WIBU to hang about the toilets?

A woman sorting out her makeup as the OP said she did doesn't look suspicious, like a man hanging around would. Women often do take longer by the mirrors etc.

She might well have looked perfectly natural or she might have looked suspicious. Who knows. An impression someone thinks they're giving can be totally different to how other people interpret it. Who knows whether she gave a little sideways glance that was noticed for example. If I picked up on someone deliberately lurking the toilets for no good reason I'd be suspicious whether they were male or female.

I'm uncomfortable letting my 12 year old go alone to be honest, but he doesn't want to go into the women's, and I think some women would have a problem with him being in there so all I can do, like other pp have said is wait outside for him.

This is a good argument for having a third, unisex option as well as male and female toilets.

A woman sorting out her makeup as the OP said she did doesn't look suspicious, like a man hanging around would. Women often do take longer by the mirrors etc.

I’d have done the same OP. And yes, I also hover outside the gents when my ds is in there.

I wonder if any of the men thought 'hmm, she's acting a bit suspiciously' as the OP hung around in a fairly obvious manner? Who's to say they weren't equally worried about her?

I hope this comes across the right way! But I think my husband would have been grateful for your presence if he'd found himself in a toilet with young girls inadvertently around him.

NOT because he's a bad guy who needs watching, but because he's super-cautious around children in a way that he says I don't have to be. Possibly one of the advantages of being a woman?

For example, we see a cute baby in a pushchair, I can smile and say "hello" and nod at the mum. He says he'd just never dare in case it was ever taken the wrong way, or in case he scared them somehow.

He's autistic and over sensitive and worries to an extreme over many things, but I can't imagine that many men would jump for joy at the idea generally either.

Yep, I'd have done the same (and have in similar circumstance) - just another adult there to keep an eye.

I've done exactly the same as you before, Iwould always rather be over cautious than find out something happened, or to think the girls felt worried or uncomfortable.

not all men are pedophiles though

Can you tell the difference, just by looking?

MonChatEstMagnifique

You make a good point though. I do think a lot of people don't consider boys to be at risk as much as girls. Young boys are just as vulnerable, I think it's just case of there being a higher percentage of paedophiles that target girls. Whether that's because they see them as easier targets, or their perversions have a preference, I don't know.

Now girls, young and unsure, are forced to silence their inner voice that says 'why is that men in a dress in here. Why is he pretending to be a woman?' Maybe, he'll ask her about tampons like Jonathan Yaniv...

I was just responding to the OPs situation as it was on the active threads. Just noticed this is on feminism and it's sounds like it's now going to turn into a trans thread so I will leave it there.

Thanks Drogo.

I just think that if I was worried about 6,8 and 11 year old girls using the toilet due to men being present, to the point of hanging around when I had finished, then I would be equally concerned about boys in the male toilets and having single sex toilets wouldn't help boys, only girls.

I hate that we even have to consider these things.

MonChatEstMagnifique

Not sure, it's a different situation from the OPs. She was in the toilets and could use the pretense of applying make up to hang around for a bit, until she felt comfortable enough to leave.
In all fairness, hanging around outside the toilets is probably a pointless attempt to keep my ds safe, but there really isn't much else I can do. Put them in the disabled toilet and get falmed for using a facility that isn't designed for an able bodied child? (which I wpuld agree with)Take him in with me at 11 years old? Like I said he wouldn't do that unless he felt very uneasy about going alone. If I felt there weren't enough people around to help if anything should happen to another child in the toilet alone, yes I probably would hang around, if it was a pretty busy toilet, no I probably wouldn't.

You did absolutely the right thing OP, and I would do the samel. Most males have no idea how ingrained vigilance is in females, it has to be. Today I walked the dog as I always do, and as I always am I was on a high level of alert, particularly along a couple of miles of canal towpath (where there have been a couple of reported sexual assaults in the past). I went to the theatre last week, one friend had parked the other side of a park, so two of us walked her back to her car after the show. The examples are endless and these are things we as women do everyday, it's second nature. Most women have been sexually assaulted at some time, certainly all the women I know have. Men don't tend to have that worry.

MonChat

Yes, I do think it's an issue with boys going alone into the mens. And I think a lot of mums for that reason bring boys into the women's as long as possible or wait outside.

I don't think that actually there is a huge issue with perverts targeting kids in public toilets. Not that it never happens, but your kids are likely more at risk of being seriously hurt in a car accident on the road to wherever the public toilet is. So my own view is that if your child is old enough to be going into the toilet alone and old enough you've told them to yell if there is a problem, it's not something to worry about excessively.

I tend to think what's more of a potential problem is older girls, like teens, or even women, in the toilets with strange men alone.

Be that all as it may, and I don't know for sure where the risk is greatest, the main thing IMO is I think most women or teen girls, and most men, are not all that comfortable being alone with the opposite sex in a public toilet. People feel like things could go wrong, or even just like they are making others uncomfortable, and they don't like it. And they shouldn't have to put up with it.

*If not of

Drogosnextwife I think many of us would do that for our own sons. But would you wait outside of you saw young boys, not yours, going into a male toilet alone?

I think the difference with boys going into the male toilet is that the parent will have made the choice that they are happy for their children to do that full in the knowledge that there will be other adult men in there. The parents of these girls possibly didn’t make that choice.

I wouldn't let a 6, and probably not even an 8 year old boy go into male toilets alone. Infact I don't think I would let them go into any toilet alone.
I'm uncomfortable letting my 12 year old go alone to be honest, but he doesn't want to go into the women's, and I think some women would have a problem with him being in there so all I can do, like other pp have said is wait outside for him.

how is it any different to young boys using a male toilet? surely they would be just as vulnerable then?

That's a fair point? What would you do if you saw a 6, 8 and 11 year old going into a male toilet alone, when you knew there were other men in there? Would you hang around outside until you knew they were OK?

I don't know if I think mixed sex toilets are ok but surely young boys are at risk in single sex toilets ? Do you do anything about this or just think there's nothing you can do about it? Genuine question, I keep reading it back and I don't know if it sounds like I'm trying to be argumentative. I'm really not, I just can't seem to make it sound any different.

Yes, I'd have done it too.

And TBH I don't think it's great for the men to be in a toilet with a young girl or woman alone, it's pretty standard in a lot of organisations for men to be very careful about being alone with anyone underage or a woman, for their own protection. My dh is a scouting leader, they aren't even supposed to be left with the kids unless there is another leader present.

So - awkward for everyone.