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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Priest telling boys how to pee at school?

499 replies

Downamongtherednecks · 23/07/2014 21:10

Tween ds is at a private school, not UK. Most staff are female. There were incidents of the boys’ loos being left with pee around the lavatory bowl, so a male member of staff (priest) took the boys into the loos (in groups) to tell them that this was unacceptable and to suggest that they aim better and that they should perhaps practice more (!).

This was not discussed at all with parents.
AIBU to think this was not an acceptable thing for the school to do? It seems far too private and something surely better handled by parents. Priest has form for sexism so it is possible that may be one reason I instinctively don’t like it. DH (robustly boys’ private-school educated) says this was fine, it's a boy/male teacher thing, and he can’t see a problem with it. Happy to be told I am being biased against the sexist priest. No intention of taking it up with school btw, as dc are leaving anyway. AIBU?

OP posts:
titchy · 25/07/2014 17:47

The handful of posters frothing about the kids being reprimanded in the toilet which is a private place, you do realise that someone is having to clean up their bodily fluid - which is even more private than a bloody toilet.

Do you go all of a flutter when looking round bathroom showrooms?

PhaedraIsMyName · 25/07/2014 17:50

Oh good grief there are some weird posts here. I agree with whoever said that if the teacher (who happens to be a priest) had taken another adult in some of you would have accused them off colluding in abuse.

The fact it was a toilet is almost irrelevant. The point was the mess they were making. It's far more effective to make that point to groups who can see the mess in the location. Talking about it at assembly would just be yadda, yadda.

DownByTheRiverside · 25/07/2014 18:54

Did you ever say how old these little poppets were OP?

ABlandAndDeadlyCourtesy · 25/07/2014 18:58

The toilet isn't a private place if no one is in there peeing at that moment.

DownByTheRiverside · 25/07/2014 19:03

So, tweenager? Over the age of 10?
Old enough to be expected to aim with a little more care so that the cleaners aren't mopping up stale urine, old enough to be put on a rota with other lads and issued with the kit to clean the toilets.

Annafromtheoffice · 25/07/2014 19:05

"Anna it wasn't any man, it was school personel"

So we should trust all adults, and judge them by the institution they work in? So nobody in the government is corrupt? So we should trust the police implicitly? And everyone at the BBC?

Sorry, I can't blindly trust people. Perhaps the gentlemen under discussion is perfectly innocent, but I could/would never be able to say that I trust somebody simply because they are 'school personnel'. So what?

Surely recent events and Operation Yewtree is evidence enough that this culture of trust and conviction we have for people in high places needs to end.

DownByTheRiverside · 25/07/2014 19:05
DownByTheRiverside · 25/07/2014 19:07

Anna, it's why the lecture wasn't 1:1, but a group of boys with one man, fully clothed in a public place.

RobinHumphries · 25/07/2014 19:17

A tween is between 10 and 12 so more than old enough to be able to piss properly

Downamongtherednecks · 25/07/2014 19:24

downbytheriverside a mix of 11 and 12 in my ds's class but the school goes up to 14, so all the boys up to that age were spoken to. The private school reference was to show that there are no 'local authority/govt rules" which could be looked at, only diocesan. DS's friends definitely pointing blame at "the big boys". Have just asked my cleaner if she thinks ds is guilty of peeing around his bathroom, she said he's "better than most" Smile and then started telling me horror stories about other houses.

OP posts:
Sirzy · 25/07/2014 19:28

But the staff can't (and shouldn't) start trying to single out the culprit. They did the right thing by highlighting an issue, showing the children and then asking them to consider their behaviour.

Chances are they had been warned before and it had fallen on deaf ears, so hopefully this will make them stand up and listen.

11 or 14 they should be able to go to the toilet without making a mess. I expect DS who is 4 to do it!

MrsCakesPremonition · 25/07/2014 19:55

"It has been brought to my attention that the boys toilet is a mess. Class X, come with me. Look, there is wee on the floor. It is unpleasant, unhygienic and unfair for Mrs.Y to have to clean it up. Now you gave all seen the mess, I expect wee in the toilets not on the floor. If you find it hard not to make a mess on the floor, then I suggest you practice at home. Now back to class"

I cannot see any problem with this sort of conversation between a member of staff and a group of boys.

WatchingSeaMonkeys · 25/07/2014 20:00

Anna - there's being cautious & there's out & out paranoia.

You sound to me like you're barking mad firmly in the second category.

I suggest you remove your children from schooling, and indeed any outside activity that involves them meeting adults.

You can then sit in your house with them nice & secure in the knowledge that most offences are committed by family members.....

mathanxiety · 25/07/2014 20:15

Victrix, WTAF?

What you are saying is, well that's all very well and mighty fine, the priest didn't abuse any of the boys, but what if he abused one boy at a later date? Never mind the facts.

[For those wondering about private RC schools in the US, they are parish run and are not normally much different in student body income or socio economic class from the public schools in the same area. They are not there to promote or maintain differentiation of one social class from another.]

Downamongtherednecks:
The line was perfectly appropriately decided by the Priest who runs your school.

