The children’s play area at the King of Prussia mall is an interesting sociology and psychology lab.
I spent one arduous evening at the mall over the holiday season, and the children’s play area, filled with 30 or so kids and their parents, was by far the most interesting thing I saw all night.
This was the runup to Christmas — the big day. I suspect Santa was watching.
Here’s what I saw.
First, the obvious — kids at play. Some were running around and crawling on the overly safe animal-shaped equipment, and others were playing in calmer, loose-knit groups adjacent to the equipment. No electronics. I did see, however, many lonesome kids stationed all around the mall, on benches or at food court tables with their faces glued to screens.
Second, I noticed that DEI seemed to take care of itself. All without special interest groups, mandates, rules, victims, or adult intervention.
Third, kids in the wild are pretty good at organizing themselves and working out differences and issues. All it took was an occasional raised voice, a grab or smack on the arm, or simply ejecting from the group. Not exactly a calm or rule-based public discourse, but effective.
Fourth, all of the adults — all of them — were sitting around the outside, heads down, necks craned, eyes glued to the 2.8×5.78″ gorilla glass. Some were probably spending their outrage budget on why the world is such a terrible place.
Look up.
