Boy, 7, arrested for riding dirt bike on sidewalk

One of the tasks I was responsible for in my previous contract was to forward complaints to the local rangers about motorized bikes riding in illegal areas.

We used to get dozens, if not hundreds, any given week.

Good on the cop/council/mayor for finally sticking it to the little punks (and their parents) who thumb their nose at legislation (designed for their own safety, mind) and then warble about how it's unfair when they are fined or have their bikes confiscated. Fuck! Why the hell would you even BUY a dirt bike if there's nowhere local to ride it in the first place? Why then, would you ride it on the sidewalk, where you are more than certainly causing a disturbance, not to mention being a significant risk to pedestrians.

Sometimes morons just need a metaphorical backhand to remind them that they are not special.

Agreed however the parent should have been the one taken under custody not a 7 yr old child. I blame the parent not the child. He's SEVEN. They are clueless in this world right now and having a cop drag him by the neck and handcuffed is a rather dramatic thing for a 7yr old.

Think about this. My son is 8yrs old and it would have a very dramatic effect on his life and I would fear what it would do to him long term when dealing with police in the future. I don't think it was a good thing and again if anyone it should have been the parent that should have been dealt with not the child.

It is a parent's responsibility to explain the rules of behavior to their children before they allow them to do something as dangerous (to themselves and to others) as riding a motorized bike on the street. Since that's what the kid was doing, it's pretty apparent that the parents already aren't keeping a close eye on the kid. Or perhaps they had already explained it all to the kid, and he chose to ignore them. Hopefully, the cop incident made a stronger impression on him than his parents.

I honestly think that a run-in with the cops at age 7 isn't horrific if you've already been taught what's right and what's wrong. By age 7, I knew there were various consequences for doing the "wrong" things. I got chastised by cop when I was pretty young for skate boarding in my neighborhood because I wasn't being careful and riding it straight out into the street. Yes, it IS intimidating to have to deal with cops at ANY age, but it's a lesson I never forgot.

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Originally posted by Isaviel
Agreed however the parent should have been the one taken under custody not a 7 yr old child. I blame the parent not the child. He's SEVEN. They are clueless in this world right now and having a cop drag him by the neck and handcuffed is a rather dramatic thing for a 7yr old.

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The cops did what the parents probably never will. Some kids just have harder heads than others and maybe it will do him some good. Or maybe in 20 years he'll just be in the news for killing his girlfriend and grilling her in the backyard. It's not like they pepper sprayed him in the face or thumped him with night sticks (that will come later).

I also don't believe that kids are always these little paragons of innocence. They can be quite capable of bodyslamming and killing their siblings or shooting their classmates.

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Originally posted by Savaric
I also don't believe that kids are always these little paragons of innocence. They can be quite capable of bodyslamming and killing their siblings or shooting their classmates.

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Ooh yes. Absolutely. Of course, it's inappropriate to automatically deal with a child the way you deal with adults (eg jail time, fines, etc), because different punishments "hit them where it hurts" - also, while they're in the charge of their parents, it's the parents' responsibility fundamentally. But this could well be the best thing to happen - if both child and parents respond to this appropriately. Child: You're scared by the whole notion of going to the police station for riding that bike on the sidewalk? Then don't ride on the sidewalk again, and it won't happen again. Parents: You're horrified that the cops had to tell your child off? Then discipline him yourself so he doesn't have to be told off by someone else, and it won't happen again.

That's not to say the cops didn't act inappropriately in this. Their response may have been a tad excessive - but it may also have been blown out of proportion by a whinging mom, too.

Being somone who hopes NEVER to have kids of their own, what I am about to say is based entirely on what I observed growing up. In the last ten years or so there has developed a sense amongst so many parents that because a child is their child the child is incapable of doing wrong. This happens for two reasons, the first being that the parents are so damn egotistical that any wrongdoing on the part of the child - who is viewed almost as an axtention of the parents on body/soul/consciousness/whatever - that does not directly impact on the parent ( cutting up mommy's best cocktail-dress and such) is ignored because the parents take it as a personal insult to them that somone could accuse their child of anything untoward. It's a product of the "Keeping up with the Joneses" "My child's on the honor-roll and yours isn't" society where children are treated almost like medals.

The second is that it is so much easier to blames the schools or the cops or whatever other authority figure brings up the mewling brat's misdeeds than to admit the child has done something wrong, think of an appropriate punnishment and carry it out, that many parents just don't bother. They kid themselves in to thinking the world is singling little Joey Bloggs out and that they should not be concerned with it and just go back to watching TV or thinking about their stock portfolio or whatever.

Both approaches are a lot more common than people realize and are what is really to blame for incidents like this.