No, you are not. I am 23 and I feel exactly the same way. I don't want to have kids in general, but if I ever do, it's not going to be in North America. I just feel so sad for today's kids in this country... I'd hate a life like that. Oddly, most people, including those who enjoyed being free kids themselves, see nothing wrong with this; in fact, consider it the only way to bring up a kid.

The general "safety" paranoia and overregulated lives are a fact of life for adults around here to; I find it so stifling... Adults are afraid to go out and explore the world (an example relevant to these boards is a phrase we've all heard uttered many times: "Oh my God, you ride your bike in traffic??!!!" As a bike tourer, I also get a fair share of "Oh my God, you ride your bike through remote regions and camp outdoors??!!" And as a woman, I am often told: "Oh my God, you walk and bike around by yourself after dark!" (yeah, it's in frikkin' Canada too! )

And the car culture is definitely partly to blame for the obesity epidemic. When walking and biking are dangerous, unpleasant and impractical, people won't do them. Home-garage-cage-garage-office-garage-cage-garage-home: some people don't ever leave an enclosed, walled environment of some sort the whole day.

What especially saddens me is that just about everybody I know - including very smart and sensitive people - completely buy the whole car 'n suburb philosophy. It's so natural, they don't even imagine how anything can or should be different. Try to argue with them, they think you're joking; so incomprehensible to them is the thought that something might be wrong.