Kid(s) doing 'dangerous' things

‘… When I heard this story, which was told me to show that children need constant guarding from their own ability to harm themselves, I could not help thinking of that pit in the compound at Wanania, when the children played unsupervised all day without incident.

These two isolated cases do not mean much, of course, but they do represent quite accurately a difference in the two cultures. There are many more potentially dangerous situations among the Yequana. One of the most striking is the omnipresence of machetes and knives, all razor-sharp and all available to step on, fall against or play with. Babies, too young to have learned about handles, picked them up by the blades and, as I watched, waved them about in their dimpled fists. They not only did not sever their own fingers or injure themselves at all, but if they were in their mothers' arms, they managed to miss hurting them either.

Similarly, a baby playing with a firebrand, stumbling and falling with it, and climbing in and out of his house with it over a foot-high doorsill, never actually touched the wood, or the overhanging palm thatch, or his own hair or anyone else's.

Babies, like puppies, played about beside the family fire without interference from their respective elders.

The boys, from the age of about eighteen months, practised archery with sharp arrows, some enthusiasts carrying their bows and snows about most of their waking hours. Shooting was not confined to rod-designated places, nor were any 'safety rules' in effect.

In my two and a half years there I saw only the one arrow wound I have mentioned.

There are the hazards of the jungle, including the great ease with which one can lose oneself in its trackless vastness and the chances or injuring one’s bare feet and naked body while walking, besides more noted dangers like snakes, scorpions or jaguars.

And there are the rivers, in which rapids are even more frequent and perilous than anacondas or crocodiles, and a child swimming farther out in the current than his strength and ability allow has a good chance of being smashed on the rocks or against one of many submerged branches.

The depth and swiftness of a familiar part of the river vary enormously from day to day according to the amount of rainfall upstream, so knowing the dangers one day may not be useful the next. The children who bathe and play in the river every day must gauge their ability accurately under all conditions.

The operative factor seems to be placement of responsibility. In most Western children the machinery for looking after themselves is in only partial use, a great deal of the burden having been assumed by adult caretakers. With its characteristic abhorrence of redundancy, the continuum withdraws as much self-guardianship as is being taken over by others.

The result is diminished efficiency because no one can be as constantly or as thoroughly alert to anyone else's circumstances as one is oneself. It is another instance of trying to better nature, another example of mistrust of faculties not intellectually controlled and usurpation of their functions by the intellect, which does not have the capacity to take all relevant information into consideration.

Besides causing civilized children to have more accidents, this propensity of ours to interfere with nature's placement of responsibility where it works best also gives rise to innumerable other hazards.

A notable example is the accidental setting of fires. In a Midwestern American city one winter not long ago there was a blizzard that completely stopped traffic, and therefore the movement of fire engines, for several days.

Accustomed to dealing with an average of forty-odd fires a day, the fire chief appeared on television to beg people to take extra care not to start fires during the emergency. He advised them that they would have to cope with any fires themselves.

As a consequence the daily average dropped to four fires until the streets were cleared, at which time the number increased to normal. It cannot be imagined that many of the forty normal daily fires were set on purpose, but those who accidentally brought them about were evidently aware that great care was not really necessary when the fire brigade was quick and efficient. Apprised of the change in placement of responsibility, they unconsciously cut the figure by go per cent.’’

Jean Liedloff, The continuum concept