Chris Freind recently wrote this article in the Delco Times about the Nanny State not protecting our children. I think this is an excellent piece that everyone should read so I am not going to restate what he wrote. I just want to say that an excellent way to fight back against the state is to stop living in fear!

The government lives off our fear. That’s why they can wage a war with no real goal, in a country most Americans couldn’t find on a map against people we never met or have no real reason to hate. (Save your comments, I know there are some bad people over there.) Fear is why the TSA can happily put their hands down our pants. Fear is the reason people get rich off the war on drugs.  Fear is how the government gets to stick their greedy little hands into every aspect of our lives. After all, without government regulation our TVs would blow up, our dinner would be poison, workers would be beaten, and all our children would all die.

When you drive your kid 3 blocks to school instead of letting her walk, or only let her play with her friends on a supervised “play date” (that term annoys me) you teach her to be afraid of her neighbors. I’m not saying we should all be stupid or naive, I realize there are risks all around us, but right now we are living in the safest time in the history of the planet. When your parents say things like “Wow, people are crazy these days, I never heard of this stuff when I was growing up” that is because there was no twitter 10 years ago. Now every time some bully beats up a kid in Australia, we all hear about it.

Get to know your neighbors. If you can trust them you know there is at least one more person in the neighborhood looking out for you. Let your kids live and learn on their own. Let them learn through their own failures and successes through experience. Let them meet new friends and learn their social skills on the playground. God knows they aren’t learning anything in school!