Are all fathers creepy?

[Alex122022]

My experience in a different thread (on swimming pool changing room etiquette) has been quite interesting: there seems to be a widely shared opinion that all men are creeps and there are never any innocent explanations for their behaviour.

While I completely agree that a father in a women's changing room - especially when there are older girls - is inappropriate, I can easily see how this could happen without any ulterior motive. Be it simply ignorance or lack of judgement.

I experienced the same on playgrounds: playing hide & seek with my daughter? Mothers approach my DW and tell her that "a perv" is watching the children. Playing with DD - well meaning mothers asking her whether she is ok or needs help.

AIBU to think this is a bit excessive?

We think OP is being unreasonable, that’s not the same as thinking all fathers are creeps. We just think OP is and are expressing disapproval of the thread.

Bollocks.

I think the upset was necessary. Your faux naivety and “surely you don’t mean ME?!?” entitlement is wild in today’s world. Nobody misunderstood you, my dude. We all understand better than you can ever possibly conceive.

"I'm not misogynistic, it just sounds like I am because you're not listening properly when I tell you how wrong you are about your own experiences."

lol

women are on high alert and will stick together, alert each other, question any male and their behaviour in the area

Hopefully the men will tell them where to go if they act as judge and jury regarding any man in their orbit! My late husband was harangued by a sanctimonious posse as he sat on a bench on the edge of a playground with his Kindle, he didn't raise his head or speak a word so obviously they got more and more hysterical, (I do know that word's derivation and use it deliberately). When I arrived with our granddaughter, having been to the loo and the ice cream shop, they didn't have the guts to even apologise. Not doubt the MNers will support the harridans!

I agree that learning social strategies helps. You do not, however, need to read women’s emotions to not harass them.

I notice that you don’t bother to engage with the part of the post that talks about what the real problem is and what you do need to do.

The question was

"AIBU to think this is a bit excessive?"

Harridans? Embarrassed for you.

Alex you weren't asking a genuine question. It would appear that you think you asked "How can I make mothers feel less uncomfortable around fathers out alone with their children", but what you said was "Are all Fathers creepy?".

Can't you see why people reacted as they did?

Start another thread and if people are then rude to you, you will be defended and posts will be removed.

I have never been as paranoid about men and children since I joined mn. I now have a 7yr old girl and think there are predators everywhere now. Never felt this threatemed when my boys were wee. I really hope I can let her enjoy her childhood without me thinking every man has nefarious intentions when interacting with her.

Sad times

What about the fathers?

This is a good place for you to learn. But to be part of the solution you need to go on male sites and (as a PP said) say ‘hey guys, we as a group are a massive problem, what are we going to do about it?’

Incidentally, the women who are wary of me don't know me - they are rather the people who believe that dads should stay in the pub and not play with their children (and then probably complain that they don't help).

Oh gosh, that’s some stretch Armstrong levels of reaching there.

Women who think men in women’s changing rooms are creepy = women who think men should stay in pubs and not play with children.

What planet are you even on ?

I can’t work out if you’re simply being entirely disingenuous or are that completely basic and ignorant.

Not all men are creeps but your brushing it away - saying that you don’t think a man in the women’s changing rooms is creepy, maybe he’s there by mistake etc is why women have their backs up. This kind of behaviour gets dismissed because men act as if the worst thing you can be is called a creep rather than the impact on women.

It wasn’t particularly nice that someone thought you were a creep just playing with your child.

OP to many men are creepy. It's up to men to change. It's not woman's job to change men

What??? This person is masquerading as a woman??

I thought they were openly posting as a man!! (haven’t rtft)

Oh, I’m dead 🤣

Predators are fathers, brothers, husbands, sons.

Not many people in their family actually know they are.

Look at serial killers like Ted Bundy etc - people often think they were charismatic, wonderful people. Even their own wives didn’t know.

Having frequently laughed at the standard of statistics on MN and the understanding of the same, no ignorance surprises me. Saying 'a minority' will be confusing to many, even though you're 100% correct!

Gisele Pelicot and Joanne Young may not have thought their husbands were predators until they discovered that their husbands had been drugging and raping them as well as inviting other men to rape them.

So half of respondents don't think it's excessive to consider that all fathers are creepy.

The vote is immaterial..It's the way OP framed the thread. He's a goady troll.

The problem is, @Alex122022 , that women are tired of explaining to men how they can do better. We have been doing it since about 1971 and some of you have got it, but most of you haven’t, and some of the ones who understand our anger still won’t use their privilege to call out their brethren’s bad behaviour.

If you have to ask ‘why can’t I take my daughter into the women’s toilets?’ you haven’t got it. You need to ask yourself why you would feel the need to do that. Why wouldn’t you take her into the men’s? If you’re questioned because you’re hiding behind trees in the park, ask yourself why it doesn’t look innocuous to bystanders. And if your response is anger- you haven’t got it.

Ask yourself why women (and men too!) prefer the bear. Then apply that to every situation.

Even the innocuous interactions. Even the work meetings. Examine your own behaviour: interrogate your own assumptions about the woman you’re talking to. Ask yourself if you are seeing a woman or a person. Ask yourself, would I say this to or ask this of a man? Ask yourself, am I dismissing what she’s said because of her tone? Am I dismissing what she’s said because acknowledging its validity means I have some difficult questions to answer?

Men are the dominant sex. Society is set up to benefit men, with girls socialised from before birth into ‘being kind’ and boys socialised to do whatever the hell they want without stopping to think about how their behaviour impacts on other people. That’s exactly why on MN we see so many threads about men’s lives not really changing when they become fathers, why women so often end up as secretaries and executive assistants for men, sorting out their diaries, meal plans, presents for their relatives, making their lives easier. We never see the opposite. Even where men step up to the domestic workload, they often still take the position of worker rather than manager, so the mental load still falls to the woman. Why is that? (Who manages the mental load in gay relationships? Or for single men? I’m going to go ahead and make the assumption that men can do it, but they choose not to or choose to let that burden fall onto someone else if they can get away with it.)

I doubt if you will read this. But if you’re pissed off at the responses on here- again, I would say, you haven’t got it. You don’t get to be pissed off and justified when women have thousands of years worth of anger. You’re just fucking fortunate we’re not as violent as men are when we’re angry.

Thank you - I did not want to engage again as I don't think it is helpful, but you have taken the effort to write a helpful answer and I would like to thank you.

I think having grown up in a male-only household has made me perhaps a bit more sensitive to criticism, as there was constant suspicion that it was impossible for my father to raise a child. It also means that I don't really understand why people make a fuss about men being fathers - I sincerely dislike the fact that there are double standards in how society reacts (and yes, I do call this out).

I have tried to extract as much information from the thread as I can - I probably underestimated how deep suspicions (if this is the correct word?) are.

@Holdinguphalfthesky they do get it though - they just don’t care. If I went into the gents with DS and stood by the urinals, how many men would happily whip their penis out in front of me and pee? Not many, they’d feel uncomfortable and want me to fuck off out of there so they could pee in peace. They just don’t care that women feel the same in changing rooms, because it inconveniences them.