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Speaker 1: It's their Happy Family's podcast. It's the podcast for the

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Speaker 1: time poor parent who just once answers.

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Speaker 2: Now about three weeks ago, maybe four weeks ago now,

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Speaker 2: location Location, Location presenter in the UK, Kirsty Allsop was

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Speaker 2: forced to hit back against critics after being mum shamed

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Speaker 2: for allowing her fifteen year old to travel around Europe

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Speaker 2: Kylie check this out.

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Speaker 3: The TV personality. Christie Allsop was reported to Social Services

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Speaker 3: after admitting that her teenage son had gone abroad without

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Speaker 3: any adults. Kirsty's son, Oscar spent three weeks interrailing in

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Speaker 3: Europe with a friend. Now he was just fifteen when

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Speaker 3: he left and turned sixteen last week. Kirsty defended this

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Speaker 3: saying if we're afraid, our children will be afraid if

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Speaker 3: we let them go, they will fly.

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Speaker 2: Fifteen years old, Oscar Hercules is given the opportunity to

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Speaker 2: jump on the train and hang out with the mate

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Speaker 2: who's sixteen. So fifteen year old and a sixteen year

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Speaker 2: old zooming around Europe on the train across the holidays.

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Speaker 2: He went to Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, Berlin, Munich, Marseille to

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Speaker 2: lose Barcelona and Madrid.

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Speaker 4: That's a pretty extensive travel over a water trip.

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Speaker 2: I mean obviously lives in the UK, so those places

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Speaker 2: so well, you can get to them on the train.

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Speaker 2: But the funeral that her posting about it on social

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Speaker 2: media created was enormous, absolutely huge. People flipping out about

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Speaker 2: a fifteen year old boy. I mean he was only

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Speaker 2: a couple weeks off sixteen, let's be honest, so he's

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Speaker 2: two years until he's an adult. Flipping out that a

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Speaker 2: fifteen year old boy would be allowed to do that

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Speaker 2: reminded me of Lenorskannazzi of the Free Range Kids movement,

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Speaker 2: the Let Grow movement. She allowed her nine year old son,

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Speaker 2: with appropriate preparation, to catch a train, a subway train

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Speaker 2: in New York City, two or three stations from where

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Speaker 2: they got on the train to where they lived on

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Speaker 2: his own at the age of nine. She was mum

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Speaker 2: shamed and called the worst mother in the world. And

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Speaker 2: it got me thinking, what are we doing with our kids?

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Speaker 2: Are we doing this right or is it that we're

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Speaker 2: getting this completely wrong. When you hear that and you

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Speaker 2: think about these experiences and the way we live, what's

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Speaker 2: your reaction.

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Speaker 4: I've been listening to you as you've been speaking, trying

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Speaker 4: to work out how I feel about this, because in reality,

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Speaker 4: I grew up in a really risk adverse home. I

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Speaker 4: lived in a really controlling environment. There wasn't a lot

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Speaker 4: of scope for me to take big risks in any way,

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Speaker 4: shape or form, to the point that I wouldn't actually

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Speaker 4: buy anything without permission, right, So that's just that it's

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Speaker 4: a purchase let alone, you know, catching a subway or

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Speaker 4: catching a train, or whatever the case might be.

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Speaker 2: Conversely, growing up in the I mean, I started school

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Speaker 2: in nineteen eighty and through those early eighties, I was

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Speaker 2: walking home on my own couple of keys. From about

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Speaker 2: the age of seven. I would let myself in the

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Speaker 2: back door where we had the key hidden, and then

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Speaker 2: I'd jump on my bike with Andy Lucas and we

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Speaker 2: would go down to the park on Gil to drive.

