Son changing with Mum at gym swimming

[tailspin21]

Firstly, I know IABU posting in this section when it's not technically but I could really use impartial opinions and I know this is one place I can get them!
So, the conundrum. DS is 8, coming up 9 years old. We go for a swimming lesson twice a week, the pool is attached to a local gym. The men's changing room is one side of the pool and the women's is the other, so they're not side by side. Hubby can't (or won't - different thread!) come with. I am very conscious that women are changing in there - there are cubicles and DS always gets changed in a cubicle, but not every woman does not should they have to. My question is how much longer before he really needs to be going into the men's? I'm becoming increasingly aware but what is the magical cut off?! On the one hand I don't want him making other women uncomfortable. On the other, as an 8 year old alone in the men's changing room he's vulnerable himself. Am I overthinking? When should he be making that move? He's not always the most sensible but is generally not completely daft!

@Brefugee

On the whole I agree with your analysis but if you read my previous comment you will see that I have approached my leisure centre and am not willing to take my DS into the female changing room beyond the cut off.

Despite being a mother of boys I do not place greater value on their needs than girls.

I find it really really sad that so many people think that a men’s changing room in a swimming pool is “just not safe” for an eight year old boy whose Mum is outside. Do you really believe that there is a paedophile lurking round every corner, and that they would prey on a young boy in full view of other men?

A teenage boy with sn was assaulted in our local shopping centre in the men's loo. Also, even if a child wasn't actually physically touched, there are camera phones now and you can easily take photos or film someone. Just look at the upskirting that happens to women on public transport. I often volunteer on school trips...I am not allowed to be alone with any of the kids for safeguarding reasons...so why would you think it's ok to send an unaccompanied child into a room with unknown adults?

@CatJumperTwat

I just find it astonishing how little regard there is for the general safety of small boys on this thread, as evidenced by your posts among others.

Quote the posts that say it's fine to put boys in unsafe situations. I'll wait.

‘how little regard there is for the safety of small boys’ doesn’t require a particular quote.

@stingofthebutterfly

Cubicles within a communal area. Where women and girls are changing. So that boy is walking through that space and then taking a cubicle away from a girl who may want to use it.

The reason I keep repeated that girls need privacy is because so so many women on here have said "I wouldnt mind". Because they dont give a shit about the 8/9/10 year old girls changing in that room.

When I worked in schools I remember an awful case of bullying. It started outside of school on a leisure centre with only communal changing. Young girl getting changes. Boys being in the room. The languag they used about her body in school, the making fun, the bullying. It was awful. And she had to endure it because some entitled mother thought her son had a right to the women's changing room.

They dont. Find another option. Keep your boys out of women's spaces because those girls deserve privacy.

no, @Branleuse
You dont know anybody elses reasons for not wanting to send their 8 year old boy into a changing room of adult men unsupervised, but given the prevalence of child sexual abuse it doesnt take a fucking genius does it.

i have CONSISTENTLY in this thread requested that girls have privacy and dignity. I have also - after it was pointed out that safeguarding says no to sending young boys into the men's - consistently recommended finding a solution that does not impinge on the girls

I want all people to be able to get changed comfortably and without worry. I'm the mother of daughters but i'm not indifferent to how it is for boys, although reading this thread the converse does not appear to be true.

Find a solution that doesn't involve the girl's changing room - campaign for it, campaign for changing villages, whatever. Leave the girls their space.

Here you go @CatJumperTwat. Your comment was 'Yes'.

Peggytheredhen

So, according to this thread, girls must change with their Mums away from potential predators, and boys must change by themselves with those potential predators.

And if we don't like it we can 'campaign'? confused

Yes.

Here you go @CatJumperTwat. Your comment was 'Yes'.

Nope, that doesn't show that. Try again?

Maybe you can't be bothered to campaign for boys' safety, but that doesn't say anything about MY regard for boys' safety.

Despite being a mother of boys I do not place greater value on their needs than girls.

yes, you're one of the few who has made that clear. Others, not so much

Boys of his age should not be in the female changing room.

Is there now nowhere that girls' and women's needs/wants and rights equal, let alone trump, those of males?

@Holly60

Really? Is that what you'll campaign for then?

Men's Changing and then Unisex Changing?

If you think the solution is to remove women's spaces then well... I'm not going to say what I think about your decision making ability because I'll get banned.

Children count equally. But not in a woman's space. In a woman's space, women count more

A woman isn't under any threat by being in a changing room with an 8 year old boy who is with his mother. An 8 year old boy alone in a changing room with unknown men is far more vulnerable.

find another solution that doesn't involve them going into the female changing area.

The comments about campaiging are laughable, given the attitudes towards small boys on this thread alone. It's a non-starter, and would probably involve repurposing the existing split changing into unisex areas.

Also, I don't take my child swimming somewhere I have to bring him into a women's changing area. We have unisex changing at our pool. I am also not just a 'mother of a precious son' as I have a daughter as well. It's the appalling attitudes on this thread towards one half of all eight year old children which prompted me to bother posting.

@Comedycook

And again for the hard of thinking.

It isnt about predators. It is about the privacy and dignity of girls.

In a women's changing area, girls needs trump boys. Boys shouldn't be in there. It is a woman's space.

