Ban men from working in nursery settings

[Aliceisagooddog]

After yet another paedophile has been found guilty of awful crimes whilst working at a nursery, surely we need to rethink this. The risks are just too great.

Women don’t commit the vast majority of sex crime, though, so you are comparing apples and pears.

This pretence that men and women are exactly the same is really unhelpful to women, and women don’t do themselves any favours by pretending it’s so or turning a blind eye to the truth of the matter.

Please read my post a few above yours on this page - the Julie Bindel piece.

Have you been to a mainstream reception class recently? In DD2's school, out of a cohort of 60, 7 are non verbal and 9 are still in nappies.

I don't think people are defending men, they are trying to put risk in proportion. People have car accidents but no one says 'don't travel by car'. As a PP stated, stepfathers are the single biggest risk group, I don't see any calls for them to be banned from living with stepdaughters?

So why aren't you advocating to ban stepfathers given that they are more dangerous to children than male nursery workers?

Male role models are incredibly important.
It's not just men that commit hideous crimes either. In the city I live, a peadophile ring was being headed up by a woman.

I’m not pretending they are the same.

What I’m saying is this is a knee jerk reaction, it’s wrong and sexist. People are all different and to suggest that ALL men are a danger to children is also wrong. You’re using a sledgehammer to crack a nut here.

It’s not a knee jerk reaction, and it’s not sexist to say that men are a danger to children in a way that women are not. Please read the article. Policies are not created at an individual level.

Why do you think we have single sex spaces? Single sex spaces treat all men as potential rapists - is that knee jerk or sexist?

It is sexist and wrong. Many women are a danger to children. Other posters have pointed that out on here many times, yet people are persisting with this. It is a knee jerk reaction.

As I said, thankfully your view is in the minority.

But those people are wrong to suggest that women and men are equal dangers to children. That is a flat out lie.

It’s also interesting that you’ve suggested that we shouldn’t treat men and women as if they are the same, yet you’re treating men as if their all the same by advocating for them to banned from working nurseries.

We should all be able to have the choice not to have unrelated men involved in the intimate care of our children. Regardless of where it is.

I can't believe that it's even up for discussion tbh.

If you're happy with a guy having that kind of access to your child because he happens to have passed a dbs check then great, that's a choice you can make for your child, but it's absolutely not something that I would allow.

I mean what additional risk are you happy to take for your child? 1%? 5%? 10%?

You could say, ban male football coaches, vicars, scout leaders? It’s not the male in the nursery that’s the problem, it’s the person regardless of sex.

There was one in the paper today showing a paedophile who’d been charged for abuse in 2024 for lacing sweets with sedatives to abuse children while they were unconscious and he’d potentially been doing it for 25 years!

There have been females who have abused and even killed children at nurseries. There was one in the last few years who suffocated a baby on a bean bag!

Do you think it’s sexist and wrong to treat all men as potential rapists, as we do so when we have single sex toilets and changing rooms?

Why do we have women's refuges? After all, not all men are abusers so why treat them as such and keep them out of refuges? We should open the doors in case their feelings get hurt by having to stay out.

Well, quite.

If you weren't happy to take any additional risks with your child, you would never get in a car. Never leave them with a friend, send them on a playdate where a man would be present, leave with extended family member, or even potentially alone with their Dad. Let them go out with their mates as a teenager or walk home alone. People will go 'oh but I know him and I know he would never do that' - everyone thinks their Dad/brother/husband/partner/uncle would never do anything like that. Until they do.

Systemic safeguards are a much better option. My daughter was abused by a female childminder. Should female childminders should be banned?
I was abused by a male primary school teacher, should they be banned?
My friend was abused by a stepfather - should stepfathers be banned from living with partners children?

Where does it stop? We cannot eliminate all risk. But we can put in safeguards - for the above examples

• childminders should have to have cctv which parents can log into anytime and should receive regular unannounced visits by ofsted or similar

-teachers shouldn't be alone with a child with a closed door or in an area where no other teachers within shouting distance

• every parent should have to do a background check on partners before allowing them to move in with their children

As I said above.

We should all be able to have the choice not to have unrelated men involved in the intimate care of our children. Regardless of where it is.

Stepfathers are a choice, not one I'm willing to risk, I won't have a male carer for my disabled daughter, because that's not a risk I'm willing to take. I don't allow sleepovers where there is a Dad around because it's not a risk I'm willing to take.

There's something seriously wrong if you read a thread about a paedophile sexually assaulting potentially hundreds of children, and your main concern is for men's rights and not children's safety.

Do you think all single sex provisions are a bad idea?

What do you mean? Single sex schools girls schools with only female teachers and boys schools with only male teachers?

What is the OP going to do when her child starts reception? My child had a male reception teacher who was very good. That was 14 years ago to makes working with young kids is not a new thing. There are abusive woman as well, dies OP think we should ban all pre school staff?

Now you’re being deliberately obtuse. Why?

Please show me where I specifically mentioned mens rights? My point was around risk in general and that there needs to be safeguards in place which protect all children from all staff, both male and female. Males may place a higher risk, but females arent risk free (a female childminder endangered my daughter life) - a certain level of risk is accepted when we place our children in anyone's care.

And yes, anyone can have the choice to withdraw their child from any setting with male staff, no one has suggested they shouldn't. And parents can request a female member changing their child, this often happens in our secondary special school, especially when children reach puberty. But last week we had 30 out of nearly 100 staff off sick so there were instances where this wasn't possible, but we always have 2 staff members present and parents of children who had specific requests on file were given choice to come in to change their child themselves as an alternative. Funnily enough none did - which indicates that either it wasn't as essential as they said it was, or that we have built up trust with them since the time they made their request so they didn't feel the need to come in - I hope it was the 2nd option.

But the key word here is choice. Some people on here have suggested that male staff should be banned from nurseries/special schools. That is what I am against - 1 small group (judging by the poll) dictating for all.

Males “may” place a higher risk?

There’s no “may” about, they provably to. Considerably higher. Not remotely comparable.

So you sound like a men’s rights activist, choosing to minimise at best, ignore at worst, the risk men pose in certain settings.

I'm actually not, I'm genuinely unsure what you mean by a single sex setting?
A single sex setting would mean only people of one biological sex being present, both children and adults? Rather than make assumptions that I am being 'deliberately obtuse' you could explain what you mean in more depth.

Or is this a reference to the several threads on here around the decision by girlguiding to only accept children and adults who were female at birth and exclude transgender females - so maintaining a single sex setting?

No, I am an advocate for each parents right to chose what is best for their child, and for better safeguarding protections in general.

And whilst on topic, I am an advocate for biological males staying out of girlguiding, because it is specifically a girls only space, both children and adults. People can chose this or chose a mixed gender space. Its a choice for each child and family. Nurseries are not a girls only space. Most schools are not a girls only space. If someone wants a girl only space they can chose a female Nanny.

The rights of two groups of people are being discussed here.

You're not advocating for children's rights, so that leads to the obvious conclusion that you care more about men's rights.

There's no 'may' in men being more risk to children, that's an absolute fact, they are. There is plenty of evidence that paedophiles are more drawn to these roles.

I personally think men should be banned from any setting where they have intimate access to non verbal children. What happened at your school, where parents were put in a very difficult position, should never happen.

It won't happen, because we all know mens feelings come first in every situation though.