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The threat is there. Even if only 1% of parents who leaves a kid unattended they get CPS called on them, it creates a chilling effect.
All parks have signs saying something like, "Kids under 12 need adult supervision." Amtrak will not let you buy train tickets for kids unless you have one adult per kid. I have four kids, so I can't take my family on an Amtrak trip until they are teenagers.
The culture is different. The rules and expectations are different. You have to admit that much.
Honestly, my initial reaction is basically the same as it would be if I had heard, "Even if only 1% of unarmed black men are shot by police..." Which is, I'm pretty sure you're missing some number of zeros. I don't know how many zeros. I don't know how many zeros matter. I'm not sure if there's a particular number of zeros where it goes from concern to not-concern. But I'm pretty sure the number is far from correct.
I was ready to believe you, because I am never surprised that the federal government would screw up literally anything in the most ridiculous way. Right before I hit "comment", I did decide to check. My search for "Amtrak children" brought me here, which says:
Ok, I could read that either way. But I guess what was nice about your claim is that it was that they won't even let you buy tickets. It's not some situation where you could buy tickets, get there, and learn that the correct reading of this phrase is that they have a one-adult-per-child policy. So, presumably, it's something I can check.
Sure enough, I just went to the reservations, picked totally random cities, totally random dates, one adult, four children (2-12, not 'youth', which could plausibly have different rules under various readings, though at this stage, it actually says, "Youth, children and infants must travel with at least one adult who is 18 years old."). At the very least, it lets me get to the page where they want me to start putting in traveler information (name, etc.) for each of the five passengers. I can tab over without entering any information, and it clearly has marked four children, with a different amount of information requested for the children than the adult.
I suppose it is possible that at some point after this step, after all the personal info has been put in and whatnot, the system will finally realize and say, "No, we actually had a one-adult-per-child policy all along, and we just tricked you into getting this far," but on first read, I think you're just wrong on this claim.
I mean, yes? But that's true for any epsilon difference. Presumably you also have to admit that I look out the window or walk around town and see kids out playing unattended all the time, too, right? Like, we're probably somewhere between epsilon and infinity, but it's kinda squishy to really capture it well.
I guess you will not believe me, but in 2023 it was the case that I was kept from buying Amtrak tickets without as many adults as there are kids. Maybe it was a COVID rule. You have to admit, it would be weirdly specific for me to just make it up.
Where do you live that you see kids unattended all the time? I have never seen that since 2010 or so.
I don't think you made it up. I have no idea what happened, who told you what, what you saw on a website, or what the code that ran their online reservation system did in the past. But I did just go to the internet archive, since you gave me a date. Maybe things were different! I'm in a 'checking' mood today, I guess. Here is the same page on their website, but from January 2023, the first of the snapshots they have available from 2023. In the spot where they would have had the equivalent phrase, the wording is slightly different:
Again, I could imagine interpreting this either way. I don't have a way of verifying what the code on their website allowed/disallowed three years ago. However, that archived page also says:
I don't know how to interpret that in any way other than that you could have had more children than you had adults. It's just the discounts that adjust, depending on details. [EDIT: It is entirely plausible that the code they used to run their online reservation system in 2023 was broken and that resulted in rejects rather than discounting according to the stated rules. I can't check that. But their stated policy appears to allow it.]
I'm in the US. Not looking to give any more information than that.
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Wow, that's crazy to me.
Yeah. I moved from Washington State to Indiana with four young kids. While contemplating the move, I considered that it might be easier for me and the kids to get a room on a train, instead of a 5 day car ride with a nursing baby. I ended up having to do the 5 day drive, mapping out every playground with a public restroom along the highway and stopping every 2 hours to nurse the baby.
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