Brooklyn Kids Could be Exposed to Porn, Pot Smoking
Nobody said it was easy raising kids in the big city. In Crown Heights, Brooklynian has a thread started by a parent who found his/ her son in a cloud of marijuana smoke at the Stroud Park playground. “A row of young men (some fathers of the children playing) sat on the benches right next…
Nobody said it was easy raising kids in the big city. In Crown Heights, Brooklynian has a thread started by a parent who found his/ her son in a cloud of marijuana smoke at the Stroud Park playground. “A row of young men (some fathers of the children playing) sat on the benches right next to monkey bars, slides, etc. all smoking weed and blowing the smoke literally into the kids faces,” said the poster. “What disturbed me the most was that this did not seem to bother anyone. The moms were oblivious, they didn’t care. Everything just seemed status quo.” One person suggested calling the police, while another parent responded, “You have to face the fact that smoking pot is part of the ‘culture’ in this part of town. You don’t have to like it, but that’s where you live … sometimes we either have to make peace with things we don’t like, do something to change them, or leave.” Meanwhile, Gowanus Lounge posted a letter from a Park Slope parent appalled by two men viewing porn at the Pacific Street public library. The parent hopes to organize the “sisters and brothers of PS” in a campaign for a smut-free library. The First Amendment was discussed, and one commenter suggested creating a separate children’s library. The picture at right is of a park in Amsterdam, where it’s also part of the “culture” to smoke pot in public (not really sure about viewing porn).
Smoking weed in playground and no one cares [Brooklynian]
Internet Porn at the Public Library in Boerum Hill [Gowanus Lounge]
Photo by janvanderweel.
I read the Park Slope parents thread on the listserv. It was one person who wrote in about the porn and a bunch of responders who replied that that is what the First Amendment is all about.
Sometimes I think the Gowanus Lounge, Brownstoner, etc are looking for stories when there isn’t one there.
From the take it for what is dept., walking past the 9TH St. entrance to PP this weekend I heard the familiar lyrics of that Dead song “Casey Jones” or whatever it’s called. I noticed a guy in front of a large group of people banging it out on guitar and having a good time. Except I noticed he kept singing “Driving that train, driving that train” instead of “Driving that train, high on cocaine.” At first I thought he was just stumbling through the song, but as I got closer I realized he was editing the lyrics because the party included a number of kids. It struck me as pretty funny.
10:22 I’m just going off the Gowanus Lounge post here (see link above), but apparently there are two seperate computer areas, one for adults and the other for children under 12 years old. The post links to a NY Press article by Norman Oder (of the Atlantic Yards Report), who made the interesting point that filters negatively impact a teenager who might think he or she has an STD, or is pregnant, for example. Oder wrote that the city’s public library system opposed putting the optional filters on its computers, in part because they unintentionally block sites such as ones dedicated to sex education, but had to in order to receive federal funding.
10:07 Funny that you bring up cigarettes, because a couple of people on the Brooklynian forum made that comparison as well. Do you think people would have been more outraged by this post had it been about a group of parents blowing cigarette smoke into their kids’ faces? Just an open question… I used to wait tables when I was in high school and college, and I was always shocked by parents who brought their little children, infants even, into the smoking section. Smoke would literally just hang in the air, surrounding their faces.
Anyone who has ever taken care of children for a little while knows that getting high is about the only way to do it while maintaining your sanity – you should just do it when the kiddies arent looking
A liberal is someone who wants to legalize pot and ban tobacco.
A conservative is someone who thinks porn is their free speech right but begging is a quality of life crime.
Simple solution.. If you don’t want your kid exposed to ganja clouds, don’t take them to the park at night.
Most appalling to this reader is the element of discovery evident here. Who let such ignorant people bear and raise children? I live in Crown Heights, and you have to be deaf, dumb and blind to think ANY block is MJ smoke free. The police are doing a lot, and crack-downs have iproved things, but ladies (mothers, specifically) wake the hell up and spend time where your children hang out. NYC is NOT Disney World.
Don’t other library systems have anti-porn policies? I know this has been a free speech struggle, but I don’t want my tax dollars enabling people to use the public library to watch porn. Much less where children can see it.
As a parent, what was wrong about the people smoking pot in the playground was that (a) some of them were getting high while responsible for young children, and (b) they were exposing children to second-hand marajuana smoke. Maybe the more drug-educated can tell me: wouldn’t that make the kids a little high? On the first point, that’s appalling. On the second point, if it makes the kids high, that’s beyond the pale.
As an adult, I feel conflicted. Marajuana is no worse a social evil than alcohol. The laws against it are socially harmful and unfairly enforced against black men. I’m going to go out on a limb here and assume the men smoking in the park were black. So, calling the police is over-reacting and possibly perpetrating a social injustice.
What about speaking to the guys and suggesting that getting high around children is, you know, kind of a bad idea. Would you do it? I wouldn’t. What kind of a jerk gets high in a playground in the first place? A huge jerk.
No good answers here.