Men in the female changing rooms!

[ewchoc]

I know this has been done to death, but I'm sat here waiting for my children to come out of their swimming lessons and getting increasingly annoyed at the number of men in the female changing rooms.

Tiny swimming pool attached to a school with two small changing rooms, clearly marked male and female. Every week there are at least one or two men who insist on bringing their daughters (all under 7) into the female side to change before & after lessons. It's just one open space, no cubicles or individual spaces, and my DD (9) is getting more and more anxious having to change in front of these full grown men!

Am I being precious or should I ask them to use the men's? Their attitude is that it's their daughters who are getting changed, so they can't take them into the male side with all the boys!

We've not actually been back to a swimming pool since COVID hit but am hoping to after Christmas. I have twin DC - one DD and one DS who have just turned 12 years old.

Both DC are autistic, but my DS in particular has high needs. Neither could navigate changing rooms on their own yet - my DD is closer to it, but my DS is still in nappies and absolutely nowhere near being able to dry and change himself. We have been lucky that our local pools have family/unisex areas but I can remember a couple of years ago at a pool party there were only male/female changing rooms. I clearly can't take a 12 yr old boy into female changing rooms (even though he's fairly oblivious to everything - but I recognise other women/girls would not be comfortable), but neither can I go into the mens. DS wouldn't let someone else help him eg/another male parent. If we found ourselves in a situation like that again now without unisex facilities, we'd have to go back home.

It really is about time that all places offer some unisex facilities because clearly there are a significant number of difficulties with solely male/female set-ups.

@Itsnotallaboutyoubaby "Regardless grown men should not be in a ladies changing room… and grown women should not be in a men’s changing room.

Exactly this. The whole point of the segregation is to allow opposite sex adults privacy from one another. Small children are a different matter as they are not seen as being able to compromise privacy and dignity like an adult.

How about this for a solution...

Designate one of girls changing room as "mother and daughter" and other as "mother and son". Similarly in males... "father and daughter" and "father and son". Then boys and girls are getting changed separately but not in front of opposite sex parents.

Maybe I just see this situation differently because my parents were nudists and I went on a lot of nudist holidays since I was a very young child so male and female naked bodies don't mean anything to me, they're just bodies.

Grown women are the ones telling young girls to feel anxious about being naked Infront of men. I'm not surprised so many young girls get body image disorders if they're being told at 9 that their bodies are sexual objects that any man will leer at and they should feel ashamed to be seen naked around them.

@NekoShiro

Maybe I just see this situation differently because my parents were nudists and I went on a lot of nudist holidays since I was a very young child so male and female naked bodies don't mean anything to me, they're just bodies.

Grown women are the ones telling young girls to feel anxious about being naked Infront of men. I'm not surprised so many young girls get body image disorders if they're being told at 9 that their bodies are sexual objects that any man will leer at and they should feel ashamed to be seen naked around them.

Oh FFS grown women are not telling young girls that they will be leered at. Young girls, older girls and women are being leered at and worse by men.

The idealized view of everyone frolicking around naked and free is lovely but it doesn't happen because a minority of people - mostly men - will take advantage.

@Vanishun

Complain to the Centre (and keep complaining until they do something).

Funny isn't it - they don't want their daughters exposed somehow to other men, but don't give a shit about yours or the other women in there.

Exactly this 💯

@SpidersAreShitheads

We've not actually been back to a swimming pool since COVID hit but am hoping to after Christmas. I have twin DC - one DD and one DS who have just turned 12 years old.

Both DC are autistic, but my DS in particular has high needs. Neither could navigate changing rooms on their own yet - my DD is closer to it, but my DS is still in nappies and absolutely nowhere near being able to dry and change himself. We have been lucky that our local pools have family/unisex areas but I can remember a couple of years ago at a pool party there were only male/female changing rooms. I clearly can't take a 12 yr old boy into female changing rooms (even though he's fairly oblivious to everything - but I recognise other women/girls would not be comfortable), but neither can I go into the mens. DS wouldn't let someone else help him eg/another male parent. If we found ourselves in a situation like that again now without unisex facilities, we'd have to go back home.

