“Midnight Ain’t What It Used to Be”
By Abdul-Hakim Shabazz | Indiana Barrister
Once upon a time, being out after midnight was a teenage rite of passage.
You grabbed a late-night bite with friends. You hung out at the mall. Maybe you caught a midnight movie. And if you were really pushing it, you’d cruise back into the driveway just before curfew—fueled by adrenaline, Mountain Dew, and the knowledge that your parents might be waiting with porch light justice.
That was then. This is now.
In 2012, Indianapolis followed state law and set curfews at 1 a.m. for youth ages 15 to 17, and 11 p.m. for those 14 and under on Fridays and Saturdays. Back then, that seemed reasonable. Times were different. So was the city.
Fast forward to 2025, and we’re having a very different conversation—one punctuated by police lights, press conferences, and yet another shooting involving teenagers downtown.
Which brings us to the current proposal from City-County Councilor Leroy Robinson. His ordinance would tighten the city’s curfew laws significantly:
- Youth 15–17:
- Fridays and Saturdays: Home by 11 p.m.
- Sundays through Thursdays: Home by 9 p.m.
- Youth 14 and under:
- Home by 9 p.m. every night.
In short, it moves up curfew by two hours on weekends and four hours on school nights for older teens. It’s a bold move. And it’s overdue.
Predictably, some critics are already warning about overreach, government nanny-state overcorrection, and criminalizing Black and brown youth. To be fair, those concerns deserve a real conversation—especially in a city with a documented history of uneven enforcement.
But let’s cut through the static for a moment and talk about reality. Because the question we should be asking isn’t “Is it fair to set an 11 p.m. curfew?” The question is, why should any 15-year-old be downtown at 12:45 a.m. in this environment?
Let’s be clear: this is not about locking up kids for breathing past midnight. Exceptions still exist for work, school activities, emergencies, and being with a parent or guardian. This isn’t zero-tolerance. It’s zero-avoidance.
The curfew is not a silver bullet. But it is a start. It’s a boundary. A bright line that says: you matter, and we’d rather not read about you in the next homicide report. Because right now, what was once innocent late-night freedom has turned into an open-air liability. Downtown isn’t the same place it was 10 years ago, and pretending otherwise is how we end up writing eulogies for kids who should be writing college essays.
Let’s also stop pretending that the current status quo is working. If the curfew as-is were truly enough, we wouldn’t have had to hold press conferences the morning after a teen was shot on Monument Circle. We wouldn’t be scrambling to reassure businesses and residents that downtown is safe. And we wouldn’t be having this conversation yet again.
I understand the instinct to be cautious about new enforcement mechanisms, especially when the city has struggled with transparency and trust. But this isn’t about punishment—it’s about prevention.
And frankly, if your biggest concern is whether a 15-year-old can hit the club district at 1 a.m., your parenting priorities might need a reboot.
Councilor Robinson’s proposal doesn’t solve everything. But it recognizes what the rest of us already see: midnight ain’t what it used to be. And in a city where tragedy is becoming routine, doing nothing is no longer an option.
Let the critics clutch their pearls. The rest of us will settle for getting these kids home alive.
