AIBU - Men should not be allowed to adopt or foster children unless they're with a woman. Safeguarding first.

[RedQuail4]

I know this will get the "bigot" and "not all men" brigade out in force, but can we please talk about actual child protection instead of feelings and equality checkboxes?

Children in care are already some of the most vulnerable kids in the country. They've often been abused, neglected, or come from chaotic backgrounds. The state has a duty to place them in the safest possible environment, not to use them as a social experiment for adult rights or to prove how progressive we are.

Look at the data on who harms children. The vast majority of serious physical and sexual abuse is committed by males. Single male households show higher risks in the statistics for child abuse, domestic violence exposure, and poorer outcomes in some studies. Women aren't perfect (far from it), but the biological and statistical reality is that men pose a higher risk, especially without a female partner in the home. A woman in the household often acts as a natural safeguard - someone who is more likely to notice, intervene, or report concerning behaviour.

We've seen too many tragic cases where single men (or gay men with access to children without proper oversight) have gone on to abuse fostered or adopted kids. Social services and adoption agencies are under huge pressure to find placements, so corners get cut and "inclusive" policies mean they bend over backwards to approve single men. The child's safety should trump everything.

Why are we gambling with kids who already lost the lottery once?

Adoption and fostering aren't a right for adults. They're not about giving men a purpose or validating lifestyles. They're about finding the most suitable, lowest-risk home for damaged children. A stable married couple (or at least a man with a woman in the home) should be the gold standard. Single women? Fine, the evidence supports they generally manage better. Single men? A male couple? No. The risk profile is different.

If a man wants to parent, he can find a wife first. Harsh? Maybe. But we're talking about other people's traumatised children, not virtue-signalling or men's feelings. Safeguarding isn't prejudice - it's pattern recognition.

This isn't about hating men. It's about not ignoring sex-based patterns in crime and abuse data when placing vulnerable kids. Same reason we don't put male staff in every girls' changing room. Thoughts? Am I being unreasonable?

It’s actually not true. Statistically, an unrelated male is not the biggest threat to a child. The vast majority of child abuse and maltreatment cases are at the hands of the child's own biological parents, with mothers being the most frequent abusers as primary caregivers. The caveat is that that the presence of an unrelated male in the home - mother's boyfriend, step parent etc, poses a disproportionately higher risk factor for serious physical harm or fatalities

Yeah plus if we want to go down the being a victim of sexual abuse explanation route, Fred West was also a SA victim as a child. By his own mother actually. But just as with Rose, none of that excuses anything. Both Fred and Rose were evil sadists.

Just because female abusers don’t hit the headlines doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Statistically child abuse is far more likely to be down to the mother as the primary caregiver.

Then how do you explain that in this case her instincts were correct ?

Which, when you look at their other failures, means absolutely nothing.

It is true that the risk of harm to a child increases when an unrelated male is living in the home

“Fatality Rates: Studies show that young children living with unrelated adults are nearly 50 times as likely to die from inflicted injuries, and children with an unrelated male in the home are 27 times more likely to die from maltreatment.“

Totally agree.It’s actually a fact that a bio mother is far more likely to be responsible for the abuse of their child than anyone else - they have the opportunity because they are the caregivers. We’re concentrating on sexual abuse here and forgetting that there are many other forms of abuse. Misandry on MN gets in the way of acknowledging that.

Which is what I said. The presence of an unrelated male represents an increased risk of abuse. But it’s not as great as the risk of abuse from the childs’ own biological parents. The biggest risk is mothers - they are caregivers. And if there is an unrelated male in the home who represents a risk to the child then as far as I’m concerned that’s squarely on the shoulders of the mother for putting a dick before her own child’s safety.

Yes I do and as cases over the years have proven, have done so. I doubt it had anything to do with being scared of being called homophobic to be honest, more like, stretched services miss things which leads to a tragedy.

I have a horrible feeling that this is not the last we’ll hear of this. I simply don’t believe that these two monsters weren’t paedophiles who went under the radar. They abused this little baby, physically, mentally and sexually, anally raped him and eventually took his life. They also took photographs of the abuse. Those urges don’t unfold overnight. They were there all along. Someone somewhere has fucked up - probably a mix of every safeguarding service involved. At some point this will surface again after investigation and the usual ‘everything is being done to ensure this doesn’t happen again’ will be trotted out. Only it doesn’t. Because it keeps on happening.

The same tragedy that resulted in an old lady being raped to death in an NHS ward because the health service allowed a ‘trans’ person onto a female ward ?

No you don’t.

You don’t trust them to carry out their safeguarding role robustly. If you did you would have no qualms about any staff members that they employ.

They don’t and never have employed a male. I’m happy and in agreement with that.
I chose them specifically for that.

May I ask what makes you so angry about me choosing to not allow males (outside my husband and perhaps two other close relatives) to access my pre school children without my supervision?

Hahaha - have you ever been to Pride?!
Me, my wife, and our little boy attended Pride recently and we joined the march alongside the adoption charity that made us a family. Seeing the views here (and on another thread) just proves that Pride is still very important, and very much needed. Because of knobhead opinions like this. 😂

I just heard a bit on the news that this vile man was into really hard core porn. End adoption to an all male household must be the way forward Imho.

Could you explain your logic there? Because straight men can also be in to really hardcore porn. So if one man is into that vile stuff, what impact does the gender of their partner have on anything?

Thats my opinion. I was against adoption to an all male household before this terrible case. A small baby needs a mother figure. Twovmales or one male is not a mother figure. The need of a child are being placed second to some sort of weird ideology.

Is it ideology or are there just not enough women adopters available?

If a medical professional has missed horrific signs of child abuse, what has that got to do with homo/hetero relationships? The doctors were also complicit in failing Baby Preston. I very much doubt that they could have thought the child was being abused, but decided against reporting it on the basis of political correctness. That's such a ridiculous statement.

I’m not angry at all.

Part of my professional life is safeguarding children, including in education, checking systems, procedures and policy.

If systems work to safeguard children, they do so regardless of whether staff members are male or female. The system does not differentiate.

If you can’t trust leaders of the nursery you use, to operate a system robustly to protect your child against male staff members, then you can’t trust them enough to protect your child against female staff members either.

In some ways not employing male staff is an easy out (and illegal). I wonder if they take other ‘easy options’. I would certainly be checking robustly in my role.

Pretty sure some of Fred Wests victims were adopted by them….just say you’re homophobic. It’s easier than this bs.

Actually ONS puts the gender split of neglect, emotional and physical abuse as largely even between men and women!

“If you can’t trust leaders of the nursery you use, to operate a system robustly to protect your child against male staff members, then you can’t trust them enough to protect your child against female staff members either.”

I do trust them.

They make it easy to trust them because they are so robust in their systems in protecting against male staff members that they don’t even have any.

☺️

This is the first case of parents killing their child i can remember where the mother was not found guilty too.

Are the numbers of children raised in households with mothers vs. Households with fathers taken into consideration with these statistics?