Priest telling boys how to pee at school?

[Downamongtherednecks]

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?

Anna look at your statistic another way 98% of clergy are not paedophiles. If you are going to use statistics then seeing as children are most often abused by family members then surely being with a priest is safer than being with a parent.

(Or to look at it a third way, why do you trust Pope Francis and his statistics?! He's a priest and therefore untrustworthy! He probably just made them up!)

I agree sparks. It is a male issue, he was the only male available at that time. He took a group of 11/12 year old boys who should know better, and showed them the disgusting mess they had made. Get over it!

paralllax80 I like that.

I have the advantage of living in a very RC northern city full of Poles, Hispanics, Irish, Italians, Philippinos and Germans, and a good few African American Catholics too. The socio economic profile of the DCs' elementary is very mixed indeed.

Whereas I live in a poor state, with de facto racial segregation, rampant gun violence, domestic abuse, little to no access to abortion, and a state education system which bumps around the bottom of the worst in the country, and in which evolution is not always taught. mathanxiety you must be aware that saying "America is like XX" is usually nonsensical. All you can say is "Around here.." The RC Church (around here) spouts anti-homosexual, anti-women crap. And yes, I think that does colour my view of whether I trust the priest(s). Not that keen on the bishop either!

A question to the single male staff member posters. If the school had got around that by having 2 priests point* at the piss would that be:
a) more dodgy;
b) less dodgy; or
c) abou the same but dodgy in a different way?

And to think MNHQ were suggesting the other day that AIBU is going to the dogs! On the evidence of this thread it most certainly is not. More like this please!

• by using fingers and not their penises

nauitcant several posters , notably sirzy suggested there should have been 2 adults there; not because there was anything dodgy but to protect the adult. I disagreed at first but now see what they were getting at.

The answer is there was nothing dodgy in the first place. Having another adult neither adds to nor subtracts from the (non-existent) dodginess. Unless of course you thought it was dodgy in the first place. Adding an extra person or persons causes a geometric increase in dodginess with each person added.

If there were two adults that would just make twice as many people to accuse of being paedos. I know of some horror stories in schools. I really do. But I see nothing about this situation that suggests anything untoward. I can't believe people want notice when teachers are going to tell their darling sons off for pissing on the floor. What about when the darlings have failed to wash up lab equipment or throw their lunch rubbish away?

Oh. And I live in possible the most catholic country in the world so I'm feeling the catholic thing full throttle. And I still don't see the increased risk of a priest teaching them basic life skills. If you do, you've chosen the wrong schooling system for your child and I suggest you move them. If you don't trust your child's school to do right by them then find somewhere that you are comfy with.

OP it sounds as if you don't like where you live and you don't like the school or the church. Do you think you need to change some things rather than worrying about a group of lads being told to behave like civilised human beings? Did you want to move to the US and that area in particular?

Re Catholic priests, when I was about 7, in Ireland, I made friends with a priest. We got on well, went for walks and to church and generally spent alot of time together. When he was moved he used to write to me and send cards and you know what, he never did anything inappropriate. I feel sorry for kids who were abused but I also feel sorry for priests now as there just seems to be nothing they can do that isn't suspect.

Just wondered how your son has taken this, is he bothered?

MrsCakesPremonition - that's exactly my point - nobody knows what happened! I can't say whether this man is or isn't dangerous. Like I said before, he could be perfectly innocent and the whole event could be completely honest and legitimate. But neither can anybody be sure what happened. Look at the recent investigations - nobody would've accused Savile, Harris etc. Everybody says they were so sure of their innocence. "They couldn't possibly be..."

Well, sorry, some people are.

I'm now beginning to understand why, when these cases appear on the news, people always seem so shocked. It's time we all stopped being so trustworthy.

YES - it all could all be innocent.

But MrsCakesPremonition, how do you know?

I'm going to guess Tennessee? Or Alabama?

In any case, if you hate it much maybe you should look for a different area to live in.

You decry all this class segregation and poor education, but you're paying for your child to go to a school that perpetrates just that, and to a Catholic school which you know is going to teach intelligent design and not evolution. The Catholic church being pro-life is not a new thing, and it's not a new thing that the bible teaches that man is head of the household. I'm not sure why you're upset that a religion is preaching what is written. If you don't agree with the word, send your child to a public school or home school them.

Also, the south does not have "rampant gun violence" I live in a state that ranks in the top five and people aren't running around shooting each other all day. Gun deaths happen here in the US, but you're 10x more likely to die in a car crash than you are to get shot.

You're sounding a bit hysterical about the South to be honest.

They do have traditional values that should be challenged, but they also have a good sense of community and they are very warm people.

It sounds like you're just taking your prejudices out on this priest who wanted nothing more than to tell your boys to stop pissing on the floor. If you're seeing something potentially sexual about a priest lecturing a group of boys in a bathroom that smells like piss, the problem might be with you.