It really is about time that all places offer some unisex facilities because clearly there are a significant number of difficulties with solely male/female set-ups.

It definitely discriminates against people like your son and the two girls I mentioned earlier who didn't have a mother in their life.

The school is obviously taking money for hiring out the pool so they need to invest a bit of money in the changing facilities.

@RubyTuesday70

I'm deeply saddened but not shocked that so many people are prioritising the mens' needs and wants here.

Not those of a 9 year old girl who feels anxious about it.

OP you're absolutely right to challenge this, and I'd be looking for an alternative if the school thinks this is acceptable.

No they are saying his daughter's feelings are as important as the 9 year old girl.

The woman /girls aren't being exposed to naked males though if dad is just helping his daughter change. Whereas in the male changing room the younger girls would be exposed to naked men.
What are dads supposed to do if they are a single parent?

As I said on another thread the other day, anyone can use whichever facilities they want to. Convention is that men go in the changing room labelled for men and women go in the won labelled for women, but it's not a legal obligation and certainly isn't anything new - it's been happening for years.

@SpidersAreShitheads

We've not actually been back to a swimming pool since COVID hit but am hoping to after Christmas. I have twin DC - one DD and one DS who have just turned 12 years old.

Both DC are autistic, but my DS in particular has high needs. Neither could navigate changing rooms on their own yet - my DD is closer to it, but my DS is still in nappies and absolutely nowhere near being able to dry and change himself. We have been lucky that our local pools have family/unisex areas but I can remember a couple of years ago at a pool party there were only male/female changing rooms. I clearly can't take a 12 yr old boy into female changing rooms (even though he's fairly oblivious to everything - but I recognise other women/girls would not be comfortable), but neither can I go into the mens. DS wouldn't let someone else help him eg/another male parent. If we found ourselves in a situation like that again now without unisex facilities, we'd have to go back home.

It really is about time that all places offer some unisex facilities because clearly there are a significant number of difficulties with solely male/female set-ups.

I would assume you’d be able to use disabled facilities as your ds has obvious needs.

@Rosebel

The woman /girls aren't being exposed to naked males though if dad is just helping his daughter change. Whereas in the male changing room the younger girls would be exposed to naked men. What are dads supposed to do if they are a single parent?

Are you saying that as long as the fathers keep their clothes on in the female changing room it’s ok? Because I very much doubt my dds would have wanted to be naked in front of any man from about 7 years old!

@Aroundtheworldin80moves

How about this for a solution...

Designate one of girls changing room as "mother and daughter" and other as "mother and son". Similarly in males... "father and daughter" and "father and son". Then boys and girls are getting changed separately but not in front of opposite sex parents.

Duh! Father and daughter will mean girls are getting changed in front of other girls fathers, ie an opposite sex unknown parent!

@CircleofWillis that is you telling young girls that every man is a pedo who wants to leer at their naked bodies.

I know that there are pedophiles, rapists and abusers out there, I've been at the receiving end of all of those things in my life, but that doesn't change the fact that adult men and women can parent their children without being called wrong for doing innocent things.

Seeing people naked is an innocent thing at its core, men and women can abuse that and turn it into something vile but we shouldn't act like the minority is actually the majority of people.

If it’s making girls uncomfortable then the Dads’ feelings be damned. It’s not about them.

@MoonlightApple

If it’s making girls uncomfortable then the Dads’ feelings be damned. It’s not about them.

It isn't about the dad's feelings, it's about his little girl who is just as important as any other little girl there.

@Aroundtheworldin80moves

How about this for a solution...

Designate one of girls changing room as "mother and daughter" and other as "mother and son". Similarly in males... "father and daughter" and "father and son". Then boys and girls are getting changed separately but not in front of opposite sex parents.

Some parents have a son and a daughter.

@Rosebel

The woman /girls aren't being exposed to naked males though if dad is just helping his daughter change. Whereas in the male changing room the younger girls would be exposed to naked men. What are dads supposed to do if they are a single parent?

