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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

WIU? Male in Female Area - Child

160 replies

Dino1 · 19/07/2019 16:00

DD is 10 and does an activity which requires she gets changed on the premises. The activity is 9-18 years mixed sex. Yesterday DD and others were changing in designated female area and 17 year old male enters and stays. DD says she was in her knickers at the time as were others, they all tried to hide.
I complained to captain who apologised but said if it makes me feel better the male is gay. It doesn't make me feel better. DD was very upset by it and felt vulnerable.
DH says I was unreasonable to complain as these things happen and the boy was obviously not in there to perv but to be with his friends. DH says it's not right but that making a fuss is not going to help anyone.
I am fuming, with DH attitude, with a 17 year old boy/man thinking it's ok to go into female area where young girls are undressed, and with captain for thinking sexuality has any implication and not recognising how inappropriate this is.
I am not unreasonable am I? The captain has apologised and said it will never happen again. Am I overreacting here? I am still angry and feel this is serious and not just one of those things.

OP posts:
TurnAroundWhenPossible · 19/07/2019 22:31

Not sure what the captain's sex has to do with it and why anyone should be getting worked up about why it wasn't mentioned.

Bookworm4 · 19/07/2019 22:34

If he’s the only male on the team he’ll have the male changing area to himself.

HeadintheiClouds · 19/07/2019 22:36

Well, not necessarily. The team would have been playing against another team, presumably?

JellySlice · 19/07/2019 22:51

Not necessarily. Teams practice together, as well as competing against another team. Any way, not all 'team' activities are competitive.

HeadintheiClouds · 19/07/2019 22:54

Yeah, true enough.

nitsparty · 19/07/2019 22:56

is the Captain linked to some kind of professional body? Contact them and report her.

donquixotedelamancha · 19/07/2019 23:27

S1naidSucks not sure why it's relevant.

I too would have assumed that most women would get it. I think that the reality is that while more women instinctively understand the need for dignity and privacy than men, there are plenty who do not.

ReanimatedSGB · 20/07/2019 01:11

Once again what was the reason given for why the boy went in the room? Reading your OP again it looks like this is an activity that takes place in the same venue, with the same participants, on a regular basis. Does he usually change with the girls? Did he stroll into the room or just stick his head round the door and yell at them to hurry up? Is your DD new to it and therefore doesn't know her team members or the usual changing room policy? There's a lot of relevant information missing here, which brings up a bit of a whiff of MUB trans-panic.

HeadintheiClouds · 20/07/2019 01:16

It’s not trans panic. The guy is not claiming to be anything other than male.

ErrolTheDragon · 20/07/2019 01:31

Did he stroll into the room or just stick his head round the door and yell at them to hurry up?

From the op '17 year old male enters and stays. '. Her DH said the reason 'to be with his friends'. There's no indication at all that her DD is new to this activity or setting.
A 17yo boy went into the female changing room and stayed there while her DD was 'in her knickers at the time as were others, they all tried to hide. ' ... I think the picture is perfectly clear. Male goes where he has no business and stays despite what was surely the discomfiture of younger girls.Hmm

donquixotedelamancha · 20/07/2019 02:02

Once again what was the reason given for why the boy went in the room? Reading your OP again it looks like this is an activity that takes place in the same venue, with the same participants, on a regular basis. Does he usually change with the girls? Did he stroll into the room or just stick his head round the door and yell at them to hurry up? Is your DD new to it and therefore doesn't know her team members or the usual changing room policy?

What a load of twaddle. What does any of that matter? OP is not trying to make out that he's a pedophile. Whatever the reason a 17 YO boy should not be in the girls changing room.

There's a lot of relevant information missing here, which brings up a bit of a whiff of MUB trans-panic.

OP has not said the kid is trans. That would not be a good reason if he was. It's not panic to want to keep single sex spaces- you are in a minority to want to get rid of them.

Perhaps we could maintain focus on the women and girls rather than derailing.

tigerlily111 · 20/07/2019 02:02

Surely the captain is one of the participants and just a kid herself. You need to complain to the organisers. Is there a welfare officer?

tigerlily111 · 20/07/2019 02:03

but YA defo NBU!!

JellySlice · 20/07/2019 07:10

what was the reason given for why the boy went in the room?

Irrelevant.

He should not have entered the girls changing room while they were changing.

differentnameforthis · 20/07/2019 07:50

Yeah, your dh is wrong.

