Bob Sihler wrote:This thread was a lot more interesting when we were debating the questions of the OP instead of starting a second Everest thread.

it's actually the third one.
http://www.summitpost.org/phpBB2/viewto ... 52e289354a

somebody stole my thunder.

MikeTX wrote:

Bob Sihler wrote:This thread was a lot more interesting when we were debating the questions of the OP instead of starting a second Everest thread.

it's actually the third one.
http://www.summitpost.org/phpBB2/viewto ... 52e289354a

somebody stole my thunder.

Don't they go hand and hand?

Sort of (hand in hand) but I think (and have tried my best) that as 'Climbers with Children' the topic is 'always on.'

These flat out categorizations of 'child endangerment' are faintly ridiculous. Quoting the law when speaking about the Everest situation, even more ridiculous. I am going out on a limb here to predict none of you know the relevant Chinese (or Nepal) law on the matter. Child endangerment is a legal definition... Everest simply does not apply.

Philosophically speaking, what is yalls problem with exposing a child to danger? And the notion that a parent is only punished if something bad happens... that seems to me to be, completely unfair.

What I have heard in this thread is some of you would be happy to have me or any other parent held to criminal charges, for the 'crime' of exposing the kid to danger, or for the 'crime' of allowing something bad to happen to a child.

Yet we all mostly agree that eventually exposure to risk does grade into true abuse, or could anyway... and that's the line I am willing to draw in the sand. Anything more than that, imo, must be considered on a case by case basis.

I got to do dangerous shit, as a kid. I toted guns, camped, jumped off cliffs into deep water, taught myself to rock climb, blah blah blah. I am DAMN GLAD my parents were not over-protective. Hell my mom used to let us sit on the tailgate of her truck as she went down our dirt road at 40 mph.... she would go to JAIL for that now lol!

"Would Mama let me do it." I think that is now my own threshold, I just decided.

Given my own childhood I can predict she would NOT have let me go try Everest. But if Dad were a ski patroller and mountaineer himself and we'd been escalating things since weedom, I believe if Pop said it was OK she would have consented.

I am proud and feel very (VERY) lucky to have had such parents. In my own modern stone aged family I have tried to keep my mind open to risk. God knows I've exposed them to it!

Am I under arrest yet?

DMT

"Risk" is the default state, and most everything we do is aimed at attenuating risk. To say that we have a right to risk implies the opposite. The problem is that our perceptions of risk are generally poor. We have a strong tendency to trade purely objective risks for risks with any subjective element. For example, there is pretty good evidence that when people traded hunter/gatherer lifestyles for agrarian ones, they worked more, lived shorter lives and suffered poorer health. For what? The certainty of a harvest and a home. Likewise, most climbers get scared on the way up, when they have a highly redundant safety system in place, but relaxed on the rappel, where there are multiple single-points-of-failure, but where they are holding the rope. For society, this means it makes sense to try to manage epidemiologic risks, risks that everybody takes habitually, like driving or building houses. Beyond those types of risk, the easily quantifiable ones, well, the individual involved has to sort it out whether he wants to or not. This includes the risk of being busted for whatever, which is and has been a theoretical risk in almost anything we do.

The fear of risk, is worse than the fear when at risk.
If one learns to handle risk, one has a better survival rate.
So, it's Darwin's award, to be risk avers into absurdum.

MikeTX wrote:

Bob Sihler wrote:This thread was a lot more interesting when we were debating the questions of the OP instead of starting a second Everest thread.

it's actually the third one.
http://www.summitpost.org/phpBB2/viewto ... 52e289354a

somebody stole my thunder.

Yup, I remember that one. I even commented on it. But you didn't have as catchy a title, I guess...

We all need to learn how to judge the degree and changes in risk levels in each situation and how to recognize the various levels of danger/consequences. Real world experience is the best way to seriously learn these lessons and as parents we need to let our children try things and sometimes fail in order to get the lessons through. Of course we hope we can do this in an environment that has minimal consequences.

In my view things crossover into child endangerment when you take your unprepared child into a situation where there is a very high risk that the consequences will be very serious or fatal. That was discussed in this previous thread where a snowmobiler took his 7 year old child out in high avalanche conditions and then parked in the runout zone while watching some idiots high marking!
http://www.summitpost.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=52332

MikeTX wrote:it's actually the third one.
http://www.summitpost.org/phpBB2/viewto ... 52e289354a

somebody stole my thunder.

Or the fourth!

http://www.summitpost.org/phpBB2/viewto ... ady#740643

This thread is still on SP, but in limboland, not showing up on GENERAL.

Dingus Milktoast wrote:
Yet we all mostly agree that eventually exposure to risk does grade into true abuse, or could anyway... and that's the line I am willing to draw in the sand. Anything more than that, imo, must be considered on a case by case basis.

I think that knowingly exposing a child to a situation where you know there is a probability (not just possibility) of great bodily harm or death crosses the line into abuse. Having said that, I also don't think you can automatically conclude this rule is being violated by the parents of this 13 year old. All circumstances have to be considered on a case by case basis. Leave for the summit in the face of a 1996 type storm? An adult can make a decision to go for it, but the rule above would be violated if a parent consented to let his minor child go.

I am definitely in the camp of exposing your children to risk as part of the growing up process. But crossing over into abuse is justifiably illegal in most jurisdictions in this country. To paraphrase Forest Gump and Bob Sihler, that's all I have to say about that.

Dingus Milktoast wrote:Am I under arrest yet?

You have the right to remain silent. Any thing you say can be used against you in... Do you waive extradition?

Mountain Impulse wrote:Knowingly putting a child in a situation where great bodily harm is likely to result is a common standard for child endangerment laws. And it's not whether the person doing the endangering "knew" but rather would a "reasonable person" have known harm was likely to result.

If that's the legal definition, then case closed: given the percentages, great bodily harm is not likely to result during the kid's Everest attempt.

Neophiteat48 wrote:So regarding the 13 year old attempting Everest, couldn't that fall into that definition? I would think so,

That would be a reasonable assessment, I should think, if more Everest climbers experienced great bodily harm than didn't.

The operative word here is "likely."

BorutKantuser wrote:This Father & Son TR is a contribution to the topic.
Enjoy!

Welcome back, Borut!