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Speaker 2: We would ride our bikes all afternoon, and as long

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Speaker 2: as I got home before my parents and before it

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Speaker 2: was dark, I had free reign. I could do whatever

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Speaker 2: I wanted as a seven year old, as an eight

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Speaker 2: year old. When I was thinking about this story, Kylie,

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Speaker 2: I did a little bit of googling, and I found

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Speaker 2: this brilliant article on our website that I used to

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Speaker 2: look at a long time ago. I haven't looked at

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Speaker 2: it for ages. It's called the art of manliness. And

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Speaker 2: a couple of years ago Brett McKay wrote this article.

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Speaker 2: He said before Steve McQueen's eighteenth birthday. Okay, so he's

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Speaker 2: a teenager, Steve McQueen, famous actor. He'd worked on a farm,

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Speaker 2: joined a circus, sold pens at a traveling carnival, hitchhiked

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Speaker 2: and rode the rails across the country, worked as a

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Speaker 2: lumberjacking Canada, laybored on a chain gang in the Deep

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Speaker 2: South that was a punishment for the crime of vagrancy.

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Speaker 2: He served a short and illegal stint in the Merchant Marine,

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Speaker 2: was illegal because he was underage, and joined the Marine

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Speaker 2: Corps for a three year enlistment. When he finally got

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Speaker 2: out of the service, the newly minted veteran moved to

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Speaker 2: New York City, where, as reported in Steve McQueen in

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Speaker 2: his own words quote, he handcrafted sandals, lugg radiators out

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Speaker 2: of condemned buildings, loaded bags and a post office, ran

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Speaker 2: errands for a local bookie, recap tires in the garage,

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Speaker 2: sold Encyclopedia's daughter door, made artificial flowers and a musty basement,

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Speaker 2: sold pottery in a large department store, and repaired television sets.

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Speaker 2: Close quote and I look at that and I think

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Speaker 2: our kids are so boring. You think about it, the

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Speaker 2: breadth and the adventure that I mean, it's obviously kind

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Speaker 2: of unique. But Sean Connery served in the Royal Navy

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Speaker 2: from sixteen to nineteen, worked as a milkman, a lifeguarded

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Speaker 2: truck driver, of laborer, and an artist's model. James Garner

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Speaker 2: did a stint as a merchant mariner at the end

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Speaker 2: of World War Two. Then this is a sixteen year

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Speaker 2: old James Garner served fourteen months in Korea as a

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Speaker 2: rifleman and earned two purple hearts, are being twice wounded,

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Speaker 2: and the list goes on and on and on. Our

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Speaker 2: kids just aren't doing this sort of stuff. And I

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Speaker 2: look at what Kirsty Alsop did and I just think,

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Speaker 2: you go like, our kids are not I don't want

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Speaker 2: to say getting in enough trouble. That sounds like I'm

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Speaker 2: looking for children to be rebellious and getting up to mischief.

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Speaker 2: Our children are lacking adventure. And we've got this resilience

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Speaker 2: malay going on where everyone's just begging for resilient children.

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Speaker 2: But if you don't let your kids do hard things,

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Speaker 2: they don't get to be resilient. I guess it's the

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Speaker 2: key point that I'm trying to.

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Speaker 4: Make over this past week. We actually sent our fourteen

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Speaker 4: year old down to be with her grandparents, So we

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Speaker 4: haven't sent her off into the wilderness or by herself.

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Speaker 4: She's gone to a safe home and she's been volunteering

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Speaker 4: on a horse ranch. Now, if she was at home,

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Speaker 4: getting her out of bed in the morning.

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Speaker 2: Is zero an all deal. It doesn't happen.

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Speaker 4: She rolls over, puts blanks over her head, ignores me.

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Speaker 4: She's just I can't hear me, even though our eyes

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Speaker 4: are half open, and it's a it's a couple of

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Speaker 4: hours drawn out process.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it's horrible.

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Speaker 4: She doesn't like using her body, she doesn't like being active,

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Speaker 4: she doesn't like doing hard things, but she loves horses.

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Speaker 4: We've sent her down there. She's been ringing me at

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Speaker 4: five thirty in the morning. I'm talking fully awake, alert, energized, excited.

