To think male nursery workers should be banned for safety reasons?

[Carla786]

I KNOW most men who work in them are fine but sexual abuse in nurseries is overwhelmingly committed by men. No more men, much less abuse risk.
Yes we need more CCTV etc to watch bad women but it cuts SA risk immeasurably.

We can still have male primary teachers etc kids are old enough to speak up then.

And yes, you can ban on the basis of sex for safety reasons. In women's refuges, eg.

My DC have a male babysitter. He is actually a nursery worker, used to be my DC's keyworker.

No issues at all.

I don’t believe safeguarding was followed here - can’t believe he didn’t have a record

No, horrible idea and a slippery slope, reinforcing that caring professions are just for women and removing male role models. Better safeguarding is what’s needed. My son is in nursery and I wish they had some male carers.

Yes. SEN children or even just any occasional accidents when they have just started Reception at 4.

I would never leave anyone I didn’t know on a complete 1-1 basis with a child because of the safeguarding risks.

Personally I only had a very small pool of people who I let look after DS who I was a sure as possible where safe (male and female)

I think the idea that the risk to children dramatically decreases as soon as a child is verbal is simplistic and naive. Many children, teenagers and in fact adults don’t report sexual abuse for all sorts of reasons. Around a third don’t tell anyone, probably higher at primary school age.

Teenagers are at far higher risk of sexual abuse than younger children. The NSPCC says over 10x higher risk. So there would be more logic to banning men from working with teenagers than young children.

I don’t think we should ban men from working with children at all but banning them from early years settings would almost certainly open up a debate about primary schools/ coaching / care for older children etc. And why would a man train as a primary school teacher just after men had been banned from working with children just a few months younger. It would absolutely cast doubt on the intentions of any man choosing to work with children.

And I really wouldn’t want my sons to grow up in a society which considers them so dangerous that they can’t have contact with young children. I think that’s likely to cause far more problems than a ban on men working with children would solve.

Yes. The point I was making is that elderly men who require personal care very often prefer to be cared for by women carers.

What the actual fuck are you chatting about 🤦‍♀️

You reap what you sow ..
We are having this discussion because men need to do better
It's not all men
But it's nearly always a man
They won't be banned from nurseries though
Their right to be employed with no restrictions
Is more important than a child not being sexually abused

TRIGGER WARNING

Look at this article :

Quotes : Every day on average, at least three cases of sexual and physical misconduct are reported in Australian childcare centres.
.
Michael Salter, a professor of criminology at the University of New South Wales, said many cases of sexual abuse in child care only came to light when offenders uploaded evidence of their crimes online, not because centres detected or reported the abuse.

Professor Salter said the sharing of this disturbing material had been facilitated by the so-called dark web, enabled by anonymising browser software such as Tor, and encrypted messaging services such as Telegram, Signal and WhatsApp. "There's about 45,000 child sexual abuse websites just on the Tor platform alone."It's estimated that the population of child sex offenders on the dark web numbers in its millions —

Centre for Child Protection, the creator of Arachnid — a system that hunts child abuse material across the web, including the dark web. Most of the material is too explicit to show, but the discussions reveal how organised and deviant they really are.

One of these guides instructs predators applying for work at childcare centres on how to answer job interview questions about why they want to work with children.
"First of all, I love children. And since I don't have any of my own yet, I really feel like I'm missing out on something very important in life, that is being a father and having the role of taking care of and giving safety to children. I would really like to have this opportunity since I look at this profession and role as a gift," the guide suggests as an answer.

"One really good news for us paedophiles is that most daycare centers, or any similar institutions, look at men as a positive thing. This is because they want the children to have male role models — this is actually a very important subject in children pedagogy today," the handbook says.

Elsewhere, a forum user posts a step-by-step guide to abusing children.

1. work or volunteer… at a daycare and gain the trust of adults and kiddies.
2. Bring toys to train target… make sure you aren't in view of any cameras unless it's your own then film away …
3. massage target to relax them…

One post from August this year reads: "My wife owns the daycare, and yes, she's a pedo, so I have access to babies.I like kissing the little ones"

Another user posted in December last year: "There is a secret room where I can play with them. If anyone wants to know more, I'll tell you in private."

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-10-28/paedophiles-share-childcare-abuse-tips-on-dark-web/105938932

I agree, quality care costs money.

Why do you find it unbelievable that many elderly men are sexually abused by male carers?

Not this topic again.
pushing women back into low status, back breaking caring roles because

• think of the children and
• dirty old men love a sponge bath from young women

instead of having better safeguards in place

It isn't just about their right to be employed, it's about everyone's right to be employed without restrictions based on their sex.

Gender discrimination laws would have to be changed or at least adjusted somehow and it would open a discussion about other roles too which would highly unlikely be limited to restricting men only.

I see what you mean but the fact remains nursery workers provide intimate care which creates unique opportunities.

'And I really wouldn’t want my sons to grow up in a society which considers them so dangerous that they can’t have contact with young children. I think that’s likely to cause far more problems than a ban on men working with children would solve.'

Women's safety and kids' safety is more important than men & boys' feelings.

They should not feel hurt! I don't want that.

Most men are NOT bad. The problem is that the ones volunteering for nursery work are much more likely to be.

But when you know that your dad, brother, uncle etc are decent people, and are pretty sure that your DH’s relatives are as well, then the threat does not lie within the family.

Time to pay women more. They are leaving in droves and then unemployable men are being pushed in childcare.

What a reductive reply.

The whole point is care work should not be low status or breaking anyone's back. All carers need better pay, conditions, training and respect.

Yes!

Men are already restricted from working in female DV & rape crisis centres, for one.

And why do you assume old men would only want a female carer because they're creepy?

Women's safety and kids' safety is more important than men & boys' feelings

Lovely sentiment for those of us that have sons.

I dont care about a guardian article. I believe you are being very very unreasonable.

Don't you think those who have had relatives who have SA their children thought that they knew their dad, brother or uncle was a decent person?

I have no idea what the actual statistics are but men make up a tiny proportion of early years workers and yet we’ve seen a significant number of horrific cases recently involving men who working in nurseries.

Of course women also offend, and I’m not dismissing that, but I can’t think of that many high profile incidents in the last 6-12 months, and they make up the majority of the early years workforce.

So I really don’t think it’s a reassuring answer to bleat about ‘women offending too!’

I’m not sure if I’m in favour of banning men from nurseries, but I don’t think nurseries should be so desperate to hire them just for wokery.