by A Strip Club, A Liquor Store, And A Bus Stop — it sounds remarkably like the beginning of a joke but it is anything but humor. Consider the role of a bus stop — it is meant to be a place to allow children to congregate and wait for a bus to take them to school and then later drop them off after work. The transition from home to school and back has to be one that involves safety for the children — both in terms of their physical well being and what they see. Having a school bus stop sandwiched between a liquor store and a strip club puts children in danger on both ends.
It is a physical danger to children to have them near a strip club and a liquor store. There are many clients of both liquor stores and strip clubs that are less than friendly to children, particularly when there has been excessive liquor imbibed and people get into drunken rages. You may be thinking that people would never drink so early in the morning in front of children, but you could not be more mistaken in this regard. I remember when I was a student at Rutgers seeing people loitering outside of liquor stores, stinking of alcohol.
Moreover, the impressions that are left on children are powerful. As mentioned in the article, there have been children who have perceived the strip club as an exciting place of future employment. I do not mean to denigrate the profession, however it is certainly not something that should be, in a way, advertised to children.
Nor liquor — if children see people going into the store at all house of the day and having a good time, they will get the incorrect impression that it is drinking liquor during the day that makes a person happy.
I am quite against the idea of a Nanny state however we do need to be particularly careful when it comes to the physical and mental well being of our children. If we want to have happy and healthy adults, we need to have safe and happy children.
It’s a sad problem. There are becoming fewer public safe havens for children.