For letting a 16 year old walk home?

[Floofatron]

Difference of opinion with DH…
My 16 year old DS is going to a party tonight. It will finish at 11pm ish. He asked if he can walk home with his friends (three others, they are 15 and 16) rather than be picked up like we would usually do. They are all staying at ours. It’s about 45-60 min walk through a fairly peaceful town. He is sensible but I imagine there will be a bit of alcohol at this party. He has a tracker on his phone.
AIBU to let them?

YABU - you should pick them up
YANBU - it’s fine to let them walk

It's fine so long as the area is not dodgy. Do then good.

For peace of mind I would pick them up or arrange transport - 60 minutes is a long time for four mid-teen boys to be walking through town late at night, especially as they are likely to have had some alcohol.

Also as the three friends are staying at yours overnight you are in essence taking responsibility for them post-party.

Mine wouldn’t be allowed to go to a party on a school night.
mind you, who hold a party on a Thursday night in term time?!

16 is definitely old enough to do this. They have there phones if they run into trouble.

We don't have to. I let my DD walk home with friends at that age. A couple of weeks after her 18th, she was 200 miles away walking back to uni halls after a night out.

Millions upon millions of people go out every day and night and don’t get stabbed in random attacks. My DC are 19 and 21 and have been ‘allowed’ freedom to walk back from parties etc from 15/16 onwards.

It doesn’t mean I didn’t worry about them (and still do) but that is MY problem not theirs. They are my kids but their own people. The least I can do is respect their independence.

18 is hopefully a lot more sensible than 16 and university towns have lots of students walking around at all hours. The boys should be fine, but I would be on tenterhooks waiting for them to get back and much more comfortable picking them up. Who knows what a group of tipsy (or worse) 16 year old boys might get up to, and it's a long walk in possibly bad weather.

Would it? My DDs are a bit older, 17 and 19 but they've walked home with friends a lot later than this, especially eldest. She goes downtown and comes home at 4am, but walks with her friend who lives opposite.

I think all parents would be more comfortable picking their kids up, but the point is that it's very important to let your children have a level of independence. Being able to handle yourself in various situations is a skill and being independent takes practice. It builds confidence and god knows we have enough anxious teens as it is.

This must just be completely dependent on your own area. Obvo you wouldn’t want your dc walking home if your local news is a constant ‘stabbing last night’ but if it’s ‘who moved Ernie’s flower pot’ it’s gonna be fine.

I'm not a fan of groups of teenagers (whatever sex) wandering the streets at night. However sensible you think they are, friends and alcohol can be a pretty toxic mix. I know you have to draw the line somewhere, but teens with alcohol are more likely to take risks and less likely to think through consequences.

If you want to foster independence and not be a taxi for them, get them to order a cab.

It’s half term here.

It’s an impossible question for anyone else to definitively answer as it entirely depends on the kids and where you are.

i would absolutely allow any of mine at that age to walk that distance where we live now. Absolutely wouldn’t have where we used to live.

absolutely would have allowed DD1 and DS1, still offer DD2 lifts frequently now (mid 20s) because she’s a daydreamer and always seems to have a friend that can sniff out trouble.

I'd be ok with this in general, but not on a "school night"

I'd want to be checking that they were clear about how to handle possible/likely scenarios e.g. being aware of women on their own and making sure they did not appear intimidating, not talking back if pulled over by police etc.

I always walked home from parties and the pub at that age (and on school nights! Thursdays were live music nights at the brewery, about 40 minute walk away, and I went very often) so I would let my children do the same, though my teenager doesn't go to parties yet but she does walk home late in the evening by herself.

Next year, when she's 16, she'll be living in a city by herself to go to school and I will have no control about where or when she walks beyond giving my advice so I have to prepare her, which I can't do by picking her up all the time.

I'd be absolutely fine with it. Some people really could do with putting down the true crime podcasts/social media doomscrolling and realising that there aren't knife-wielding maniacs hiding behind every bush. Violent crime is considerably lower than it was 30/40 years ago so I don't know where this 'Eeeh you used to be able to walk home in my day but not any more' stuff comes from, if not from the fact that other people's misery is so often nowadays packaged up as ghoulish entertainment.

15/16 and you know they’ll be drinking?

even if you say they’re walking back, I bet you get a call to say one of them is utterly inebriated and can’t walk home. So you’ll end up picking them all up anyway

The most at risk of violence are males between the ages of 16-24. We perceive danger to women more, and react more when it happens.

But for OP, yes I would allow it, and at 16 I wouldn't be contacting their parents to ask if it is ok .

I'd have no issue with my teen daughter walking home with a group of friends in this way either.
And, I'd be more worried about my teen son doing it, as I'd be concerned that (particularly after drinking) he would be more likely to inflame any situation that arose.

When yours are 20 and living away from home sadly they’ll be more at risk because you never allowed them to develop the ability to risk assess situations. So they’ll put themselves in more danger. You’re parenting according to what makes you comfortable rather than what’s best for them - and that’s poor parenting.

At 17 I was walking across London after clubs kicked out to get the first train out of Waterloo. But different times i guess. As long as the area was fairly ‘safe’ I wouldn’t want kids wandering through parks at that time for example, I think as a group it will be fine. My dd at that age was wandering across our village and back as they drop off friends in a group and she and one friend live very close so they walk the rest of the gang back home first. I’d want to be confident they were a good group of friends, DS has a couple of ‘friends’ I wouldn’t trust to not abandon him.

You’re parenting according to what makes you comfortable rather than what’s best for them - and that’s poor parenting.

That is the most concise explanation I have read about this. I agree completely, parents parent to manage their own anxiety.

Yes I would. How else do young people learn independence, learn to risk assess, learn what to do in an emergency?

Disagree with that. I expect my child will make sensible decisions such as not walk late at night (when there are taxis or not drinking and driving) and i’d rather they be aware of potential dangers as opposed to thinking “it’ll never happen to me”

i don’t think taking unnecessary risks (allowing 16 year olds to walk home for an hour late at night after drinking is one in my opinion) is going to make then any safer. Most of the attacks that happen are people who have been walking believing they are safe and it won’t happen to them & would have made no difference whether they were used to it or not.

i could argue it’s poor parenting to let teenagers do the walk but i wouldn’t as we all parent differently. I’ll happily allow mine to “never develop the ability to risk situations” if it means they never put themselves in the potentially risky situation to start with! I wouldn’t walk home as adult in that situation so wouldn’t be encouraging it as teenagers & the main difference is at 20 i can’t control their decisions (don’t expect them to be living away from home at 20 anyway) but at 16 i could. If i let them do it at 16 they’ll assume its safe at 20 & potentially get into even riskier situations as they deem it to be safe and not a risk based on past experiences! Not just from a potential attack point of view but traffic etc as well - not worth it when i could drive to pick them up & instil in them the idea that there is always an element of risk so always chose the safest option & never walk home. It’s quite simple.

I have a son the same age. As there’s a group of them, I think it’s fine and would allow it (and I’m someone who errs on the side of caution).