If boys don't have an option of family changing then you dry them poolside and take them home in a onesie.

You do not take them into a women only space once they are above the age mandated by the centre you are using. You do not get to do that. You have other solution.

Telling girls that they need to give up with privacy is not the answer. Ever.

I had exactly this situation as was a single mum to two boys. By the sounds of its, he’s the only one doing the swimming and you’re not swimming yourself, so you can be right outside the men’s changing rooms? If it’s lessons then there must be other families there too?

In any case, good idea to put swim gear on under dressing gown/trackies to arrive in (even if it means getting changed in the school toilets if the lesson is straight from school) I don’t agree with him going home wet, though, especially as the weather gets colder so I would have him use the men’s bit for this ones with you standing outside.

It's nice that you have had so little call to distrust adult men though.

Oh don't worry, I've had my experiences (including being dragged into a dark alley late at night , punched to the ground and sexually assaulted - I wonder if the police did ever catch that multiple sexual offending fucker, unfortunately it was before DNA could be used otherwise they could have got skin from my fingernails I guess )

My point is that women AREN'T considering 8 yo boys to be sexual predators. But if mothers of sons are worried about their children being at risk from strange men in changing rooms then they have to accept that one day, their grown up sons will also automatically be one of those suspicious men. I don't know. I only have a daughter and of course I have to try to warn her about some male motives without putting her off men for life or regarding them all as bastards. Maybe mothers of sons are fine with them always being considered a risk to women.

Anyway, it is nice to see that many mothers of sons do understand that invading women only spaces is not a reasonable thing to do.

[quote ImUninsultable]@Holly60

Really? Is that what you'll campaign for then?

Men's Changing and then Unisex Changing?

If you think the solution is to remove women's spaces then well... I'm not going to say what I think about your decision making ability because I'll get banned.[/quote]
Probably just unisex to be honest. Just get rid of single space changing rooms and replace with floor to ceiling cubicles. The current set up seems to be causing so much angst!

I don’t really mind what you think of me to be honest, but thank you for restraining yourself so masterfully

@Peggytheredhen

I am a single mother to 2 boys. No option of their dad taking them. Always me.

Once 8, they did not go into the women's changing room. Because it is not an option. It is off limits to boys aged 8 and over.

My boys are not predators. They are boys. But that's all they have to he to be excluded from the women's. It isnt "women and non-predator changing". Its "women's changing".

Therefore, all my boys need to be to be excluded is male. And they are. So they're not allowed in.

It's that simple. Not because they're predators. Because they are boys. And their school friends are at the pool and those girls are changing in that room. They deserve privacy. My boys deserve safety. But those girls dont need to solve that for me by giving up their space.

You said: Yes, boys must change by themselves with those potential predators @CatJumperTwat

How does that not show that?

Actually don't bother replying. It's half term and I have things to do.

I mean this isn’t just about an 8 year old boy using female changing rooms at swimming pools, is it!

That’s just one, difficult aspect, of a much wider issue about the need to have safe single sex spaces for women and girls.

Haven't RTFT but I wouldn't want to leave an and 8 YO, more so a lone 8 YO, of either sex by themselves to get undressed in a room of strangers whatever the sex of those strangers. You domt know who is on there, if it's a quiet time of day they might be just them and one adult stranger in the changing room, and if there's a group of people in there you run the risk of the bystander effect, of something going unnoticed, or people just not caring or only reporting something they see later as they leave the leisure centre.

Obviously it isn't fair on children to have to get unchanged in front of classmates of the opposite sex, and the places should have family facilities, but you have to weigh up the choices you have. Here the choices are 1. Allow an 8 YO child to go onto a room of strangers by themselves, where they and those adult strangers will be undressing or 2. Take them in with you so you can keep them safe and they can go straight into a cubicle, eyed averted from any girls in the changing room passing through to the cubicle and staying inside to change.

Anyway, it is nice to see that many mothers of sons do understand that invading women only spaces is not a reasonable thing to do.

It’s a shame it’s such a exclusive club though and it’s not something as a society we can find solutions for or even want to find a solution for. Rather than the emphasis being on othering ‘mothers of sons’ really we should want to keep all children safe.

Actually don't bother replying. It's half term and I have things to do.

You mistyped "Don't bother replying because I have no coherent arguments."

My point is that women AREN'T considering 8 yo boys to be sexual predators. But if mothers of sons are worried about their children being at risk from strange men in changing rooms then they have to accept that one day, their grown up sons will also automatically be one of those suspicious men. I don't know. I only have a daughter and of course I have to try to warn her about some male motives without putting her off men for life or regarding them all as bastards. Maybe mothers of sons are fine with them always being considered a risk to women

I'm sure you wouldn't ever want your DD to be alone in a room with an unknown man at the age of 8, yet people seem to expect mums of boys to happily send their sons into that situation. What's the difference? An eight year old boy is as unable to defend himself as an eight year old girl.

what do you do if your DS needs to go to the loo and you're out with him but without DH? At that age surely they're going by their own and you're waiting for them? This doesn't seem significantly different to that.

Unless there were separate 'tweens' changing rooms (one for boys, one for girls) I don't see a solution that is perfect. Maybe if you had larger unisex changing rooms that are cubicle only?