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Speaker 4: She gets in the car with your father, drives off

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Speaker 4: to his work, and then has to wait an hour

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Speaker 4: and a half before she can get to the horses.

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Speaker 4: And she spends an entire day in manual labor.

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Speaker 2: Like shoveling horse poop, and she's rushing.

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Speaker 4: Fast, been happier. Yeah, it is so joyous watching our

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Speaker 4: kids do hard things and actually realize that in finding

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Speaker 4: purpose and direct in our lives, that they actually come

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Speaker 4: to life. And I love watching that in her. I've

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Speaker 4: seen it happen in each of our girls in different

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Speaker 4: ways and through different experiences, and it's just it's amazing

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Speaker 4: when they do something they didn't think they could do.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I want to add a couple of things here

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Speaker 2: in case people think this is some sort of privilege

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Speaker 2: thing that we're paying for. She's volunteering. So as a

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Speaker 2: homeschool kid, she's got a bit more flexibility than most kids.

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Speaker 2: But she's volunteering her time.

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Speaker 4: She doesn't get paid, not.

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Speaker 2: Getting a penny. And the other funny thing is, I mean,

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Speaker 2: she's barely on a screen, and when I give her

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Speaker 2: a call, maybe at seven thirty or eight o'clock at night,

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Speaker 2: she is exhausted. I can't talk to you. I got

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Speaker 2: to go to bed. I'm so tired. But she's having

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Speaker 2: these adventures. She's hanging around with just a wide variety

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Speaker 2: of people having all these adventures being outside literally living

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Speaker 2: her best life. And I'm looking at this and going,

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Speaker 2: we've really stuck this world up in so many ways

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Speaker 2: in terms of the expectations that we have in our

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Speaker 2: kids and the way that we control them and prevent

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Speaker 2: them from living an adventureous life. On the podcast, like,

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Speaker 2: we've talked a fair bit about risky play, the importance

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Speaker 2: of it. We've referred to different societies around the world,

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Speaker 2: the Canadian Psychological Society, the American Pediatric Association, who are

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Speaker 2: literally pleading with parents to get the kids involved in

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Speaker 2: what we now call risky play, which was once upon

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Speaker 2: a time just called play. So maybe I want to

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Speaker 2: take the kids camping more, quite honestly, because that there's

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Speaker 2: just something about being outside and that's what our kids

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Speaker 2: need so that they can be resilient.

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Speaker 5: Kirsty also a TV presenter, of course, who has been

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Speaker 5: at the center possibly one of the most bizarre controversies

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Speaker 5: that I've seen in modern times. You know, we talk

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Speaker 5: about how the world has gone completely stark, staring bonkers mad. Kirsty,

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Speaker 5: Very good morning to you. Thank you so much for

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Speaker 5: joining us. I mean, this has been I think one

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Speaker 5: of the great illustrations of what's wrong with this country.

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Speaker 1: I'm very interested in the recent research which says that

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Speaker 1: some of the anxiety that young people are suffering is

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Speaker 1: due to a lack of trust, that we become increasingly

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Speaker 1: risk averse, that we think the world is a more

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Speaker 1: dangerous place, which it isn't, and as a result, we

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Speaker 1: are holding our children back and that this isn't very

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Speaker 1: good for.

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Speaker 2: Them, Kylie. One of the things that came up a

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Speaker 2: lot with the parent shaming was the question what if

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Speaker 2: something happened? What if something happened?

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Speaker 4: I think we live our lives like that, don't we.

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Speaker 2: Well, if we do, though we end up living small lives.

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Speaker 4: We do. We do the reality that me literally getting

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Speaker 4: in my car every day, there's a what if?

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Speaker 2: Right yeah, or catching an aeroplane or whatever it might be.

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Speaker 2: When I'm doing my workshops, and I should just hasten

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Speaker 2: to add, no matter what, if something does happen, you

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Speaker 2: wonder what could I have done? What could I have done?

