March 4, 2014 9:31AM # Helicopter Parents, Helicopter Governance, and Today’s Childhood By [Walter Olson](https://www.cato.org/people/walter-olson) --- SHARE Should parents helping their child’s teacher put on a short class party have to [submit to a background check](http://www.freerangekids.com/dear-parents-please-come-to-our-45-min-class-party-with-your-background-check/) first? Is it child endangerment to leave your toddler in the car for a few minutes on a mild day while you [run into a shop](https://www.cato.org/blog/leaving-child-alone-car-few-minutes-abuse)? If your child gets hurt falling off a swing, is it potential child neglect *not* to [sue every solvent defendant in sight](http://www.freerangekids.com/a-fall-from-the-swings-a-leon-in-medical-economics/)? Should [police](http://www.freerangekids.com/dad-on-foot-arrested-for-refusing-to-wait-in-line-of-cars-to-get-kids/) have [arrested a dad](http://reason.com/archives/2013/12/05/school-nannies-and-the-death-of-common-s) who walked into school at pickup time rather than wait outside for his kids as he was supposed to? Author Lenore Skenazy has led the charge against the forces of legal and societal overprotectiveness in her book Free-Range Kids and at her popular blog of the same name. This Thursday, March 6 — rescheduled from a weather-canceled event originally set for last month — she’ll be the Cato Institute’s guest for a lunchtime talk on helicopter parenting and its near relation, helicopter governance; I’ll be moderating and commenting. The event is free and open to the public, but you need to register, which you [can do here](https://www.cato.org/events/quit-bubble-wrapping-our-kids-0). You can also watch online [live at this link](https://www.cato.org/live). ##### Related Tags [Government and Politics](https://www.cato.org/government-politics) [![Creative Commons License](/build/cato_2020/images/creative-commons.svg)](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/).