I would recommend taping a note to your forehead: Are the kids still in the backseat?
Something Important
- Donald R. McClarey
Donald R. McClarey
Cradle Catholic. Active in the pro-life movement since 1973. Father of three, one in Heaven, and happily married for 43 years. Small town lawyer and amateur historian. Former president of the board of directors of the local crisis pregnancy center for a decade.
The world is mad is it not?
We had this issue in Australia for many years of people leaving kids in hot cars. Windows wound up. And it gets very hot here. Some do it to “dash” down to the store. Others more shockingly have been charged for leaving them in the car whilst they gamble in casinos or play slot machines. It’s usually a certain demographic or people from certain ethnic backgrounds, unfortunately.
The latest is not to leave dogs or pets in cars. Howzabout not leaving your kid for a start.
I kept looking for the link to the Bee…
Words fail.
Leaving aside the particularly unfortunate phrasing of this advice…
The obvious solution would be to make it an ironclad rule to ALWAYS look in the back seat EVERY time you get in or out of the car, so it becomes a habit. It only takes a second or two and is a good thing to do even if you don’t have kids or pets riding with you. Or get an alarm or some other device that reminds you when the child is present — these are easily obtainable online:
https://www.safewise.com/car-seat-alarm/
As the oldest son of large family, I can testify that we were all very good at making our presence in the backseat known to my Dad, as he often reminded us. 🙂
I can’t even imagine, leaving a child, or for that matter a pet, in the backseat of a car at any time. I lived for 20 years in Phoenix and it is beyond unthinkable.
It sounds to me like the contemporary effect of social media rewiring the brain.
I would recommend car makers give control to the owners of the car so they can switch off the passenger airbag and put the kids up front in the car with them.
I grow tired of all these “nudges” trying to make us safer and then acting surprised when we end up doing more stupid things than we did before they all tried to force improvements upon us.