To think male nursery workers should be banned for safety reasons?

YABU
My son is currently studying in the Early Years sector. He has received excellent feedback from colleagues and parents in his nursery placements and is adored by the children he works with.
He has become the strong male role model he never had himself, and as he is also autistic, he brings lived experience and perspective to his work. He is an extremely valuable asset to any Early Years Team and certainly no threat whatsoever.

Imagine if men were trying to ban women from a specific industry/field of work based on the behaviour of a minority of the population

I’m undecided on the thread topic but:

Personally, I don’t care removing men makes childcare look like women’s work. People already assume 99% of nursery staff are female.

Does having 1 sole male worker in every X nurseries really change perceptions?

When men were asked if they’d rather meet a strange man in the woods or a bear, they also chose the bear.

Let’s ask men if men should be barred from intimate care jobs for vulnerable children. Or whether the solution is to double ratios (for adults and children) so as to always have a female chaperone.

What studies

No staff should ever, ever be alone with vulnerable people.

Vanessa George was using her position as manager to break the rules. Reported by an agency worker iirc.

Two staff, always.

These things cost money, we can't really afford that when so many of the (women) who would rather be looking after their own children are having to work in largely unproductive minimum wage jobs.

There are endless threads on Mumsnet from women who end up hating the fact that they're seen as the primary carer for their DCs while the fathers get away with barely changing a nappy. Do you think those women are wrong to feel that way and that, instead, they should see themselves as privileged to be trusted to do such important work?

I don't know why it's a controversial take.

"Let's ban men, who are more likely to be paedophiles, from settings where they are able to abuse and rape untold amounts of children"

Is aways met with "but family members...." OK but family members are never going to be banned, and generally family members don't have unlimited amounts of children they have access to. It's not comparible.

Or "But women..." OK but the fact you can practically name every woman who has sexually abused a child at nursery whereas you wouldn't even know where to start with a list of men is telling.

Then we have "But care workers/doctors/nurses" - male care workers shouldn't be involved in the intimate care of women and children and doctors and nurses should always have a chaperone.

Doing something that would cut down well over 90% of sexual abuse in nurseries shouldn't be a hot take, it's just common sense, and I don't care how many blokes it offends or how many women say the best nursery workers are men, or their uncle/cousin/son/neighbour is the bestest of the best at working with kids.

I did, but I didn't come to the same conclusion that you did from it. Not least because you entirely missed the point the article made about the risk from women.

But let's get down to the core of it. What, to you, represents an acceptable risk:

1. a male care worker in a nursery
2. a male parent being in sole care of a nursery-aged child
3. a male care worker in a primary school-aged breakfast club / after-school club
4. a male parent being in sole care of a primary school-aged child

Or something else?

I don’t agree with banning men from early years settings but I do agree with proper safeguarding procedures. Nappies etc should be changed in the room the other care workers and children are in. This was the case at my dcs nursery. They shouldn’t be allowed to take children off in private!

You say ‘woman’s work’ like it’s a bad thing. It’s your misogynistic attitude that devalues it.

it IS women’s work. It’s work that is so important that it should only be done by a woman.

What investigations would those be?

That’s precisely why a blanket ban wouldn’t work, it would have to be sex segregated IMO.

I provide personal care staff to SENd schools for a living, and once a child hits KS2, they generally won’t employ male staff unless it’s for the male cohort.

Some settings are already doing this, which would be preferable to a whole male ban, I think.

Yes you are being very unreasonable. A ridiculous idea to ban all men from a particular job based on the terrible actions of a few. This is outright discrimination. How on earth could we argue for women's rights and equality if a prejudiced idea such as this came to be.

I don't think it's an either/or, I think nurseries need across-the-board, strongly enforced, much stronger safeguarding practices and policies, with frequent unannounced inspections to ensure they're being followed and implemented.

Or male carers stick to caring for other males?

This is true.

What would we rather?

I think it stands to reason that if you would prefer a man wasn’t providing you with intimate care, and you’d prefer them nowhere near your genitals, disabled children and adults deserve the same dignity.

We can’t (rightly) say that men don’t belong in female same sex spaces, and then be advocating for women to be solely responsible for male care. That doesn’t add up.

Doesn't this just reinforce the idea that childcare is women's work? It'd then be hard to argue the opposite for the home environment, and the balance of parenting responsibilities becomes even more inequal and women suffer more.