Playing it safe is now dangerous for children

“Children need to encounter risks and overcome fears on the playground,” a Norwegian professor of psychology declares in the journal “Evolutionary Psychology.” “I think monkey bars and tall slides are great. ... The best thing is to let children encounter these challenges from an early age and they will then progressively learn to master them through their play over the years.”

Besides, adds a British university professor of risk management, “There is no clear evidence that playground safety measures have lowered the average risk on playgrounds.”

Having raised one kid who chipped a tooth eating cotton candy, I’m not sure we need to give children more opportunities to injure themselves by increasing the danger factor of playgrounds.

Not that there is any such thing as a “safe playground.” No matter how carefully you design them, construct them and pad them, the risk of injury on playgrounds is pretty much the same for kids as it is for playing dodge ball in the middle lane of Interstate 75. Build it and they will hurt themselves on it.

Or someone else.

As parents, we’d like to believe playgrounds are safe places for our children to have innocent fun. The reality is that playgrounds are fields of screams where some kids think the specific purpose of playground equipment is to inflict as much pain as possible on their fellow players.

On the seesaw for instance, the object for anyone over the age of 4 is to time your downward push so that the board goes up just as the rear end of the person at the other end is going down. We even had a name for that maneuver when I was a kid, but I’ve since discovered it had sexist connotations, so I can’t repeat it.

And what's the point of pushing that merry-go-round thing if it isn't possible to make it whirl fast enough to make other kids flying off and land on hot asphalt?

But maybe the researchers are right and the next time my grandchildren are in town I should find a more dangerous playground for them. Encouraging them to climb to the top of a three-story sliding board and hang from monkey bars the height of King Kong might be good for their anxieties, fears and emotional issues.

My anxieties, fears and emotional issues while watching them, on the other hand, probably will lead to a pretty severe heart attack.

Contact D.L. Stewart at dlstew_2000@yahoo.com.