Sorry GodDamn I'm not in the least hysterical (nice sexism, btw). I work in development so it is perfectly possible to see from an analytic viewpoint the problems a region might have. I am a little surprised you think RC schools teach Intelligent Design though!! RCs have no problem with evolution so you may be confusing RC with Southern Baptist? I specifically said that the PUBLIC schools don't all teach evolution. Nowhere did I say I hate the area, I have a lots of likeminded, warm friends, (not all Southern, not all American). I have friends who, for example, volunteer as escorts to get pregnant women safely to clinics, through the baying crowds. And the gun violence can be quite trying, you know, as for example, two weekends ago when I couldn't let my children out as there was an idiot with an Assault Rifle shooting in the woods behind my house and the tiny local sheriff's department (five officers) didn't have anyone to send. Of course, you aren't going to believe me when I tell you the KKK recently were handing out recruiting leaflets when we went to the rodeo. But none of this means I don't like living here - it's interesting and vibrant, and the scenery is stunning. BTW calling a group of young boys "little assholes" doesn't really make me think very highly of your opinion. (And round here people definitely say COMFORT BREAK)

I might be missing something but how is saying "You're sounding a bit hysterical" sexist?

Anna, your approach is irrational.

We do in fact know what happened. The priest pointed at pee and told the boys it wasn't acceptable to urinate on the floor.

The fact that reality doesn't match with your prejudice is a problem of yours. It does not reflect badly on the ability of the boys to relate accurately what happened.

I'm guessing Mississippi.

The RC school my children go to teaches evolution. Schools in Ireland (nearly all RC) teach evolution.

In this instance, this being mums net ^hysteria* may just be an apt description, marcopront.

It was a quasi medical term for women who became a little loud or anxious, due to disturbances of the uterus (those lovely Greeks and utera)

Then it became a somatisation - again a bodily dysfunction causing psychological disturbances - the literally wandering womb, cure was pregnancy! 19th century Psychologists cured hysteria by application of water spray of dildo to the clitoris - not joking there!

So, by definition only women can be hysterical, hence the sexist accusation. But as I said earlier - this is a forum populated mainly by women, so in this instance, the term loses that a little!

(Hysterical is an adjective that is hardly ever applied to men. It implies that women's negative emotions spring from hormones and therefore nobody but women themselves are responsible for those negative emotions, especially anger, irritation, etc. Weirdly, there is no correlating implication that women's happiness or contentment springs from hormones.)

OP --
The point of having a male authority figure whom I assume was white in an old fashioned confederate state bringing the white boys to the site of the lesson was imo a really good idea. It is possible that in that culture, the priest figured having a woman do the talk would mean it would have been ignored. (After all, I assume you have spoken to your DS plenty of times about peeing into the toilet, yet your cleaner implies he is not as bad as other boys, which is imo damning with faint praise.)

He probably saved some underprivileged cleaning women from having to do a disgusting bit of work that really should be completely unnecessary.

I'm really shocked by this thread.

I think it's absolutely fine for someone to take a group of boys into the loos and ask them to pee better.

Based on the thread title I imagined the priest demonstrating how to pee or asking the kids to pee while he watched.

hmmmm, maybe further west.. Texas?

God love you, I wish I could say exactly where I am. I've enjoyed the guesses, though. It didn't occur to me to give the priest's race mathanxiety but since you ask, he isn't a white Good Ole' Boy, he's Latin American, from a patriarchal culture. In the interests of full disclosure... The school custodian is white female, the cleaning staff are two males (one white, one Hispanic). The male sports coach had to resign after a domestic violence scandal (another bone of contention).

Someone asked if ds and his friends had a problem re the priest lecturing in the loo. Apparently "a bit weird" and "Gross", is what they said to each other. But I'm afraid "how children feel about it" is not always a useful measure of whether something is acceptable or not.

I have used hysterical when referring to a man's behaviour.

I've always taken taken it as one of those words like glamorous, fabulous, fantastic, decimate that have very specific original meanings but which have evolved to different/more general usage.

Hysteria, in its original form, was believed to have been caused by a females womb travelling around her body and causing nonsensical thoughts, etc.
I haven't read all threads since I last posted but I should disclose I suppose that as I am Irish, that the whole notion of clergy taking responsibility for any aspect of personal hygiene fills me with horror - that's not an exaggeration, I literally think to myself WHY?
This is separate to gender, or race, or profession.
Then, separately, as I work in health services, I launch into "who else is there", "are staff/children protected",
what is the ultimate goal of this action?
I do realise it comes across to most as excessive, "hysterical", and judgemental.
However, it is because of our horrible histories in Ireland: the ongoing legacy, court cases, denials, admissions, government apologies/denials/payouts (take your pick), that I will always ALWAYS be careful when my child is being "schooled". This applies to all issues, not just this particular issue of toileting.
What I feel personally is being missed on this thread, is the history of those who had no choice but to use religious schooling and are now dealing with a legacy that is beyond the experience of most countries, particularly one such as the UK, where Catholic education is sought after, in some circles, and is paid for accordingly.
The history of trust and abuse in this country has illustrated my view of educational approaches, and whilst I am cogent of the arguments of most posters, it won't change my basic approach to education and the correlating CP issues, regardless of religion, gender or beliefs.
Better safer than sorrier.

Anna, I don't know. But I'm not prepared to live my life or compel my DCs to live their lives in a continual state of siege, fear and distrust. I feel it would be very damaging to their ability to build healthy relationships.
But I can tell that there is nothing I can say to persuade you that the overwhelming majority of people are capable of interacting with children without being, or thinking about being, abusive.