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?

The only lack of respect for cleaners is I'm sorry coming from you loud and clear.

I don't have a cleaner at the moment and one thing stopping me is my much loved senile cat who has dementia and has accidents. I'd no more expect a cleaner to clear up cat pee than I'd expect a cleaner to clear up 11 year old boy pee. The cat has at least the excuse he's losing his marbles.

So when your son is grown up and living with a long term partner and he misses the loo, who will wipe it up?

OP, you've had time to go at some length into what your work involves and your cleaning arrangements, but haven't managed to explain how talking in a communal toilet invades anyone's bodily privacy. Are you going to address that?

I can't afford a cleaner so it tends to be me who cleans the bathroom, I have 4 boys and they have all been taught to clean up any piss and put their own tissues in the bin.

A priest in the toilet with my son?- I don't think so.

Why, combust? When, in this scenario, the priest is fully clothed, talking to a group of fully clothed boys, and in a room which is open to the rest of the school population at all times?

*phaedra" you are an adult, so you remember to put tissues in the bin (not sure why you don't like bins in every room, but my kitchen bin is a long way from the dc's rooms), and you are focussing on that to keep your home pleasant. Dc are not so focussed - My house is a normally functioning family home, and I think any cleaner coming to interview for a family-home cleaning job is going to expect the kind of mess dc leave. (Unapproved) lipstick soaked tissues, and rat-kicked out bedding are my dd's main "crime", ds's is lethally sharp lego scattered underfoot and randomly abandoned socks. I do lecture them, and they improve, then they forget, then I lecture etc etc. See? Normal.

So when your son is grown up and living with a long term partner and he misses the loo, who will wipe it up?

I wholeheartedly agree with Sirzy.

I have 2 DC, both boys. From a very young age they were taught I, or their father, pick up no-one's clothes or clean up no-one's piss but our own! You make a mess, you clean it!

DS1 currently shares a living area (barrack block) with 35 others. There are communal bathrooms, he is agog at the "disrespectful little shits" (his words not mine) who piss everywhere and expect someone else to clean it up. He's had his time on cleaning the bathrooms, and yes he did point it out to two or three of them when they pissed on the floor and he had just cleaned. My bet is the priest was a lot more polite!

Sorry - I've explained multiple times but here we go again..
I don't condone peeing around loos for boys or girls once they are old enough to know better. I think they should be considerate of the environment in which they live, and others who use and clean the loos. I don't mind the school telling them not to pee around the loos, and to tell them that they should be considerate etc etc... I DO mind dc at an age where they are being taught a lot about their bodies, their growing sense of self, sexuality and of their own rights over their own bodies, being taken into a cubicle by an adult (priest/nun/male teacher/female teacher/whomever) in order to be given a lecture about a private bodily function. It seems to be calculated to belittle, embarrass, shame and invade their privacy. Children have rights, and their privacy should be respected. You will, (if you have a dc this age) have noticed that your child's doctor ASKS their permission before examining them. Because they aren't babies anymore -- and contrary to what has been said by one poster, children's bodies are private. In my job (which actually has SOME relevance), I would not dream of talking to a child about private issues such as urinating, or asking to see the marks of what has happened to them. And if I did need to talk about it, I wouldn't do it in front of other children in a private place.

But they aren't being examined, or even touched. If they are embarrassed they can't manage to wee in the toilet then (assuming no medical reasons) good so they should be. 10 year olds should know how to wee.

It's not private, it's causing an issue for the students and staff.

I don't think your comparison about a doctor examining an older dc is valid because the priest didn't examine them he took a group into a communal bathroom to point out the mess being left.

We will have to agree to disagree that peeing is not a private function. And that lavatories are not a private place. Funny that they have locks though

If they aren't babies anymore they should stop acting like it and pee in the toilet and not on the floor.

I have 2 DC, aged 19.5 and 17.5, I would have no problem now or at any other point in their lives with an adult doing to them what the priest has done to your son.

Hard luck if they were embarrassed, maybe they will think about where they pee in the future!

Peeing might be a private function but they were not watched while they pee'd. They were not examined while they pee'd. They were not lectured while they pee'd so it is a red herring!

