For teens at the NorthPark Center mall in Dallas, there’s no more whiling away the hours loitering at the food court with their school chums. If kids under the age of 18 want to hang at the mall after 6:00 p.m., they now have to do it with parents in tow.
“I really do respect that there are parents who may not agree with us completely,” a NorthPark spokesman tells CBS Dallas-Fort Worth. “I can tell you that we’ve also spoken with all of the merchants in NorthPark and they think this a very good idea.”
The mall will randomly check IDs of unaccompanied teens. If they are 17 or under and sans parent or guardian, they’ll be asked to leave or to have said parent/guardian come join them in their evening revels.
Teens heading to the movie theater will be exempt while they are actually at the movie, but if they want to linger in the mall afterward, they are out of luck.
And obviously, those teens who work in the mall would not need to have their parents standing nearby while they work.
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Teens just get kicked out of one place after another. Where the hell do they expect them to go?
I guess they do what we did–head to the train trestle to smoke dope and drink beer and swing out on the tire swing over the ocean of broken glass, or maybe hang out under the high-tension power lines further down the tracks. The hum was soooo cool. Oh, about the kid who got stoned out and climbed them? Well, he actually lived and had permanent burn scars all over his body for the rest of his life. No biggie.
Yeah, that’s a better choice.
That’s pretty much my take on it. The law abiding ones have something taken away while the thugs move to somewhere seedy.
I think it should be like this ALL the time. I’ve seen far more wild teenagers and kids in malls than I have well-behaved one, and it’s the same at every mall across the country that I have been to.
Most people forget these people are bloggers from Chicago. lol I recommend anyone who thinks parents should not be in tow please go to Ford City Mall in Chicago and show your tolerance ^_^
They do this at the malls around me (in MO). I like it because it gives me an out when my 13 year old wants to hang out at the mall with friends but doesn’t want me there. I don’t want her there alone, so this rule keeps us from having to argue about it.
Also, you can actually walk through the mall on weekends without having to push through mobs of teenagers who are being obnoxious.
As a 17 year old, I think they should just kick out all the kids who behave like little sociopaths. I know, I know, another person posting an “I am the EXCEPTION!” comment…
I’m a well behaved kid, and I do not get a kick out of making a scene in the local mall. (Who even goes to a mall to hang out anymore? That seems like something that you only see in movies.) When I go to the mall, I’m there to buy stuff and then get out! Maybe stop by the food court for a pretzel, but that’s pretty much it. My boyfriend is 18, so we often run into problems when out at night- sometime we’ll be somewhere where I could potentially be kicked out, yet he can be there without a problem. Nothing magical happens at 18 as far as maturity goes. The kid who was rude enough to make a scene and scare shoppers at 17 will be just as much of a jerk when his birthday comes around. This policy is an attempt to not handle the real problem! The same man power used to check IDs could be used to kick those losers out- regardless of age! Instead they are alienating a customer group- and you know what? Those kids will find a new mall to go to- and will probably continue going to that mall long after their 18th birthday. Everybody has a mall that they prefer- we’re creatures of habit. This policy won’t be good for them in the long term.