Am I Crazy, Or...?

This is a story from this morning's Tribune.
The accident in question happened within a few blocks of my house; I saw the commotion around 6:30 AM, after returning from dropping Tim off at work. I could see the demolished car, but other than that there were no details available. There were, though, at least three traffic helicopters hovering over the scene for a long time--at least half an hour--to get pictures for the morning news.

It wasn't til I saw this story that I discovered the details:

Five teenagers--two 17-year-old boys, a 15-year-old boys, and two girls, aged 13 and 14--were driving eastbound "at a high rate of speed" at 3:30 in the morning.

I don't even HAVE kids, and I can already see about half-a-dozen things wrong with that sentence.

I even asked LJ, because I wanted to make sure I wasn't thinking like a puritanical idiot. I said, "You have a 13-year-old daughter, right?" "Yeah," he said. "Would you let her go out with two 17-year old boys at 3 in the morning?" He looked at me like I'd lost my mind. "HELL no," he said.

SO:
1. Two VERY young teen girls out late...
2. ...in a car...
3. ...with two boys at least three years their senior...
4. ...at 3:30 in the morning...
5. ...speeding....
6. ...and not wearing seat-belts. (The story says the girls were ejected from the car.)
7. This is only my speculation, but I'll be really interested to hear the toxicology results on the driver.

I look back to when I was 14 years old. I had a crush on an older guy, true enough, but had I mentioned any intent of dating him, I feel sure that horsewhips would have been invoked, at the very least, as a possible consequence to any "older boy" who would dare to date my barely-teenaged self. And further, there was never any question of actually GOING anywhere with him; there was never any question of going ANYWHERE, in any car, driven by anyone other than a parent or a friend's parent. (As I remember, the one time my friend's 19-year-old sister was tapped to drive us to the mall, my parents freaked out so much that I ended up staying home. And SHE drove like someone's great-granny.)

Even had the unthinkable occurred and I HAD been allowed to associate with "older boys", there was no question, none at all, of whether or not I would have been out of the house at 3:30 AM. I would have been just as likely to have been on the moon, or playing wide-receiver in the SuperBowl, than to have been out after 10 PM--and it was a huge privilege, bestowed only on special occasions, to be allowed to stay down the block at Debbi's til 10. My parents knew where I was at all times; they had the numbers of all my friends' parents, and could call in a heartbeat to see if I had left on time, or if I was where I said I'd be. Knowing that, I never strayed; in fact, the worst thing I did in THAT line came long before my teenage years-- it was when I was in first grade and another little girl told me it was okay to come home to her house straight from school, without calling my mom first. I don't remember her logic, but it was very persuasive; the amount of trouble I got into, however, was FAR more persuasive.

But that was me, and that was almost 25 years ago. Apparently my life was a million miles different than those two little girls--for that's what they were, underneath all their 13-year-old sophistication--little girls. They were little girls who nobody, apparently, was watching out for; not in any way that matters, anyway. You can say what people always say, with stories like this: They were good kids; they just made a mistake. But thinking back to my own life: someone had seen to it, from very early on, that I would be far too terrified of my parents' wrath to even consider the actions that would lead me into such a "mistake". And nobody, apparently, did that for these girls, nor for the boys who survived. Nobody threatened, if those boys weren't back by 11:00 at night, to eat their drivers' licenses; nobody told them that the first time they got a speeding ticket would be the LAST time they saw a car until they were 30. (I got so hysterical, leading up to telling my mom about the first speeding ticket I'd received, that she said afterwards "God, is that all? I thought you were going to tell me you were pregnant.") Nobody told those girls that if they got caught hanging around high-school boys, they'd be locked in their rooms, with no phone and no TV, til their hair turned gray. Nobody sat them down and told them Look, I know you don't think it will happen to you, but that's what everyone thinks--so please, PLEASE wear your seatbelt. No one ever said to them Please, PLEASE, if you're in a situation you're not comfortable with, call us for a ride. I might not be happy about it, but I won't punish you for trying to stay safe.

I feel bad for these families. I don't know them, though the girls live close enough that they've probably walked down my street before; I've probably passed them on the sidewalk, or driven past them. They were way too young to be out that late, way too young to be in a car with high-school boys...way too young to die. I feel bad for these families, yeah--but I wonder, too, how it ever got this far. No parent should ever bury their child, true enough; but no parent should let the rules be unspoken, or leave their kids to fend for themselves. Maybe 25 years ago, but surely not in THIS world--not anymore.