If Only Bigots Have Boundaries - How Will Safeguarding Be Possible In This Brave New World?

How many little girls are you willing to allow to be molested to spare the feelings and stroke the sensibilities of a few grown men?

me, NewlyGranny?

I am with you all the way. 0.

Perhaps my sarcastic tone has not been obvious enough.

Helleofabore, I don't think you get safeguarding, and that's probably not your fault, but it does matter.

We don't force enhanced DBS checks on people who want to work with children and vulnerable adults because we believe they're all perverts with evil intentions; we do it to identify the 0.0X% who are, and protect people from them.

We don't build houses to resist the wind strengths of an average storm; we build them to resist the once in a century event.

We err on the side of caution because people's lives and well-being are precious to us as a society. And look - evil and devious people still sometimes get through! Safeguarding is about thinking the unthinkable and preventing it.

Nobody who takes safeguarding seriously ever says, "Well, most people are well-intentioned and honest, so let's not suspect anyone. It'll probably never happen."

Do you have contents insurance or a burglar alarm to guard against the unlikely event of a robbery? Do your doors have locks and do you use them? Do you lock your car when you leave it? Do you have life insurance in case a tree falls on you?

If you didn't bother, probably nothing bad would happen, right? But I bet you bother. Because the unlikely, even the unthinkable, might happen.

When you lock your house, are you accusing all your neighbours of being thieves or are you just taking wise precautions?

How many little girls are you willing to allow to be molested to spare the feelings and stroke the sensibilities of a few grown men? Just a round number for the UK per year would do. 5? 50? 500?

I'll tell you my round number of acceptable collateral damage. It's 0.

I've had to have DBS checks through my volunteer work. It didn't once occur to me that it was some kind of terrible slur on my character.
Frankly, anyone who immediately screams bigotry the moment they come up against basic safeguarding and boundaries is raising red flags left, right and centre.

That creep was so self righteous about it.

I remember that creepy bot ''t*rf crawler'' thing that was made to monitor this board for certain 'problematic' words to report, and safeguarding was one of those words.

The kind of people so dead set against safeguarding, or desperate to brand it 'phobic', 'bigoted', 'offensive' or 'stupid' are likely the very reason we need safeguarding to exist in the first place.

I can't think of a single innocent reason to be so against it, especially when it comes to children.

I'm a doctor. I share a 'characteristic' (well a qualification) with thousands of well-meaning medics. I also share it with Harold Shipman. I have various checks and balances put on me because of the latter.
One of those is access to means. The method he chose to murder vulnerable people with would be a lot harder for me. Even if I wanted to.
That's safeguarding. We can't see inside people's heads and note who has the murderous intent, but we can see situations that would allow that intent to turn to action and do our level best to change it to make it least likely. Restrict the means. Single sex spaces is an example of this.

I also dislike how the conversation seems to end up talking about female spaces as the target service. For example, a swimming pool with male and female changing facilities. The 'debate' talks about how men who identify as women or whatnot are 'excluded' by keeping the facilities single sex. That's just a lie. No one is excluded from the service (the swimming pool). Males are excluded from the female spaces and vice versa. Yet the reaction is like they can't get where they want/use what they want and I think it's really telling. It's not about participating in public life. It's about invading private spaces.

Really mishy

Safeguarding is now bigotry?

Mishy

But freedom to be a bigot and free speech is also free for others to call you out on it.

You did read the OP didn't you Mishy? Are you saying that campaigning for stronger safeguarding in the aftermath of the attitudes of many telling little girls that they should not look at the penises in their single sex spaces, is bigoted and that you are calling us out on it?

Is that what you meant to do?

*No one is perfectly free to be a bigot, and I see little deplatforming in the UK press - quite the reverse!

But freedom to be a bigot and free speech is also free for others to call you out on it.*

Talk about missing the point...

Any thoughts on effective safeguarding, Mishy ?

I hear you OP, some things I see online are extremely disturbing.

