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?

Yeah, and we've heard them all.
'Oops, sorry, didn't realise my zip was down/this was ladies only/I was only joking/where's your sense of humour/Jeez, you can't say anything these days/fucking bitches.
Recently I was in a pub and went to go to the loo which was down a short corridor and as I got to the door i saw a man just ahead of me about to go into the Ladies.(Bog standard middle aged bloke) and I just said 'this is the Ladies.'
Well, if looks could kill I'd be six feet under now. He actually scowled and muttered something very like the fucking bitch comment above. The door to the gents was facing him and was unmistakeable.
In hindsight I think he was furious at being thwarted, I can't think of any other reasonn for his nasty behaviour. And no,he was not in the least embarassed, just angry. It has given me pause for thought.

Probably another case of the 80;20 rule. 80% of fathers/men will be perfectly fine, respectful and not potential perverts. 20% may be. But it's the 20% that we all notice because they stand out, either by doing "dodgy" things, saying "dodgy" things, or just the way the act. The 80% majority will be entirely harmless and won't be acting strangely so won't be noticed.

Thanks @Alex122022 for saying that.

Sometimes my husband looks sideways at me when I talk about this stuff- but most men still don’t see women as people in the way they see men as people, with hopes, dreams, individuality, and concerns. And all it takes to reinforce that impression is a single conversation where I have to speak to a man about the impact his behaviour is having on people around him (let’s say, playing music loudly enough to intrude into neighbours’ homes). I can go round and be smiley and apologetic and terribly terribly sorry, and I get anger or hostility, like “well it’s not that loud, it can’t possibly be heard where you are saying it can, and it’s a Friday, and for fucks sake”. My husband can go round and be absolutely blunt, and gets a “oh sorry mate, I didn’t realise, didn’t mean to upset you, let me turn it down right now”.

So yeah, I tend now to give much less benefit of any doubt. I hope you might start to understand where we’re all coming from. It’s less personal to you and more general to men as a sex, but the change can only come from you. Men don’t get it when we say it.

The same way she would if she was shopping alone FFS.

Oh do fuck off with your minimising bullshit.

As women, we deal with these things on a DAILY BASIS.

Men having the odd inappropriate thing happen to them once in a blue moon is not the same.

Oh dear. Not covering yourself in glory there mate - OR winning your feeble argument. You're embarrassing yourself. Know when to quit!

Stop doubling down, admit you're wrong, and apologise to all the women on here you are offending and upsetting and insulting, and you may JUST manage to leave the thread with a tiny shred of self respect.

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This. ^

And the vast majority of 'dads' don't want to be anywhere near their daughters undressing/being half naked in a changing room!

As I said earlier, my DH wouldn't come anywhere near the female changing room(s) when our DD was in there. Not even when she was little.

He didn't feel comfortable at all, and knew that other girls and women would be a bit and a bit if he was sitting/standing 2-4 feet away from them, hidden only by a flimsy curtain.

Only a wrongun has your point of view OP.

my father was not ....he used to have young women on night trains < a very typical way to travel in another country > come and sit near him....he looked strong, moral and fatherly

There should absolutely be suitable changing facilities for your DS where you can assist him, but girls and women are entitled not to have him in their changing rooms. It's not about him being a threat (I'm sure he's not), it's about girls and women being allowed to get changed in a space that is free of boys and men.

Not all men but you can’t really take the risk. It’s like how in the street if you see an urban type with a balaclava on you’re going to put your phone in your pocket but there’s no guarantee they are a phone thief it’s just staying safe and street wise

You want to learn and understand? Ok.

Women are perved on and creeped at by men from our very early teens at least, and for some even earlier.

What makes us uncomfortable is knowing, from our own experiences, just how depressingly boringly everyday it is to encounter men like that. They aren't a rare breed of man, they are very much a common or garden breed of man. Not all men, but certainly enough that women factor them into our day to day decisions and behaviour.

So, I'm sorry, but it's not about you being a great guy and how can you make us understand that, it's about us not wanting to have to waste our mental energy and emotional energy assessing each and every men to avoid pervs while not accidently making nice men feel bad about themselves.

Bascially, if you stop considering that the impact on men's feelings is the most important measure of what is reasonable for women rather than the impact of some men on women, it will make a lot more sense.

Actually I’m fine with a “no women in the male changing rooms or toilets” rule as well. No issue at all with that. Equality for both sexes.

And strangely enough I have never met a woman keen to barge into the gents and set up camp, it only ever seems to be men keen to shove their way in where they clearly aren’t wanted.

Oh you sweet summer child.

Like all women, it is the behaviour of men that will lead her, over time, to come to suspect the motives of all men.

If you truly want a better world for your daughter, fix the men.

Why don't you ask some older fathers of daughters how they managed?

Why on earth do you expect that women should be "disinterested" in a discussion about how male entitlement encrouches upon us?

We are very much interested parties when it comes to how far our boundaries should be allowed to extend against men by default, thank you.

What a relief!!! I opened this thread at teatime and had to leave it to make the tea and fume, but I'm delighted to see that the OP has had his arse handed to him. Fucking Creep.

Not all snakes are poisonous but do you want to go around trusting all snakes?

I think you are quite mistaken. What OP has learned is that the majority of women are quite understanding - but that there is a vocal minority that has rather bizarre ideas and would prefer fathers to stay out of the life of their daughters as much as possible.

Two statements really surprised me - that it is considered completely acceptable that fathers would never want to be seen near a playground or clothes shopping with their daughters. Seriously?

🍪

Own up, who put 50p in the meter and started it up again.

And again, the focus here is on the thoughts of women, not why women think and feel this way. We think and feel this way because of the behaviour of men. We all have been subjected to the behaviour of creepy men. For most of us, it started well before our teens.

Please stop focussing on women, and instead focus on changing men.

I am sorry I am confused: when women think it is perfectly acceptable - even laudable - for fathers not to want to go to the playground or go clothes shopping with their daughters, how does this improve the behaviour of men?

Fathers should be as involved in raising their children as mothers. This can cause some problems - and they can be addressed (as has been pointed out here quite frequently - albeit not as vocally as some other opinion).

I'm sorry - I really don't see why fathers should be treated differently.

9 Men always know the “real reasons” for everything women do and say.