The men/boys aren’t being exposed to naked frmales though if Mum is just helping her son change. Where as in the female changinf room the younger boys would be exposed to naked women. What are mums supposed to do if they are a single parent?

Using your logic the mens changing room will be full of mums and the womens changing room will be full of Dads.

If you’re a woman would you happily be naked in a changing room full of men?

Adult men should not be in woman's changing rooms
Adult women should not be in men's either
We can talk about all the different scenarios but until this is set in stone and people complain nothing will change
People who suggest using the classrooms - this would never be allowed

Adult men should not be in woman's changing rooms

Adult women should not be in men's either

We can talk about all the different scenarios but until this is set in stone and people complain nothing will change

Except they are not women's or men's changing rooms. They are primary school children's changing rooms where it makes sense for the children actually changing to always be in the correct room.

The only real answer is enough individual changing rooms. The issue is that I suspect the schools don't need really individual ones for their own use during the day, and they don't make that amount of money from hiring them out to pay for them. So either the price of lessons would have to go up if the schools charged more, or the lessons would be stopped totally.

[quote NekoShiro]@CircleofWillis that is you telling young girls that every man is a pedo who wants to leer at their naked bodies.

I know that there are pedophiles, rapists and abusers out there, I've been at the receiving end of all of those things in my life, but that doesn't change the fact that adult men and women can parent their children without being called wrong for doing innocent things.

Seeing people naked is an innocent thing at its core, men and women can abuse that and turn it into something vile but we shouldn't act like the minority is actually the majority of people.[/quote]
NekoShiro, no one needed to tell me that there were predators out there. I found out myself when I was 7 and a man exposed himself to my friends and me while we were playing in the park, at 9 when a neighbours daughter was raped while babysitting, at 11 when men tried to stare at or touch my breasts, at secondary school when men would drive past making comments or follow me home or steal underwear from school or leave pages torn from explicit porno mags on the ground on my way to school. These are all things that happened before I was 13.

Do you lock your house at night? Do you hide your PIN number at a cash machine? Do you ask for references for the people who look after your children? Do you expect individuals working with vulnerable people to have a DBS? These safety measures are put in place, not for the majority of honest people but for the minority who could seriously fuck up your life if you are unfortunate enough to encounter them.

The dads with daughters and mothers with sons need to complain as there are no separate facilities for them.

OP and her DD have done nothing wrong expecting a female changing room to accommodate females only. She shouldn't have posters telling her to find other facilities, or for her and DD to just get used to it nakedness around the opposite sex is fine.

We all know the risks, it's not normal for children to be naked around men that are not close family members.

If this is in the UK then no law has been broken.
There is no law saying Men only or Women only allowed in specific sex toilets or changing rooms.

People saying report to police is ridiculous as no law has been broken.

Why all this fuss when all the person is doing is changing their child.
Your all assuming that all men are predators. Women are predators too. Finally more media coverage is being given to women predators so they are exposed too.

I think that gyms and swimming pools should all have non gendered places for people to get changed.
What about a disabled man who has a female carer or a disabled woman with a male carer? What would happen then?

This whole man in women changing room drama is ridiculous. All he is doing is changing his daughter. He has already seen naked girls body. I'm sure he doesn't want to look at your children. But you are OK with other women looking at your naked children? Don't you see the hypocrisy? You know there are women who like women too, right?

Someone's mentioned transwomen and no doubt mumsnet anti trans mob will be going crazy with this thread.
Transwomen are female and will can can use female changing rooms and toilets.

I am male and I would take my female child to a female changing room if there was no non gendered changing room. Women come into the mens all the time with their kids.

@Boredoutmymind, where to start with that!

You clearly think that women abuse DC and it's all fine, nothing to see here, don't worry men have seen naked girls before, none of them pose risks in women's spaces?

We inhabit different planets as the violence and sexual predation I have seen is male dominated against girls and women.

I'm sure he doesn't want to look at your children.

Most women still don't want to get undressed in front of men, whether they are actively staring or not. My daughter has right to privacy and single sex space when she is undressed. There is a female changing room where she can expect that.

A swimming pool has the right to offer certain changing rooms to persons of one sex only.