He brought the boys to the bathroom in groups and showed them exactly what he was talking about, which is an unimpeachable pedagogical method of delivering an important lesson.

Your DS is in a RC school and RC values are being taught. One of the values is respect. There is little point in thinking respect is some dry matter like trade among the early American colonies, with no practical everyday application. Respect is peeing into the goddamn toilet or urinal and not beside it or all over it or down the wall behind it or onto the floor in its vicinity, and then walking away and leaving it for someone who could not ever be paid enough to clean it up.

And 'better than most' is no reason to clap yourself on the back or post a Smile.
If I heard something like that about DS I would be fucking horrified, and ashamed of both him and myself.

Your cleaner was being polite and tactful, and if she cleans for any other homes and someone asks the same question about their DS, she will say the same thing to everyone else who asks.

Maybe if you cleaned your own bathroom you wouldn't think this was a Smile matter.

Maybe if you gave your DS the job of cleaning up his own urine he would learn to pee straight.

Deverethemuzzler · 25/07/2014 21:09

anna why would the fact this took place in a toilet be anymore dangerous than anywhere else?

If the man is not to be trusted with a group of boys in a toilet he surely should not be anywhere near children?

And that would be a totally different thread.

It is ridiculous to bring abuse onto a thread about a member of staff asking children to make less mess.

As for the kids being 11-14 Shock

I thought this was bout 5 year olds.

This thread is insane. The matter is connected to boys's willies therefore it is astounding and outrageous and Something Should Be Done.

Hmm
HavanaSlife · 25/07/2014 21:14

Some people are fucking ridiculous. He didn't pop his head in while they were taking a piss ffs give your head a wobble

Downamongtherednecks · 25/07/2014 21:34

Not terribly relevant if I have a cleaner or not, unless you think women are defined by their ability to clean. Which I don't. The only conclusion you can draw from my having a cleaner is that I have the means to pay one, and choose to do so. Mine is very nice and also house-keeps when I am away working. "Better than most" is actually funny, because her (professional) experience is that there are an awful lot of bathrooms much worse than DS's, belonging to older boys and men. And nowhere did I state that I think peeing around loos is allowed, nor that the school should not deal with it.

OP posts:
PhaedraIsMyName · 25/07/2014 23:53

Well you mentioned the cleaner first. I don't have a cleaner now but had several over the years. I'm sure if I'd asked any of them how my (tip of a) house compared with others they'd have said exactly that.

Anyway not relevant to the thread. Oh and YABU and your thread title is inaccurate and sensationalist.

Annafromtheoffice · 26/07/2014 00:48

MrsCakesPremonition - well I'm glad you know what was said verbatim...

"Pope Francis has been quoted as saying that reliable data indicates that "about 2%" of clergy in the Catholic Church are paedophiles"

But as long you're quite sure that this man is absolutely trustworthy...

PhaedraIsMyName · 26/07/2014 00:58

Anna we have no idea if he is a paedophile. It's not relevant to the incident. He was not on his own with the boys, no-one's genitals were on show.

MrsCakesPremonition · 26/07/2014 01:16

So give me your version of events. At the moment I can't see what danger the boys were in, but you seem very sure that the lesson placed them at risk of some sort.

Downamongtherednecks · 26/07/2014 03:39

er.. Mathanxiety not sure what Utopian part of the US you are talking about, but in large parts of the South the private school system is most definitely about maintaining class and even colour differentiation. The dc's school has an almost 100 percent white profile (partly due to the fact that the local black Catholic population is tiny, and partly that the tuition - while less than we were paying in the UK - is still hefty and beyond the means of the socio-economically disadvantaged black and hispanic population.) It's a bit of a shock after London.

OP posts:
lettertoherms · 26/07/2014 04:29

So... why is your son in this school, if you have such opinions about it and the staff?

Sparks1007 · 26/07/2014 05:03

Wow. The thought that a teacher could be sexually aroused by being surrounded by a group of embarrassed tweens in a piss soaked skanky school loo is laughable. Are you for real!?!!?! Maybe you're just feeling catholic guilt over not teaching your son to pee straight.

Or, maybe you just don't know what teaching young people is like. Sometimes it's hard work getting them to think about how their actions impact others. You do need to show children where they've gone wrong before dealing with how they can fix it. A quick (poor) model: Say your child wrote an essay/lab report/maths test and scored poorly. The teacher returned it with a big fat F on it and nothing else (no comments, markings etc) and then said "I expect you to improve next time". Your child would be thinking WTF?!! HOW?!? ON WHAT?!!?

Like I said, not a great parallel but children learn through modeled behaviour and feedback. End of. This thread is crazy.

CasperGutman · 26/07/2014 07:20

Nothing wrong with what the priest did. I was expecting there to at least be some aspect that made the behaviour seem questionable, but there's nothing! What a weird thread.

This was just a member of school staff speaking to a group of pupils in a room. I realise some say this was inappropriate because the room had more ceramic tiles than usual and some porcelain bowls containing water, but that's just silly. You should be more concerned if a member of staff (priest of not) kept a single child in a classroom on their own, during lunchtime say, but even that would be perfectly normal and acceptable in most schools around the world.

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