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Speaker 2: In my workshops when I'm teaching my resilience presentations, I

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Speaker 2: consistently talk about how valuable it is if kids can

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Speaker 2: have a level of independence, and I make sure that

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Speaker 2: I'm emphasizing developmental appropriateness. We're not in Japan and you're

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Speaker 2: only your three year old walk two kilometers to the

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Speaker 2: shops on their own. That's not what I'm referring to.

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Speaker 2: But if you've got a nine year old that wants

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Speaker 2: to hang out with his or her nine year old friend,

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Speaker 2: instead of saying, well, jump online and chat with each other,

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Speaker 2: why not say, jump on your bike and meet at

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Speaker 2: the park and hang out for an hour and then

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Speaker 2: come home. Why can't we do that? Whenever I say that,

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Speaker 2: though the look of astonishment and terror on parents' faces

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Speaker 2: is enormous, I mean the vast majority, i'd say eighty

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Speaker 2: to nine percent of parents say, oh no, I would

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Speaker 2: never do that with my eight or nine year old.

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Speaker 2: And yet I look at Lenorskanazzi and the nine year

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Speaker 2: old on the subway, I think, absolutely, absolutely, for sure,

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Speaker 2: this is great, especially if I mean the strength in numbers.

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Speaker 2: If the kids are hanging out with others, it's got

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Speaker 2: to be developmentally appropriate. But parents are really terrified of it.

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Speaker 2: And I think if we go back to that Jonathan

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Speaker 2: hate thing that he talks about in the Anxious Generation,

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Speaker 2: the move from a play based childhood to a screen

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Speaker 2: based childhood. We really do believe that there are awful

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Speaker 2: people who are out there to get our kids, and

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Speaker 2: yet the research seems to indicate that our children are

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Speaker 2: safe today than ever before, never been safer.

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Speaker 4: Once your kids are old enough, they've literally got a

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Speaker 4: tracking device on them all the time. You've got a phone,

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Speaker 4: and you can have access to them whenever you need to. Like,

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Speaker 4: I can't imagine being a parent back in our parents'

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Speaker 4: day when you literally said goodbye to your kids and then.

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Speaker 2: You didn't see them here from your access.

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Speaker 4: To them at all until the end of the day.

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Speaker 2: I remember when I was maybe, I know, twelve eleven

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Speaker 2: something like that, Mum had dropped me off at the

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Speaker 2: doctor's surgery. I had to have an appointment about whatever

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Speaker 2: it was, and she had to go and run some

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Speaker 2: errands her warehouse. Mom and dad ran a furniture warehouse

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Speaker 2: back in those days, and her warehouse was about a

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Speaker 2: five k walk from the doctor's offices the doctor's surgery,

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Speaker 2: and I waited out on the curb side for Mom

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Speaker 2: after my appointment for probably about forty minutes. She'd been

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Speaker 2: caught up, she'd been involved in something else. She'd totally,

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Speaker 2: totally forgotten to come and get me, or hadn't been

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Speaker 2: available to get me. I don't know which it was.

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Speaker 2: Let's say that she wasn't being negligent, but she'd been

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Speaker 2: held up or something like that. And after about forty minutes,

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Speaker 2: I was like, oh, this is dumb, and so I

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Speaker 2: just started walking. And in my mind, as an eleven

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Speaker 2: year old, I thought, if Mum is on her way

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Speaker 2: to find me, what is the most likely path that

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Speaker 2: she'll follow. What are the roads that she'll take? And

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Speaker 2: I walked back in that direction. I made it about

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Speaker 2: four of those five kilometers, so I guess I walked

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Speaker 2: for about forty or fifty minutes before Mum drove along

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Speaker 2: the road and she saw me and pulled over and said,

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Speaker 2: I'm so glad I found you. I've just left I've

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Speaker 2: had all these problems. And I jumped in the car

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Speaker 2: and that was it. But there were no phones, there

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Speaker 2: was no way for her to contact me. She just

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Speaker 2: trusted that i'd wait out on the curb. And then,

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Speaker 2: I mean, fortunately I had the smarts to know which

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Speaker 2: way she was probably going to drive, and she spotted

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Speaker 2: me on the side of the street.

