Over 8s in the changing rooms

[HenweeArcher]

I’ve started swimming just before swimming lessons at my gym recently as it fits in well with the crèche being quiet. I’ve noticed that no matter what day I swim, I can always count at least 2 or 3 boys who are almost undoubtedly over 8 (which is the rule) in the female changing rooms just before lessons. Sometimes they use the separate cubicles (there are a couple in the corners) to change themselves so are more than capable of changing alone! I’m aware that some boys might need extra support for whatever reason but I fail to believe that a handful every day at a small health club do.

AIBU to mention it to management? It doesn’t necessarily affect me a great deal as I’m fairly relaxed about nudity and don’t see it as my responsibility to all of a sudden start changing under a towel or anything but I do feel it’s unfair for younger girls to be put in this position.

I am amazed that some women on this thread are defending taking their boys into a female changing room at age 9 ffs!!

It's paedophiles that are the problem not men.

Most paedophiles are men so that puts a boy in male changing room unaccompanied at risk. Especially if paedophiles are aware boys cannot go in female changing.

If I knew who the paedophiles were I would make sure they weren't using either changing room, but I don't so I have to make sure my children are not alone.

I foster a boy aged 11 who is terrified of being in male changing areas. We are not allowed to change in the same room so we have to be in cubicles, this narrows where we can go to swim- some pools have mixed changing areas and I have to be in the next cubicle to him so he can make sure I'm there, others (depends on days and sessions) I end up having to take him into female areas.
In my own local pool which we love because the water is warm and safe.
I've had to learn not to make assumptions about children in adult spaces or single sex spaces because sometimes it's about keeping them safe too.

arethereanyleftatall

It's the lizard brain. Most violent or sexually motivated attacks are committed by men of low class/opportunity/prospects. When humankind first got going, men would compete. Fight to display their strength, show aggression to display their dominance. Those who lost wouldn't get access to a mate, so would have a drive to steal one.

Those basic instincts still exist today. Men with lower prospects tend to commit more sexual crimes because, in their lizard brain, they have less chance of winning the sex through conventional means. They also have a drive to show how dominant they can be. Men is positions of power do it to maintain that position of power.

Obviously it's not all men, but that lizard brain is ticking away inside everyone and it takes huge societal steps to overcome. And the way men have, until very recently, been the automatic head of the household/country/company has not helped. They do need put in their place now! However, this particular issue is not the hill you want to die on. Telling patents of 8/9 year old boys that we must send them alone into a room of naked adults is just not OK. The rule "doesn't apply" because it shouldn't bloody exist. It is too young.

We do need to take massive steps to empower women but not at the expense of another child's safety. This is not the right place to start to teach boys a lesson.

I really don't understand why all pools don't have unisex changing rooms with wall to wall cubicles instead so everyone can get changed in privacy. Ours is unisex and it's great. I can keep an eye on my children no matter what age they are. DH often helps get DD (9) changed after her lessons (admittedly to rush her along as they close at the same time her lesson finishes). No one feels awkward or like they have no privacy, there's no issues with adult males being in the same room because it's all cubicles and it makes a damn site more sense that way that having a certain sex age limit with caveats such as SN or disabilities.

I would feel very nervous of my son being alone to get change even if he was 10 years old.

Rubbish. men of all education and class rape and attack girls and women.

But on the slight tangent topic that we somehow got on to - it is clear from the stats of crimes committed, plus the sheer number of women who post daily on mn about their misogynistic husbands, that something either nature or nurture causes many men to believe they are superior to women.

But you're talking about reported crime, and women who have enough of an issue to post. People don't bother to post about the all of men out there who aren't arseholes and who don't commit crimes. I can't think of anyone in my friendship, work or community schedule that are either misogynistic or criminals. It's not that they don't exist, but if you are taking posts on mumsnet as a way to prop up your argument that all men are pigs, then you've not got a lot to work with there.

I wouldn't want to be in the same changing room as an 8 year old. And I'm sure he wouldn't me.

There will never be an age cut off which both sides are happy with. There will never be a solution both sides are happy with. Not with open plan changing. They arent fit for purpose in a time where we are so aware of sexual abuse. It's needs individual and family cubicles.

In a centre without individual facilities, then it's just never going to be resolved. I can say with certainty that my 7 year old would not be going alone into an open plan just because he turned 8. But I know there's someone round the corner to tell me I'm wrong because it makes them uncomfortable.... well, my kids being sexually assaulted would make me far more than uncomfortable, so he'd be staying with me. But we're all going to argue for what's best for our own circumstance.

No one is in the wrong. The different 'right opinions just don't work together so open plan simply shouldn't be allowed anymore.

Chrisjen No no solution will make everyone happy. But there are rules. You should follow them, or not go. You don't get to just ignore rules you do not agree with.

@marymarkle

For fuck sake. Statistics tell a different story. The reasons go much deeper, analysis goes much further but that's a basic description of one area of it. And as I said, men in positions of power will also commit those acts as a way to show they deserve to retain that power. The point is, it's been built into men from when we first started walking around. That's why men commit more violent crimes than women. It doesn't make it OK and it doesn't excuse it since civilised people control themselves but brining my son into a the women's changing room is not causing him to become an attacker as suggested by posters on this thread.

There will never be an age cut off which both sides are happy with.

Aside from anything, I thought we'd got away from the expectation that all children develop at the same rates and children with SN aren't seen in public. Every child matures at a different rate, and what is suitable for one child, is completely unsuitable for another.

And don't go to open plan changing rooms if you can not follow the rules.
As someone with a disability, open plan changing rooms are way easier to use than any other arrangement I have ever seen.

This is not about children's development, this is about saying that girls and women deserve single sex changing rooms. And so there is a cut off age for boys.

I can raise my boys to respect women and be decent and civilised and good whilst also protecting him from being alone in a room with naked, grown men whilst he is a small 8 year old boy.

@MidniteScribbler

Which is exactly why I said there will never be a cut off age everyone agrees with.

But this thread just confirms my view that a lot of people don't really give a fuck about anyone except their own family.
So they don't give a fuck if a 9 year old girl refuses to go swimming because there is an 11 year old boy in the female changing room. As long as their child is okay.

chrisjen Yes its all about your son. Just keep ignoring the rules as long as you are both happy.

@marymarkle

And young boys deserve to also feel safe and nut be left naked in a room, alone, with grown men they don't know.

Open plan changing does not work. But a girls needs do not trump the needs to keep a boy safe. And keeping a boy safe does not trump the needs of the girl having privacy. Both arguments are of equal weight. No one is in the wrong. So as long as there are open plan changing rooms, this argument goes round in circles.

But at least the mum's of boys can admit that we understand the girls needs are of EQUAL importance. You all will just carry on screaming that the girls needs are more importance, whilst also saying that boys think the world revolves around them... And you don't spot the irony in your argument...

No you are saying only the boys needs are important. Because you ignore the rules. You have choices that you are ignoring.

And so there is a cut off age for boys

There's a cut off for opposite sex children in changing rooms - not just boys.

So it's not just that women and girls deserve privacy, men and boys deserve privacy too so you are also arguing for girls going with a male relative to either change alone or don't go too.

So they don't give a fuck if a 9 year old girl refuses to go swimming because there is an 11 year old boy in the female changing room.

So the 9 year old girl doesn't give a fuck that the 11 year old boy, who probably has special needs if he's in a female change room at that age, doesn't get to go swimming, because she won't step into a cubicle to get changed?

And I do wonder what you think will actually happen to an 8 year old in a changing room with other boys and men, during a family swim session.

MIdnite We are talking about open plan changing rooms.