Hmm. If I had seen the same thing I would have assumed the child was autistic and using an assistive communication device.

My seven year old still rides in a stroller when we're smart enough to remember it in advance. If we don't have it, we end up carrying him, and he's getting really heavy. To anyone who doesn't know him, he appears perfectly normal and I'm sure lots of judgmental people have assumed the worst about us, but I long ago stopped caring what other people think. But he can't/won't walk long distances--low muscle tone combined with no social awareness. The social awareness is one of those things people seem to think means that people with autism are awkward socially or don't talk, but in reality it's a lot more--it means, for example, that he won't know to keep his clothes on in public and will happily strip naked when he's hot or uncomfortable, because wearing clothes is a social construct as much as it is utilitarian. And it also means that if we're going someplace that he's not internally motivated to go to, you have to physically force him to move or else he'll just stop walking when he's no longer interested and will stand perfectly still or lie down in the middle of the sidewalk or parking lot or store aisle. A stroller is just easier.

And you know, you're probably right. Chances are this kid was perfectly normal and was playing a video game. But you don't know this and you don't know what the situation was or why you saw what you saw, and I think it's a bit silly to jump to conclusions when every single person on this board was in her youth a member of a generation that an older generation despaired over. And while chances are you saw a normal if somewhat lazy kid, chances also are that he'll grow up just fine and will do well enough in school and will get a good enough job and will be happy and well adjusted and will take his son to soccer lessons and his daughter to Girl Scouts (when they're not wasting time with whatever the 30-year-in-the-future version of Nintendo is) and will whine about filling out tax forms and will watch too much football on t.v. (or whatever the 30-year-in-the-future version of t.v. is) and will, generally speaking, turn out just fine, just like every other generation that an older generation has despaired over.

Sarah