Are you asking about things that weren’t considered dangerous when I was a kid, but are now? I always thought that was largely a cliche? Pretty much everything that I did as a child that is, or could be, considered dangerous today was considered dangerous then, too.
One thing that does come to mind: I don’t think the general public back then was as aware of the danger of second hand smoke. So, exposing kids to cigarette smoke (by smoking indoors, in cars, or even going to public places with smoking sections) didn’t seem to be considered risky or dangerous.
Otherwise, pretty much everything I did as a kid that would be considered dangerous today would also have been considered dangerous back then in the days when dinosaurs ruled the Earth and the wheel had only recently been invented. That includes activities sanctioned by adults, like riding in the bed of a pickup truck, and those which weren’t, like mixing random chemicals together to see what happens.
Run around in the woods with a good stick.
Nobody should be preventing you from running around with a good stick!
Man, the older I get, the more I miss being a kid with a good stick.
You can still run around in the woods with good stick regardless of age. I still do it with my nephews.
Bike helmets didn’t get common until 6th grade or so. Same with face guards and mouth guards in anything but football.
We also had a diving board with a full size car spring. A gymnast pal could do double flips off it.
That diving board sounds fucking wild
We still don’t use bike helmets here in the Netherlands
We were riding off skate ramps at the time though. If I lived in a place with separate bike lanes I might consider going helmet-less. But I’ve also been hit by a car and likely saved a lot of brain damage by having a helmet on. Same with skiing (helmets and accidents, not hit by a car!).
Play outside
Walking to school alone.
Too many to count, but I’ll leave you with one of the least dangerous: woods porn.
One time in the mid 2000s my friend and I were on a hike in the mountains and we found a tree that was like a cave, all branches everywhere except a little entrance. Inside we found porn magazines with the pictures ripped out and placed on branches all over the inside of the “cave”. After that we always joked about the porn cave we found.
Got vaccinated.
That’s a joke. The real answer is almost everything. I was practically feral and lived next to a swamp in Louisiana. RFK Jr. is 100% wrong about disease prevention but there’s no vaccine for snapping turtles.
We’d grab our bikes and ride across town. If they saw our bikes were gone they knew we’d be back later.
After the abduction and murder of two local girls, this wasn’t so accepted anymore. Kids were still out and about, but you’d get grilled about where you go, who you’re with, where are you coming home. You were supposed to be at someone’s house, mum would call and make sure that’s where you were. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bega_schoolgirl_murders
I don’t see any kids out around town anymore now though. Just the ones that walk from the bus stop to their house after school. That might just say more about todays youth culture though.
This is one of the reasons cars have such a chokehold, kids don’t bike places as often because of safety concerns.
Holy shit that is heartbreaking. Thanks for responding to the topic but it’s a rough article.
I didn’t know these two girls because they were a few years older, but I knew other kids who did know them. Wasn’t good.
I’m GenX, my entire childhood was dangerous.
Tell jokes.
Go outside.
Walk to school.
Build a flamethrower with a super soaker. Swim with sharks.
deleted by creator
Occasionally we would walk the mile home from elementary school. We’d sometimes stop to play in the creek along the way. We made sure not to do that one in spring though because there was a flash flood one year while a schoolmate was playing down there and drowned him.
Driving a tractor by myself, when I was a tween. I was driving a tractor before I could reach the clutch, I had to get off the seat and stand to use it, not that there’s much gear-shifting driving a tractor through a field. I had a dirtbike out at the farm as well. Built a little fort in the woods.
I used to drive a land cruiser around the farm while the men threw hay bales off the back tray. I would’ve been about seven, pottering along in first gear. I was too small to throw hay.
Freedom.