With friends or not, he should not have been in there. Ask your dh how old your dd needs to be before she is allowed to ask for privacy from males, and would he feel it acceptable for a male to watch his daughter get changed through her bedroom window? Or watch her get changed at the swimming pool?

differentnameforthis · 20/07/2019 07:54

@stucknoue - Yanbu but it's possible that the young man felt threatened in the male changing rooms, many gay teens are bullied for their sexuality though in that case using a unisex disabled changing room is the answer

So it's OK for a child who is bullied to insert himself in a female only area, with younger peers who are likely to be hitting/going through puberty/periods/developing etc, who are in various states of undress, because he might be being bullied?

So females have to be humiliated because he can't be bullied? Bullshit.

InstantCoffeeSavesTheDay · 20/07/2019 08:05

I am so fed up with males in female changing rooms. “But they are not there to look at girls, they are harmless”.

This is quite off topic, but we had swimming lessons and they had set up a special area for mums and children (children not allowed in female changing rooms). However, children were allowed in the male changing rooms.

A dad came in to the designated space with his 5 year old (didn’t want her ogled by men presumably) and did not think that my DD10 should worry (she did) as “he was a dad”.

I am afraid that I told him that I was changing too and took my top off. He scooped up his daughter and rushed off. Probably afraid to see something he wouldn’t be able to unsee....

onedayiwillmissthis · 20/07/2019 08:16

're your husband...I do notice that many men are quite sure that gay men should be in female spacesHmm...I wonder if this is because they are convinced that they are somehow 'at risk' from a gay man's advances etc. Or maybe they think they might...you know catch 'the gay'?

InstantCoffeeSavesTheDay · 20/07/2019 08:26

I am just astonished at the utter disregard of the feelings of young girls. Between about 9/10 and 18 their bodies are changing massively and some are quite uncomfortable. Their feelings are valid and important too.

As an adult woman, I wouldn’t be to happy with a man in the changing room, but I could deal with it in a different way. And if I caught someone staring (as if!) I would stare back or say something if it made me uncomfortable.

A young girl is unlikely to be able to do that, so in addition to all sorts of insecurities, they were put in a situation where they were unable to assert themselves.

needmorespace · 20/07/2019 08:30

If the boy identified as a girl, there would be many, many individuals and groups, the latter including some receiving public funding,who would say It's perfectly OK and categorically tell you that you are a bigot for suggesting otherwise. See Mermaids and Stonewall. The NSPCC refused to answer questions hypothesising just such a scenario here on Mumsnet, when they had agreed to a webchat about safeguarding. Girl Guiding UK similarly

^ this
This needs pointing out again and again. This thread is almost unanimous in the belief that this young man should not have been in the female changing area because girls/women are entitled to privacy. But if this boy identified as trans, all safeguarding seems to evaporate and it would become ok and anyone who objected would be called transphobic. Women and men in this country need to wake the fuck up and see what is happening in front of their noses.
Women's and female rights are being eroded in plain sight and if self-id is passed in law (like in Canada at the moment - see the court case of Jessica/Jonathan Yaniv) then this young man would have every right to be in that changing room and it will be too late for hand-wringing.

SarahTancredi · 20/07/2019 08:31

And once again women and girls have to have an approved set of reasons to object whilst the boy is just assumed to havee done it for a multiple number of reasons and any of them.are ok Hmm

Homophobes in the mens is not our problem.to solve.

Dirtyjellycat · 20/07/2019 08:33

YANBU for all the reason last PPs have said. The situation you describe is totally unacceptable.

I don’t want to derail the thread but can I ask people a question? When I was in primary school we always got changed for PE at our desks. We sat boy-girl, boy-girl etc and I always felt uncomfortable undressing next to a boy (and I was wearing bras by year 6 so this made me even more self-conscious).

Does this still happen now? A few people have mentioned the boys shouldn’t be in the girls changing rooms after the age of eight, so I’m just wondering what normally happens in primary schools now - are children still having to change in front of each other?

TestingTestingWonTooFree · 20/07/2019 08:38

YANBU

bellinisurge · 20/07/2019 08:40

@Dirtyjellycat , from Y5 at my DD's primary boys and girls changed in separate areas.

CassianAndor · 20/07/2019 09:03

Dirty the law states that schools must provide separate changing and toileting for children over the age of 8.