The Badger Herald: Opinion: Parenting not duty of state

Opinion

Parenting not duty of state

Looking for a print version?
Simply use your browser’s ‘Print’ command and a printer-friendly document will be generated automatically.

Also by Brad Vogel:

A new King for council? (April 20, 2006)
Segregated fees must be returned (February 20, 2006)
Diversity initiatives misguided (April 24, 2006)
Time to move on (February 23, 2006)
My lovely lady mumps (May 1, 2006)

Monday, February 6, 2006 12:00 a.m.

4 Vote 0 Votes

The Wisconsin State Legislature threw a party last week. Democrats and Republicans held hands and frolicked through the hallways in fits of bipartisan glee. Fred Risser and Scott Suder were hitting it off over drinks. The lion lay down with the lamb. It was a great time for a great cause under the dome.

But someone forgot to invite one important guest — common sense.

Thursday's seemingly innocuous festivities resulted in the passage of legislation that requires all cheese-head children up to the age of eight to be strapped into a child safety seat every time they ride in a vehicle. Why? Well, safety, of course. Who can argue against safety? Governor Doyle certainly can't; he's poised to sign the bill into law.

Brilliant. Thanks, State Legislature. Next time you decide to get chummy and cross the aisle, can you mandate chain mail for college students? I would feel much safer at Madhatters if I knew everyone would be wearing a full suit of armor for FAC. I might even have a chance if Booker Stanley showed up.

Hyperbole aside, this is simply bad public policy. Prior to the philosopher kings' decision to improve our lives, the law required children to be secured in car seats up to the age of four. Kids between the ages of four and eight had to wear seat belts. Things made sense. Parents could actually take all of the little tyke's friends home from a bumper bowling birthday party.

But the nanny state knows better. State Senators Carol Roessler, R-Oshkosh, and Judy Robson, D-Beloit, led a bizarre coalition of odd political bedfellows that included everyone from Scott Jensen, R-Waukesha, to Jennifer Shilling, D-LaCrosse, in passing what one dissenting state senator aptly called "an enforcement nightmare." The new law creates a complex tiered system of weight, height and age classes that might, one senator suggested on the floor, require police officers to carry scales in their trunks.

Under the bill's language, a child younger than one who weighs less than 20 pounds must be in a rear-facing booster seat in the back seat of the vehicle — if the vehicle has a back seat. If the child is older than one, but younger than four years of age or weighs less than 40 pounds, he or she must be restrained in a forward-facing booster seat in the back seat of the vehicle — again, if there is a back seat. If the child is over four, but younger than eight years and between 40 and 80 pounds … yeah, you get the idea. Or maybe you don't. I, for one, am baffled by the impracticality of it all. I can't wait to see how the state's Amish community implements this one.

Instead of forcing constituents to buy a bevy of child safety seats, the legislature should give parents a bit of credit. Let adults make decisions in the best interest of their children. By and large, people want to keep their children safe. Institutionalizing that desire in feel-good legislation, however, raises questions about how far the state is willing to go to dictate the intricacies of child rearing. Dean and Pam Schneider in Tomah don't need a bicameral entity to instruct them in parenting. They can set the potty training schedule themselves.

Mandating child safety seats up to the age of eight seems a tad ironic, given the fact that the legislature is considering a bill that would allow eight-year-olds to hunt with a mentor. Some might find the latter legislation as appalling as the grand safety seat mandate. Yet teaching a child the ways of the woods is at least drawn from the deep tradition in some parts of the state (urbanites may not be able to fathom it, but in some areas of Wisconsin, hunting has been and is family, community and a way of life). The safety seat requirement, conversely, is nothing but a symptom of a disturbing trend in the past decade.

Shackling a seven-year-old child in a child safety seat is a glaring example of the growing tendency to keep kids from growing up. Graduated licensing is another. Both measures subordinate pragmatism and principle to a stifling insistence on safety above all else. The legislation is a nightmare in more than enforcement terms. How does one keep a seven-year-old in a safety seat and one's sanity?

Some legislative Republicans objected to the grand safety seat mandate as it passed the State Senate by a vote of 23-10. It's too bad they couldn't muster a majority. Now it looks like next November might bring us a scene in northern Wisconsin where little Timmy's father has to swing around the front of the Chevy S-10 and unbuckle him before handing him the .20 gauge and tromping off into the forest.

Of course, the S-10 doesn't have a back seat, so things might be complicated.

The passage of the child safety seat mandate, on the other hand, was a simple affair. Judging by the cups and cans on the floor of the legislature after its party last week, it's quite obvious that most of our representatives were drunk.

Brad Vogel (bvogel@badgerherald.com) is a senior majoring in political science and journalism.

4 Comments | Leave a comment

Anonymous | February 6, 2006 1:27 PM | Reply

The REASON they have to make legislation for such issues is that no, not enough parents DO have their children's best interests in mind. Children who are too small for an adult belt WILL often suffer needlessly in a crash when they could have been in a booster. Too many people live in a world with blinders on, thinking "this won't ever happen to me". Funnily enough they're the same people who mope about and rant and rage and complain when they are in a collision and their child is seriously harmed, saying "it should have been more obvious to parents that a safety seat was necessary".

My thought is DUH. You don't expect your 6-yo to wear your 200lb 6foot tall husband's size 11 shoes, why should you expect him to fit a seatbelt designed for an adult of that size?

Anonymous | February 7, 2006 12:07 AM | Reply

Lets just wrap our children in Bubble rap and charcoal until they are 10. We shouldn't let them play sports until they are 18 because even the most casual observer can notice the volume of injuries from playing football, basketball, lacrosse, hockey, skiing, snowboarding, gymnastics, cycling, etc.

Can you imagine how many knee surgeries children are having that could be prevented if only we stopped parents from forcing them to play a sport. I mean how I survived without wearing a helmet while riding my bike and skiing is beyond me. As a parent with a 14 year old and an 8 year old I find it hard to take seriously the observations of people who want to bubble wrap their children and prevent them from surviving the bumps and bruises of life.

I make my 8 year old wear a helmet skiing because he can't take lessons without one. I don't make my 14 year old wear a helmet because their is no way in hell I would have worn a helmet unless my parents stapled it to my head. Show up at the lodge rent a locker helmet goes in, enjoy the rest of the day without a chunk of hard plastic strapped to my chin. Parents should get to raise their children as they see fit with as little Nannyism from the state as possible. I don't want my kids in intensive care but I don't want them thinking that everything in life comes easy because sometimes you fall down and it hurts like hell, its called adversity. How are you going to respond to it if you have spent your entire life trapped in a comfy cage created by well meaning pencil necked geeks.

Anonymous | February 7, 2006 10:11 PM | Reply

I completely agree with the article. I couldn't believe the state is willing to send an eight year old out in the woods with a shot gun or rifle, but yet say they are still to young to sit in a vehicle with out a car seat. Can you imagine taking your child out of the car seat and handing them a loaded weapon? We really need some one to step in and make better sense out of the laws being thrown out on the table.

Anonymous | February 20, 2006 9:59 AM | Reply

When you have children of your own you will feel differently. The purpose of having them in a booster seat is not to keep yhem from growing up, it is to keep them from severing their carotid artery in their neck as the seat belt hits them in the wrong spot.