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Speaker 4: But you only have the smarts if you've given opportunities to.

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Speaker 2: Exactly right, That's exactly what I was going to say.

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Speaker 4: Because so many kids they wouldn't have a clue what

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Speaker 4: to do in that situation. They'd be absolutely panicked because

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Speaker 4: they've never been left to actually utilize those skills.

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Speaker 2: Probably worth highlighting that it would never be a problem

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Speaker 2: because our children would probably have a device on them,

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Speaker 2: or they would be able to ask the doctor surgery

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Speaker 2: to ring mum on the phone and say where are you?

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Speaker 4: Like, yeah, I'm five minutes later. My kids are on

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Speaker 4: the phone going just checking. Are you coming to pick

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Speaker 4: me up?

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Speaker 2: Exactly Yeah, So we've got We've got what I guess.

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Speaker 2: The main point that I'm making here is our children

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Speaker 2: have never been safer. It's never been easier to give

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Speaker 2: them the independence and the freedom because unfortunately it's not

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Speaker 2: true independence and freedom. They're still tathered to us one

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Speaker 2: way or another because of those smart devices. This podcast

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Speaker 2: episode really today is just to plead with parents again

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Speaker 2: to in developmentally appropriate ways, give your kids a long leash,

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Speaker 2: or let go of the leash entirely, and give them

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Speaker 2: the opportunity as much as you possibly can to live

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Speaker 2: an adventurous life. These stories that you get to tell

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Speaker 2: when you've done that. I mean, can you imagine sitting

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Speaker 2: around the dining table having a meal with someone like

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Speaker 2: Steve McQueen and hearing that story, or, for that matter,

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Speaker 2: sitting opposite sixteen year old Oscar Hercules and saying, tell

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Speaker 2: me about your trip.

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Speaker 4: I know that you're all for this, but I'm going

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Speaker 4: to put I'm going to push back a little bit.

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Speaker 2: I'm going to push back a little bit, of course.

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Speaker 4: Because in both cases that you've shared with us, with

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Speaker 4: Leonor and Oscar, these were boys. Yep, that's the first thing.

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Speaker 4: How many stories do we hear of mums of young

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Speaker 4: girls taking the same kinds of risk? So that's my

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Speaker 4: first one. And secondly, when we're talking about little kids

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Speaker 4: like this, this is a big deal. Is it? Are

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Speaker 4: we more risk averse now because there are more bad

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Speaker 4: people around? Or are we more risk averse now because

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Speaker 4: media and social media has really amped up the publicity

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Speaker 4: of bad stories?

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Speaker 2: Okay, so there are two questions there. The first one

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Speaker 2: relates to gender. There is unfortunately statistical evidence that indicates

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Speaker 2: that girls are more likely to experience negative outcomes than

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Speaker 2: boys when it comes to assault. For example, Having said

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Speaker 2: that the numbers are still tremendously low, fortunately when it

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Speaker 2: comes to a stranger, but we do definitely see girls

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Speaker 2: as being more vulnerable. You and I are selective and

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Speaker 2: how we do this, but we encourage all of our

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Speaker 2: girls to have independent time, whether it's walking to the

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Speaker 2: nearby IgA or walking to the beach. We're fortunate enough

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Speaker 2: to live within walking distance. It's still a fair hike,

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Speaker 2: but we're within walking or riding distance to the beach,

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Speaker 2: and we encourage our kids to do that from about

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Speaker 2: the age of well, Emily's ten and we're comfortable with

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Speaker 2: her walking round of the IgA. Our kids that are

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Speaker 2: thirteen and above, we're comfortable with them going down to

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Speaker 2: the beach as long as they promise to tell us

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Speaker 2: where they're going and they swim within the flagged areas.

