I've noticed a disturbing trend in the news lately. It's the whole, "A neighbor called the authorities" thing. Who are these people who do this? We actually experienced it here awhile ago, but I didn't really think much of it other than it was annoying.
We were unloading the kids out of the car, and My Big Guy wanted to "drive" while we got My Little Guy ready for bed. We do this on occassion - let him hang out in the car for a bit (without the keys of course) and he pretends to drive and pushes all the buttons and turns on my emergency lights. A good time is had by all. Once he decides he's done "driving" he comes back in the house and we move on with our lives. Sometimes he leaves the lights on, but luckily my car has that thing where it won't let the battery die if the lights are left on so we don't worry about it too much.
Apparently the neighbors DO worry about it.
They called the cops to report that "some light was flashing in our garage". Seriously. They didn't come over, and ring our doorbell and kindly let us know that the emergency lights were left on on our car. Nope, they called the damn police. The cop came to our house at 10:00 at night, and my husband had to show him ID to prove that we do in fact live here while I turned the flashers off my car.
This is a lesser version of what you see in the news lately. A kid was walking by himself, and a neighbor called the cops because he was alone. Kids were playing in the street so a neighbor called the cops on them. Kids are doing some pretty innocent thing and a neighbor is "concerned" and calls the authorities.
I just don't get it. And it totally creeps me out more than anything that the kids might be doing. I have this image of some random neighbor peeking through the drapes and being appalled that kids are, well, being kids and calling the cops on them. Then the neighbor watches the cops come, smiles smugly to themselves and walks away feeling good that they prevented... who knows what. It's creepy. And it scares the hell out of me that my neighbors (or anyone else) would be creeping on my kids and I while we're outside.
It's creepier than Big Brother to me because these are people in my community, my neighbors. We're supposed to all be in this together and be friendly to each other. Calling the cops is not friendly. It's a complete over-reaction and makes me concerned that they'll be called again based on how I want to raise my kids.
We live on the corner, so our backyard is pretty visible to the public. I worry that when we let My Big Guy go out there by himself (in his own yard!) someone will see him, think he's too young to be alone (which in society is probably anything under 9 at this point) and call the cops, or CPS or something. That's what scares me more than anything that might happen to my kid. And that's messed up.
Mind your own damn business people. And if you have concerns about me or my kids, come over and TALK to me.
What is wrong with people? We had neighbors call animal services to come pick up our cat who had followed me three doors down as I was talking E on a walk. The same cat who basks in the sun on our front porch all day everyday. Did they talk to me? Nope. They just trapped our cat, who was basically standing in our front yard by this point, and called animal services. What the heck?
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