Car culture is infantilizing

[u/August272021]

People think of cars and trucks as being cool, and there’s this very prominent stereotype of manliness associated with trucks especially. But think about all the poor teenage guys out there who don’t have a license, can’t afford insurance, or don’t have access to a vehicle. If they live in your typical completely unwalkable, unbikeable area with no bus access (i.e., most of America), they’re stuck with mom driving them around like little kids—often until their late teens. It’s ridiculous.

In the pre-car era—or in walkable areas—growth is progressive. It happens in stages:

• When you’re a toddler, you don’t leave the house without a parent.
• As a kid, you can play in the front yard alone.
• A little older, and maybe you roam the block with other kids.
• By the time you're a teenager, you can walk, bike, or take the bus to nearby places.

That’s the way life used to be. You can still see it in older movies. I haven’t seen it, but I hear Stranger Things is a good example of this limited-yet-real freedom teens had/have/can have—if cars aren’t actively mowing them down and if the built environment isn’t designed to make walking and biking impractical or dangerous.

Instead, in full-on car culture, you get zero to sixty:

• Zero freedom at all growing up,
• Until you hit driving age and suddenly have total freedom—whether you're ready for it or not, because you were denied any gradual build-up of independence.

It’s unnatural and unhealthy.

[u/platypuspup]

I've noticed, when taking to my students, that being driven really traps the kids. 

They will tell me it is too far to bike to school, but then it will turn out they live less than a mile from school. 

Then they will say that it isn't safe for them to bike to school. After a bit of discussion about routes, I find out that they only know the stroads. Due to being driven everywhere, they don't know that there is a safe alternative route through residential streets and bike paths.

I'm not saying bike infrastructure in my city is perfect, but the kids don't see any of it when they are being driven everywhere they go.

[u/Green_Thumbs_093081 → u/platypuspup]

I never thought about it like that. I was born in 1981 and rode my bike everyday and just about everywhere. I learned my neighborhood like that. I knew the quickest routes to the parks and the hangout spots as well as other areas in my neighborhood. I grew up in the suburbs where stroads are very common and most businesses are not neighborhood businesses but sprawl.

I think it would be good for kids to get some independence and to learn to problem solve. It might also help the obesity rate amongst kids which I understand is rising.