we going to grow as a society or make thought-full decisions for our city when the adults don’t even know how to look after themselves?

Related posts:

1. Big Fish, Little Fish: Voices on Bullying
2. Blogtrotting: Thailand Passes Controversial Cyber Bill
3. Faker Fiver
4. Police In Blue Ball Caps
5. Caribana Goers: They are watching you!