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Speaker 2: So even girls, I think, again, you've got to use

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Speaker 2: your common sense, but we've got to give them the freedom,

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Speaker 2: the flexibility to be able to do this stuff. And

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Speaker 2: we've just sent two of our young adult daughters overseas.

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Speaker 2: They've gone for eighteen months. One of them has just

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Speaker 2: come back and the other one is still away and

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Speaker 2: we'll be away for quite some time. So I'm going

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Speaker 2: to push back a little bit on the gender thing,

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Speaker 2: but developmental appropriateness, and maybe a year or two later

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Speaker 2: so that they're just that much bigger, that much more mature,

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Speaker 2: that much safer. In relation to your question about whether

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Speaker 2: we're a more risk averse culture, the answer is absolutely,

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Speaker 2: fundamentally in every way. Yes, we just were so focused

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Speaker 2: on what. In a different book, Jonathan Hate talks about

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Speaker 2: safety ism and keeping our children safe physically and emotionally

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Speaker 2: and socially and psychologically, and keeping them safe in every

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Speaker 2: way possible, and I just don't think that's good for them.

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Speaker 2: I think they need to be able to encounter some

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Speaker 2: risks and challenges.

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Speaker 4: I remember when I felt really controlled as a child

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Speaker 4: and didn't feel like I had enough freedom to do

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Speaker 4: the things that I wanted to. I would often say

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Speaker 4: to my mum and dad, you can't save me from everything.

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Speaker 4: When I'm a big person, when I've got my own children,

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Speaker 4: I'm going to let them do the things that they

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Speaker 4: want to do, because I think that it's really important.

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Speaker 4: And as we've parented our kids, I definitely am the

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Speaker 4: more risk averse parent in the equation, but I also

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Speaker 4: recognize the importance of allowing our kids to have some space,

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Speaker 4: some rigal room to grow and to experience life in

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Speaker 4: their own time and own way.

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Speaker 2: Risky play. It's the way of the future. Well, it

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Speaker 2: needs to be the way of the I don't know

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Speaker 2: why I said that that, just where did that come from?

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Speaker 2: Let me say that a different way. Our kids need

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Speaker 2: to take risks, risk it's the way of the future.

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Speaker 2: It's not we're going in the wrong direction. It's all

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Speaker 2: about keeping our kids safe these days, and that is

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Speaker 2: not in their best interest. It doesn't help them if

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Speaker 2: be resilient, it doesn't reduce their anxiety. But the more

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Speaker 2: we can I mean, as we're recording this podcast, literally

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Speaker 2: I've looked out the window and I've seen our ten

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Speaker 2: year old taking the dog out the front gate for

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Speaker 2: a walk. And she's going out on supervised and she'll

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Speaker 2: be gone for fifteen or twenty minutes. And she's doing it.

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Speaker 2: Why because she knows that she needs to be in nature.

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Speaker 2: She knows that it's good for her to move her body,

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Speaker 2: and she knows that it's good for the dog, it's

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Speaker 2: good for the dog, and totally comfortable with that, totally

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Speaker 2: comfortable with that it's in her best interest to be

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Speaker 2: able to do it. If you would like more information

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Speaker 2: about how you can help your kids so live life

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Speaker 2: on the edge, check out we'll link to it, The

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Speaker 2: Art of Manliness, The Least Interesting Generation. Will link to

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Speaker 2: that because I think it's just a great read and

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Speaker 2: it's a reminder of what our kids could do if

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Speaker 2: we gave them enough for him to do it. And

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Speaker 2: check out Jonathan Hates's book The Anxious Generation for more

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Speaker 2: around that. The Happy Families podcast is produced by Justin

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Speaker 2: Ruland from Bridge Media. If you'd like more info about

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Speaker 2: making your family happier, you'll find it all happy families

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Speaker 2: dot com dot au