What One Georgia Mom’s Arrest Tells Us About Our Rule Culture

Author

Bubba
22 Nov

Is there such a thing as too many rules and regulations? (Free Press)

A case study: Brittany Patterson, a mother of four, was arrested last month for "reckless conduct" after her 10-year-old son walked alone about a mile to a gas station in rural Georgia.

  • Patterson was not home at the time, although her disabled father was supervising the family residence.

  • The Georgia mom’s arrest reflects a broader trend of parents being penalized for granting children independence.

Free Press reporter Leighton Woodhouse on how Patterson’s experience isn’t an isolated incident:

In a suburb of Detroit, police threatened to call Child Protective Services on a father for allowing his 6-year-old daughter to walk a few blocks by herself to a store. In Connecticut, a librarian told a mother she had committed a misdemeanor by letting her 6 1/2-year-old son browse the shelves of the children’s section at the local library by himself for a few minutes while she ran across the street to buy him a bag of chips. And in Waco, Texas, cops arrested a mother for making her 8-year-old son walk half a mile home to discipline him for acting out. She was charged with a felony and consequently lost her job.

Parental rights advocate Lenore Skenazy:

You can’t make laws and run society always fantasizing about worst-case scenarios.

Zoom out: In an Atlantic essay earlier this year, Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch argued “an excess of restrictions has taken a very real toll on the lives of everyday Americans.”

  • Gorsuch noted that Congress passes an average of 344 new laws per session, adding 2–3 million words of law annually.

  • An estimated 5,000 federal crimes exist today, compared to about 3,000 in 1982.

  • Federal crimes include damaging government-owned lamps, selling mattresses without labels and consulting with “known pirates.”

The vibes: Since the pandemic, the share of Americans who think government is doing too much has spiked.

Bubba’s Two Cents

The outrage over intrusive pandemic measures (like lockdowns) may have sparked Americans’ broader frustration with excessive rules, from bureaucratic delays in construction to invasive personal cases like Brittany Patterson’s. Could this be why figures like Donald Trump, who openly flout the rules, are so appealing to a weary electorate?