Anyone else hyper vigilant that some men may be pedophiles

[Cantgetwarmbrr]

I wasn’t like this before I had my Dd, she’s 5 now and just always in the back of my mind I wonder about people and hate feeling/thinking like this. For example, really nice, married guy neighbour with a son who walks his dogs and chats on to my Dd, which is nice 🤷🏻‍♀️ I even felt on guard when taking her to Santa as one Elf guy kept telling her how beautiful she was. It’s a horrible way to think, it’s just always there at the back of my mind. I can’t ever imagine letting her go to sleepovers etc, but know I’ll have to one day.
Does anyone else have this in the back of their mind sometimes?
I even said to Dh that I’d never leave her with another male, even close friends of ours etc, who I love and have known for years, why am I so paranoid about this? Does anyone feel similar?

Yes the Elf is meant to entertain but by telling a young child they're beautiful? Sorry but it is creepy and if something seems creepy then you should definitely trust your instincts OP. No situation is 100 % safe and it's sensible to question why someone might want a job as an "elf". Not to say it's necessarily the case but nothing wrong with being vigilant at all!

OhpoorMe
Thank you. I hadn't seen that one.

That sounds disturbing.

I was like this so don't think you are being unreasonable. I wasn't abused as a child or anything and had a lovely childhood myself but had a DV relationship in the past and he was someone I'd never ever in a million years have expected to be violent. So when my son was young I was extremely aware of the fact that you never really can tell what someone's like. It can be the person you least expect. I didn't even feel comfortable with my son being alone with my brother or uncle. I'd never admit that out loud. My brothers an amazing man.

And we wonder why there are so few men in primary education.

For goodness sake everyone, please see the comment above. There is NO type and it’s dangerous to go down that route as it leads to misplaced trust.

Yup, I am proudly hyper vigilant. I was abused by a relative until I was 8 or 9 and it has completely changed the course of my life, torn my family apart and left me with a lot of physical health issues too.

I won't allow sleepovers, my kids have strict rules about playing outside by themselves. We talk about our bodies, who they belong to, who can touch them, and reiterate the pants rule frequently.

I have two statements I took from workshop by our local councils lead safeguarding person that I absolutely live by:

1. Be wary of anyone who tries to separate you from your child.

1. 1 in 10 people who work with children do so with their own motives or nefarious intent.

I generally employ a healthy and professional level of suspicion at all times.

@Cantgetwarmbrr
I think you have a bit of anxiety about this but IMO you can never be too careful with your own kids. But you do largely have control over this.
DH and I both safe guarding leads. We would never leave DD with anyone other than our parents. She won't go to sleepovers, we have made this very clear to other parents and give zero fucks what they think, they aren't necessary. We chose her nursery based on their rigorous safeguarding procedures.
She has recently started cubs and DH stays with them. They put out an email asking for parent helpers recently so anyone could have had access to the kids, I was not impressed.
I could not give a shit about anyone thinking we are being overzealous, it is our job to keep her safe.

Would everyone else leave their child with a man who wasn’t the father?

Yes I would. My brother, father, FIL, BIL are all people who I would trust to look after DC. I would also allow sleep overs when age appropriate with parents I know, although I'd want mum there too.

I generally employ a healthy and professional level of suspicion at all times.

I'm terribly sorry for what you went through, that would be bound to change your perspective on things like this. However, I would gently suggest that too much suspicion is not 'healthy'. I'm not sure where this safeguarding person gets their figures from, but one in ten seems an awfully high number. I keep hearing these extremely high numbers of potential pedophiles cited and it just seems so so unlikely to me. I am forty years old, have know many people intimately (I don't mean just sexually, I mean in terms of friendships) and I can name one person who I know for certain went through sexual abuse as a young person. I just don't think that pedophilia is as common as people on this thread seem to think.

Jesus suffering. What does the 1 in 10 thing even mean? I am shocked they showed this. I have worked in safeguarding for 20 years and never heard this statistic. Do you have a quote because it sounds like utter BS to me (unless 'do so their own motives' means to pay the mortgage or, god forbid, they just like working with children).