But I am optimistic that good will prevail. The mainstream are waking up to the dangerous logical conclusions that things like self-ID or ineffective law on transgender rights would lead to.

There are increasing number of men in high places who get the importance of all this stuff.

Shame that it's the men in high places that we need to convince - but that's the patriarchy innit?!

I believe we are succeeding.

Mishy, which is more important; worrying about being called a bigot, or safeguarding for children/vulnerable adults?

But freedom to be a bigot and free speech is also free for others to call you out on it.

No one was above or beyond suspicion.

Can't be said enough.

assuming that all people must be perverts because some who share a characteristic with them are perverts, is just plain wrong

Again louder for the people in the back..

THE👏🏻ONLY👏🏻WAY👏🏻TO👏🏻TELL👏🏻THE👏🏻DIFFERENCE 👏🏻IS👏🏻IF👏🏻WOMEN👏🏻ARE👏🏻SEXUALLY 👏🏻ASSAULTED 👏🏻OR👏🏻NOT

Why oh why is it so hard to understand. Zero functioning penises in women’s spaces keep women safe. It’s literal sexual violence roulette. Will this be the one that attacks me?!

There was a great video posted I think by Belstaffie, a Leeds lesbian who was a social worker and then a probation officer working with sex offenders, about how early on in her university training as a social worker she and her cohort of maybe 70 students went to a lecture where a lecturer talked about knowing what normality looked like. One of the students interrupted and said something along the lines of 'Who's to say what's normal?' and the lecturer responded by saying that all good social workers had a clear idea of what normal was, because it was only by knowing what was normal that they could do their job. The lecturer gestured around the lecture theatre at all the students and said that at least one of those there, and possibly two or three, would be there because they had decided to train as social workers in order to gain access to vulnerable people and children with the intent to abuse them. The lecturer said that the abuser in their midst was likely to be likeable, charming and the last person anyone there would identify as a safeguarding hazard. No one was above or beyond suspicion.

Every time I see Stonewall pushing the boundaries of the acceptable back a bit further and teaching young people that any concept of normal is discriminatory, I remember that. It's an abuser's charter. Stonewall are befuddling all their diversity champions into believing that 'normal' is a bad word and that the more diverse their workforce, and the more accepting of every form of diversity, even extreme forms, they are, the better. Does anyone remember how, when a member of their staff filmed himself masturbating in his leather gear in the workplace toilets and posted it online, the NSPCC defended him and blamed prurient complainants?

I've always been a bit embarrassed about being seen as a prude but I'm really learning the importance of boundaries.

Cancel culture is very real and has almost become a gladiator sport in some instances.

Virtually nobody under 30 seems to get this. Perhaps because they have no children? A young friend has been cancelled by many of his friends. He's not even a member of any GC group. His crime seems to be sharing a rather anodyne Guardian editorial on the subject. This is very insidious and a lot of relationships will never recover from the fall out. I fear for the future.

Please don't be blinded by "be kind".

twitter.com/FemmeLoves/status/1412316271698448386?s=20

twitter.com/JamesBarry1789/status/1412154364618227721?s=20

twitter.com/DaniBado/status/992406693450518529?s=20

somewhere around z) would be the kids’ welfare.

And way before that will be

) children should be taught not to stare at other people's genitals as it's rude.

Having seen some of this week's contributions on here from adults arguing that safeguarding, high quality medical care are not needed for this group of vulnerable children alongside the celebration of a flasher's rights, it seems that certain adults feel emboldened to celebrate the removal of safeguarding boundaries.

This will not end well.

Good safeguarding puts needs above wants and wishes - a child might wants you to not disclose self harm, but they need support, a family might not want professional intervention but might need it to safely care for their children, a child might want to stay with their chaotic, abusive family but might need to be removed for their very survival. A trans woman might want to access female changing rooms/refuge spaces/but women and children need single sex safe spaces for their safety.

It’s not about assuming everyone is dangerous, but acknowledging some people do present a risk to others, and addressing the needs of the other above the wants of the particular individual.