Critical Mass and Children

[Marc Brett]

I attended my first CM on Friday after being outraged by
Vicki McReery's death on Blackfriar's Bridge. I enjoyed the
freedom of owning the streets again, being in such a large,
well-tempered (mostly!) crowd, and getting a free tour of
London's sights. I'm planning to be there next month.

I'd like to bring my kids (age 5 in a seat and 8 on a bike)
next time. It'll be a bit of an adventure for them, of
course, and it's certainly the safest way to cycle the
capital until they're in their late teens.

However, I didn't see many children on the ride I was on.
Two or three very young ones in seats or trailers, and a
couple of early teens with their dad. Most others seemed to
be 18 to 30-ish, with a smattering of over-the-hill folk
like myself and quite a few very fit-looking pensioners. The
7-17 range seemed very under-represented.

Why is this? Are kids these days just apathetic, or are
other Friday night entertainments more attractive? Or is
there a real or percieved threat for children that I didn't
see? I don't really want to be there with kids if a CM
turns ugly.

So is it a good idea to expose my innocent sprogs to these
radical lefties, or should I leave it until they're older?
All opinions welcome.

[Marc]

In article <49thb0lhpp8ncgn82673h2ng3qbu44htcr@4ax.com>,
marc@fordson.demon.co.uk says...
> The 7-17 range seemed very under-represented.
>
> Why is this? Are kids these days just apathetic, or are
> other Friday night entertainments more attractive?
>
Or are parents more wary of using their children as
political puppets?

[Daniel Barlow]

Marc Brett <marc@fordson.demon.co.uk> writes:

> However, I didn't see many children on the ride I was on.
> Two or three very young ones in seats or trailers, and a
> couple of early teens with their dad. Most others seemed
> to be 18 to 30-ish, with a smattering of over-the-hill
> folk like myself and quite a few very fit-looking
> pensioners. The 7-17 range seemed very under-represented.

We had a few kids on BMXes turn up to the ride we were on on
Friday evening; though we were on skates not bicycles. They
rode around on and off the pavements doing stupid
unpredictable things (which is not desirable behaviour in a
fairly tightly packed group of a hundred or so inline
skaters), but after a while either they ran out of energy or
enthusiasm, or their electronic tagging devices started
buzzing, and they left us alone eventually.

If you'd like them along, I could take some CM flyers
along with me on the next skate in case we meet their
like again ...

> So is it a good idea to expose my innocent sprogs to these
> radical lefties,

Only if you want them to grow up Tories, I suspect. If you
want your kids to be lefties, I'd probably suggest that you
move to suburbia, and soon. Make sure it's somewhere with
crap public transport, and resist all entreaties to act as a
taxi service.

-dan

--
"please make sure that the person is your friend before
you confirm"