if your kid put several of them in his mouth at once, which he probably wouldn't, since they taste bad,” you would say (according to Dodson): “A massive recall of toys! Is something in your child's toy box on the list?”
(To which, by the way, a friend once remarked: “If something that terrible is out there, threatening my children, why the hell are they making me wait till eleven to find out?”)
TV stations love those toy recalls because that way their newscast gets to scare people (good for ratings) while also doing a public service (good for the soul). It's like exposing OSHA violations at a strip club.
Now maybe there is some point to telling us the most anguishing stories of our day, every day. But I was a reporter for twenty years, and I'm still not quite sure what that point is. Is it to warn us about a dangerous neighborhood? That's helpful, I guess. Or to remind people to look both ways when crossing the street or to drive safely? Can't overemphasize those. Is there an exploding pacifier out there that we shouldn't buy? Tell all! But, as former Tucson anchorwoman Tina Naughton Powers says, “On local news, it's ‘Good evening and welcome to death, doom, and destruction. Here's what didn't happen to you today, but it could so we'll keep you in fear!’”
So when Anderson Cooper hosts an hour-long special on missing children, as he has done, he never says, “First off, remember: this will probably never, ever, ever happen to you. In fact, it's almost exploitative that I'm even here talking about it.” No, he turns to the camera with those devastatingly earnest eyes and says, “It is every parent's nightmare.”
Then he interviews the parents who lived that nightmare—their boy rode off on his bike, never to be seen again. Then he talks to a “safety expert” who talks about kids getting snatched from their bikes and calls it “a common scenario.”
Common? It is so not common that it almost never happens. About seventy times more kids die by drowning—is that common? Four hundred times more are killed by car accidents. Four hundred for every kidnapped kid. But would you call a fatal car accident common? Tragic, yes. Common, no.
“Not a word about probability has been spoken,” notes The Science of Fear author Gardner. “Having just seen a string of horrifying examples, [one might] conclude that the chances of this crime happening are high.”
In fact, the fear of some crimes is so over the top that the newest wrinkle—actually, not so new anymore—is parents going online claiming to have just narrowly escaped having their kids snatched away.
You've probably seen a Facebook post like this one: “A man came up to us at Sam's Club and asked if the empty cart nearby was ours… . It seemed like an innocent encounter.” Innocent, that is, until the mom and kids head to Walmart and see the guy again. Can you imagine? How terrifying. He was “feverishly texting on his phone but not taking his eye off my daughter.” This, wrote the mom, could only mean one thing: “I have absolutely NO doubt that that man is a trafficker looking for young girls to steal and sell.”
And I have absolutely no doubt that she's wrong.
Why? Well, first of all, these breathless Facebook posts are so similar, they seem to have been stolen (like an innocent child!) from some Breathless Mom Template: First, mention seeing some guy or guys looking at you and your kids at Store A (or Aisle A). Then, mention the guy or guys turn up again in Store B (or Aisle B). Don't forget to mention your incredible “Spidey Sense” that these ostensible “shoppers” were up to no good. To prove it, throw in a completely normal detail as proof-positive of their nefariousness. (“He only had a few items in his cart,” “He kept glancing at his phone,” “His friend was waiting outside with the minivan's door wide open.”) Then, use the following stat, no matter where you live: “And ______ is the #2 city/state in America for sex trafficking!” (Never say it's #1. That's not believable.) Finally, congratulate yourself for, against all odds, saving your kids by either (A) bravely staring down the guy or guys, or (B) asking the store manager to walk you to your car.
These stories sometimes get hundreds of shares and comments like, “Whew! That was close!” and “Glad your mama bear instincts kicked in!” So maybe it actually seems like a good deed to forward them to your own circle of friends, as a reminder to be on the alert.
But this is not spreading helpful information. It's just spreading baseless fear. I asked crime researcher David Finkelhor, this book's best friend when it comes to debunking urban myths about crimes against kids: How many children have been stolen from their parents in public and forced into the sex trade?
He said he has heard of exactly zero. And remember: His entire job is to track crimes against children.
Why, then, do so many moms write these stories? I don't know if they truly believe that they saved their kids from traffickers, or if they just want the adulation that comes from thwarting a close call.
And in fact, it doesn't matter. What matters is to recognize that when someone is writing about a crime that, in the end, did not take place, we can't talk about it as if a crime did take place. It's like me saying, “I saved myself from the chandelier falling on my head by diving under the couch! … And also, I guess, by the fact that the chandelier didn't fall.” Did I save myself? Do I deserve comments like, “Good move!” and “Close call!”
Anyway, for some reason stories of children in peril—real or fictional, on almost any medium—are great for getting attention. And so, day after day, second after second, a vision of the world comes into our lives that is sad, scary, shocking, and totally at odds with the odds. Switch it off, press delete, or find some other way to ignore the drumbeat of doom and you'll probably be a little more at peace. A little less worried about your kids’ safety.
That may sound like I'm saying, “Ignore the awful truth and go live in your little bubble.” But I'm trying to say that that the horror-filled media is a bubble of its own—a soul-freezing, hope-crushing, shoppers-as-psychopaths place. If you lived there, you'd be dead now.
Or at least impaled on a towel hook.
REAL WORLD
The First Thing I Did Was Disconnect the Cable
Writes a Free-Ranger:
I have to say that I am an overprotective mother and have tried to loosen up a bit lately. I do not want my children to grow up in fear of everything. I am taking baby steps—just allowing my children, one being a teen, to go to the park across the street unsupervised—but I am getting there. The first thinge I did was disconnect the cable. Not because of what the kids were watching but because of what I was watching. Just like the Internet. If something catches my eye, I read it. But if it is about another child abduction or another school shooting, I do not read it. I am trying to let go of those fears that the media has generated.
Going Free Range
Free-Range Baby Step: Don't click that link! Get today's local news from an actual local—a neighbor. Bonus: Maybe you two can keep an eye on each other's kids, literally making your block safer.
Free-Range Brave Step: No more keeping CNN on as background noise. I know, it's nice to hear a voice. But the fear seeps in even when you think it doesn't. Switch to music or some podcast that isn't a 27-part series on tracking a murderer.
One Giant Leap for Free-Range Kind: Get up and go out. Spend that hour you were going to watch another Law and Order on a walk with the kids instead.
