Should Childless Adults Be Banned from Playgrounds?

LOS ANGELES, CA — California’s largest city could soon become the first to outright ban adults unaccompanied by children from hanging out at public playgrounds. The proposed law, which aims to make play areas in Los Angeles free from “creepy activity,” triggered instant backlash. Critics contend the law is based on fear-mongering and criminalizes inoffensive behaviors such as sitting on a park bench on a sunny day.

Los Angeles, however, wouldn’t be the first to go to extreme measures to keep children safe. Santa Monica, New York City, Miami Beach and Hollywood (Florida) all have similar measures, Los Angeles City Councilman Mitch O'Farrell, who proposed the ban, pointed out. After widespread media backlash, O’Farrell defended the proposal this week, arguing that it wouldn’t ban adults from enjoying parks and open spaces. It would simply keep people with no business at a playground away from the children.

“Our park facilities should be a safe haven, and we must do our part to provide the proper shelter for our kids,” O’Farrell said. “In my district, I have received complaints of drug deals taking place in our kids’ play areas, and other disturbing behaviors. This is unacceptable, and I will take every precaution.”

O’Farrell’s critics argue that there are already existing laws against drug dealing, lewd activities and loitering. These laws, they argue, give police the tools they need to keep the community safe without criminalizing benign activity.

“O’Farrell argues that we can’t assume every adult who wanders into a children’s play area is benign. But why should the city assume that every adult without a child is a pedophile," asked the Los Angeles Times Editorial Board. “That makes a childless adult a criminal just for being in a particular public space, which is an overreach that can lead to foolish enforcement — like ticketing people for sitting on a bench eating donuts or playing chess.”

The newspaper further stresses that such a law would deprive anyone but families from enjoying the city’s rare open spaces, which in many neighborhoods are nothing more than a pocket park with a playground and a park bench.

Slate takes the criticism a step further, arguing such a law offers a bleak view of humanity that isolates parents and families from the rest of the community.

“This segregation has its pros and cons for children,” writes Slate’s Elissa Strauss. “They’re provided with a relatively safe environment in which they can explore and take risks. But in the process, they’re denied exposure to the wider, messier all-ages world, which would likely broaden their perspective, offer challenges more like what they’ll experience later in life, and spark their imaginations.”

TELL US WHAT YOU THINK IN THE COMMENTS: Should playgrounds be prohibited to everyone but children and their guardians?

Photo: Reiner Kraft via Wikimedia Commons