1 in 10 thing is bullshit, unless they mean people just wanting a job so taking it easy rather than doing their best for the children.

@jm9138 Nope, no evidence or anything, only what they said. It didn't mean just peados, it was things like narcissists, bullies, people involved in drugs and human trafficking. It was a few years ago at a working with children forum for childminders and foster parents. It's just always stayed with me.

@VanityDiesHard, you might be 40 and only know 1 person it's happened to, but that's because survivors don't tend to tell anyone that it's in their past. Of my friends I have only told 2 people, and that was only after a fuckload of very intense therapy that allowed me to talk about it. You could be someone I know IRL, hang out with daily, and you would never, ever know my story.

@XDownwiththissortofthingX but that's a horrible way to look at it.

You can't equate robbing a bank if you won't get caught, with sexually abusing a child?

The incentive of robbing a bank if you absolutely won't get caught, is that you would be incredibly wealthy.

The incentive to sexually abuse a child is only there if you are sexually aroused by abusing children. Ie a paedophile.

You are not being unreasonable.
My brother in law, whom I had known for 54 years, was revealed as a paedophile and extreme collector of child pornography.
I had never left my children alone with him and they were the only children in both extended families who were not abused in some way, either directly or were filmed by this convicted criminal. Be vigilant.

I have been very vigilant as sadly we have experience of CSA in the wider family. I won't apologise for being more careful than other parents. I do think many people are too trusting. If you find worries are intrusive, seek counselling support.

I don't understand. So a large percentage of people want to work with children because they are are narcissists and bullies and want to deal in drugs....ok....so a job working with children is attractive to them? I am struggling to see this. I don't want to be mean but you quote a statistic that would worry most people and is clearly rubbish so it has to be called out.

Best thing you can do is equip your daughter to be vigilant. Show her the NHS pants/ song video and talk to her about abuse and keeping secrets etc

WHY do some posters still use the term ‘child pornography’? It’s inappropriate and minimises the subject.

I am also hyper villagent. I just see it as risk assessment for safe guarding my child. I'm aware most of the time these people are likely not but you have to consider that they could be and protect and educate them.

I don’t have a “fear” of people being peadophiles as such, but I am wary of who I leave my children with and I would be a lot less likely to leave them with a man. Eg I have a male friend and a male family member who have offered to help with small bit of childcare if I ever need it, but I haven’t ever and wouldn’t take them up on it. Where as I would with a female friend etc.

As a woman I feel safer with other women than with men, so I guess it’s similar to that.

To be honest I work in a field in which I have encountered pedophilies especially those who look at child SA on the dark web etc and it's very scary how normal these men appear in day to day life and how many of them there are. The everyday person is probably not aware of this but I personally will not be allowing my children to attend sleepovers or be looked after by anyone (man or woman) that I do not know well/am related to. You're not paranoid but you can make conscious decisions to ensure your DD is safe while still allowing her to participate in activities.

Your posts on this thread are hard to fathom.

Why would a significant number of men lie in a study about something that is considered heinous in society out of "bravado"? Or out of a naughty urge to skew the results as you seem to suggest in a following post.

Most people lie about shameful things they do when questioned in studies, not make up lies about shameful things they don't do or wouldn't do.

The fact they answered yes to the question, if they wouldn't be caught, suggests to most normal minds that they have a desire to explore the sexual abuse of children, and given today's world may have explored this desire already by viewing images - which are created by the sexual abuse of actual children.

Your arguments about why this study's figures are to be discounted are specious and show a desire to deny and downplay how depraved a significant portion of men have become in this pornographied world.

But lots of men are sexually attracted to children, especially teenagers. It is not uncommon.

This.

I was groomed by a pedo right in front of my Dad. He was about 15 feet away and couldn't hear what was being said to me.

I don't think you can be too vigilant.

Children are abused in front of their parents.