If you piss in a locked room it is definitely a private function.

If you piss all over the floor in a locked room and then don't clean it up, you have negated the private part!

I don't really understand what you are failing to grasp about this OP.

Down, peeing is private and lavatories are private when someone is peeing in there. No one disagrees with that.

The disagreement is over whether it's a private place when people are in there for things other than toileting. The fact your cleaner goes into your bathroom to clean it despite it having a lock on the door surely shows that a lavatory isn't always private?

"So when your son is grown up and living with a long term partner and he misses the loo, who will wipe it up?"

If it is such a private place then nobody else should be responsible for cleaning up someone's private mess surely?

ok Fairy so if a teacher took a group of boys into an anonymous bedroom at a boarding school, pointed out semen-encrusted tissues on the floor around the bed, and said it was (rightly) disgusting and that it had to stop, would you be happy with that? Ejaculation is a "normal" bodily function, boys sometimes discuss and laugh at it, and it takes place somewhere that is sometimes private (one hopes!). I think it would be a breach of privacy, unnecessarily embarrassing and would be appalled that boys were being spoken to with no regard for their body-consciousness and stage of development.

It seems to be calculated to belittle, embarrass, shame and invade their privacy.

Tempted to go into capital letters here. Unless the priest is singling out one particular child, how can talking to a group about toilet etiquette possibly invade their privacy, let alone belittle and embarrass anyone? You seem to take that as a given but you never never explain it.

Hakluyt I'm afraid ds has already told me that girls are yucky and that he will be staying with me when he is older so he doesn't have to marry a yucky girl, but he will push my wheelchair. Cheers, ds!

Your problems OP are:

you're unhappy with the educational compromises you've had to make to live where you live;

you don't like the priest for separate and unconnected reasons; and

you've got some weird views about natural bodily functions.

Your attempt to air them via a bizarre WTAF incident in AIBU though has been hilarious so thanks for that.

But that would be singling one person out as presumably they would know who's bed it was, as would the others.

They don't know who used the toilet. They don't really need to know who it was. What they do need to do is point out the issue, make it clear to them that contary to what mummy is teaching them it isn't the job of the cleaner to clean up their mess and highlight the importance of aim.

rednecks I read the first half of this and thought you were being strangely over the top and yes, YWBU. I still think that - but I do now understand where you are coming from. You say you knew Fr Kit Cunningham and were totally shocked to discover that he had sexually abused boys. I know the uncovering of his history was profoundly unnerving for a lot of people - many of whom thought of him as a friend and had welcomed him into their homes and families.

I am considerably older than you and I knew Kit before he was a parish priest in London, but after he was ordained. He was well known among the women in our circle for his wandering hands and was someone to avoid when he'd had a few drinks, I disliked him. I watched as he developed his charming persona and moved in exalted circles, he became known as a 'character'.

When it all came crashing down after his death (www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/belief/2011/jun/19/kit-cunningham-child-abuse) I was profoundly saddened by what had happened to those boys, but not at all surprised to hear it. Female friends from those days were equally unsurprised while their husbands expressed shock that such a 'good bloke' could have done anything like that.

I left the RC church almost 30 yrs ago - having had my fill of seeing the problems caused by systemic misogyny coupled with repressed sexuality. I have many family and friends who remain RC, I have friends and family who are priests and nuns so I KNOW there are good, honest, decent, well adjusted people who are in those roles but I do understand that this has left you with a deep mistrust of not only clergy but (probably) your own instincts to know who to trust. The RC church has not protected its children from disturbed individuals in positions of power so I do understand your unease. Perhaps those people giving you such a hard time have not experienced such a profound abuse of trust as you feel you have had due to Kit.

No-one is saying that peeing is not a private function. But how does talking about being reasonably considerate in your use of the toilet meant that you are invading that private function? And why does it stop invading your privacy if you are outside the communal toilets, but not if you are inside?

If any of us are posting about this from our bathrooms (not impossible in my case!), are we invading privacy, or are other people invading ours?

If I decided to tell my ds off about his poor aim and did so by bringing him into the bathroom and showing him the mess he'd made, would I be invading his privacy?