I think this goes to the heart of the attitude that somehow San Diego (and California) is the promised land where there is abundant opportunity. This was probably truer 50 years ago. I find Mexico (although poor and with a different set of issues) to be MUCH more family friendly.

Downtown SD is a terrible place to raise kids, that article in the UT was silly. Who in their right mind would want to raise a family there? The ratio of sex offenders was an interesting stat but not surpriseing. The place is a shit hole, always has been and always will be. I don’t care how many ball parks or condos they build, it is still a shitty area to live in general, but for kids, forget about it.

jg, I have to agree with you on this one. I went to Catholic school and I do beleive that some old fashioned ideas work extremely well. (No, I was not molested).

One time, I was at the park and my dog, who is normally well-behaved, started to eat some junk that he wasn’t supposed to. So I gave him a light spanking. Some lady came up and scolded me. What was I supposed to do? Reason with the dog? Little did that lady know that I treat my dog better than most humans are treated.

When my dog was a puppy, I took him to training school and the most effective way to make a dog heel it to use a choke chain and yank on it hard a few times when he pulls away. The dog learned his lesson real quick and didn’t pull anymore. Sounds rough, but that’s the proper and loving way to do it.

I want to say what a depressing article, but if these folks are fine with it, who am I to judge. That elementary school didn’t sound too good. You also read about South Park or North Park being family friendly, but I couldn’t imagine sending my kids to the public school there. I guy I know who lives in Linda Vista, and (despite two break-ins during upgrade) and raves about how awesome it is. Meanwhile the daughter goes over to High Tech High, instead of whatever the regular HS would be (Kearny Mesa I think).

Has anyone ever looked at the sex offender maps (http://www.meganslaw.ca.gov). I was shocked by the overall density when I first looked at it a couple years ago. Downtown is pretty dense, but there are a lot of places in SD that are as densely offended as downtown (parts of Normal Heights,El Cajon, Oceanside and Escondido are fairly dense with these guys).

Map downtown Oceanside and you will be amazed at the density of sex offenders, although most are not violent but rather ‘she was 16 he was 20’ type of offenses. Still, it appears that almost every other house in DT Oceanside has a registered sex offender living in it.

Aren’t we also dealing with a situation where people no longer feel obliged to follow social norms, standards of conduct etc., but instead seek their own self gratification and individual pursuit of whatever they want. Back in 1950 you would be looked at strangely if you didn’t wear a suit to church, if a man wore earings in public, if you displayed semi pornographic material in public. Today it’s a free for all freak fest, standards have been thrown aside and the goal seems to be to act as strange, cocky and self absorbed as possible, while doing everything possible to ignore societal standards and norms.

Our children’s heroes like 50 cent exemplify this attitude so it is no wonder that we are experiencing moral decay, both sexual and also societal. Just take a look at myspace.com and you will find all the proof you need. The goal seems to be to create the most offensive, sexual homepage possible to showcase to the entire world that you are indeed an individual, that you don’t ‘care what other people think’ etc. Popular culture to include movies, music etc. is no better. Isn’t it no wonder that people who would have otherwise walked the straight and narrow back in say 1955, are now IMing 15 years olds, engaging in risky behavior etc. that all would have been prevented in the past by shame, lack of opportunity and a desire to conform?