Young dependent male children in women's only spaces?

[PrincessTeacake]

Long term lurker here, very infrequent contributer.

Circumstances over the last year have meant I spent most of my very little free time on Tumblr, for convenience's sake, and I fell into the radfem circles there. Every now and then there's a rift in the community over something and it all gets a bit childish because they are mostly young and quite reactionary. I stay out of it for the most part, but I wanted to get some (more sensible) opinions here on the latest rift.

Someone brought up the topic of little boys in women's only spaces (bathrooms, changing rooms, emergency shelters) and there was a lot of talk about how boys can't be trusted under any circumstances, that it was equally as bad as letting intact transwomen in, and naturally some of the mothers in the community got quite upset. There was a lot of anti-child rhetoric being thrown around and some harassment of the mothers.

What's the consensus here? I'm asking mostly for one of my online friends, she was very upset by this discussion and was on the receiving end of quite a bit of the bullying.

"I don't have statistics, which seems to be what you are after. I know from working with sex offenders that there is a definite risk in the scenarios that people on this thread are telling mothers to place their male children in. You can choose to believe me or not, that's up to you."

Of course I believe you perceive a risk. I'm just trying to find out whether it's an actual risk that we need to take action about or not. When you say you know there's a definite risk, do you know of cases where an 8 year old boy has been sexually assaulted in the changing room of a swimming pool? Where it actually happened?

The risk of being assaulted in the men's changing room may be small, but it's a lot higher than the risk of it happening in the women's changing room.

Some people don't like cats seeing them in the nude...

Still, it says a lot that I feel uncomfortable about this. He is fine, more than capable, it's just he won't see that he is vulnerable. Why should he?

That is capable of being read in two ways. I think I'm with Bertrand on this. There will be other men, boys and fathers in changing rooms, are they just going to ignore anything which happens?

On the question of refuges, I Googled it and Scotland seems to have a cut off of 16 but England can be as low as 13.

www.gov.scot/Publications/2003/10/18296/27382

In the course of googling I found this very recent article by Erin Pizzey. She seems to have lost touch with reality even more. She does have a point about the need to break cycles of violence where it has endured for generations and is seen as normal (baby Peter 's family for example) and refusing to allow a 13 year old , even if accompanied by his mother, access to a refuge is questionable behaviour. The rest of her article however....
whiteribbon.org/mega-featured/how-feminism-succeeded-in-destroying-family-relationships/

"
The risk of being assaulted in the men's changing room may be small, but it's a lot higher than the risk of it happening in the women's changing room."

Really? I think it's about the same, actually. About zero.

"Why should I have to send him on his own if I'm not comfortable with that? "

Why should 9 year old girls have to share a changing room with him if they aren't comfortable with that?

But its hard for some to project their rape and abuse and patriarchy dominance/victimisation internal narrative onto a cat because it was never part of the generation culture or creating the economic and social structure they are afraid of...oh..wait..

"The risk of being assaulted in the men's changing room may be small, but it's a lot higher than the risk of it happening in the women's changing room."

Is it any higher than it happening around the house of a cousin or family friend? Or at a sports or other club activity?

Or, statistically speaking, is it a heck of a lot lower?

It is clear that more sexual assaults are carried out by men than women. Therefore it is more likely that you would be assaulted in a "men's" space than a "women's" one.

Hopefully you are right to think that very few assaults are carried out. Zero seems incredibly optimistic however. And the figures are affected by all the mothers who take young sons into their changing rooms anyway, and all the places (all the pools where I live for example) were it's unisex anyway.

"About zero" is exactly the probability is winning something substantial in the lottery, and yet some people win every time.

If everybody has all of their vague uncomfortableness pandered to, we will just have a more isolated, jumpy and paranoid society..

probability is of winning

" I don't feel comfortable sending Ds1 alone to get changed. I have never been in there."

Surely it'll be roughly like the women's - some cubicles and some open areas, by your description? You could always ask a staff member what the layout is.

And as he gets older, you'll still never have been in there. When are you comfortable he can go in alone?

"If everybody has all of their vague uncomfortableness pandered to, we will just have a more isolated, jumpy and paranoid society.."

Since both sides are discussing discomfirt, not sure of your point here.

My son has autism and I brought him into the swimming pool changing rooms with me until he was 8 years old, although we both changed in a family cubicle. We got a few dirty looks even then, but what could I do? Does 'womens only space' trump 'being inclusive to disabled children'? I'm a feminist, btw

After that age, though, I did have to train him up to use the men's changing rooms safely. I would probably have left it later to do that if it was based on my own feelings, but he is very tall for his age and we just got fed up with the looks and comments.

we're talking about pre-pubescent children. the idea they can't get changed in the same room with adults present is tragic.

Cote, the odds of a person winning the lottery each week are calculable and, depending on numbers of tickets sold etc, are almost certainly above 50 %. I don't get your analogy?

do you know of cases where an 8 year old boy has been sexually assaulted in the changing room of a swimming pool?

No. I won't, and can't, go into specific details of cases, who the victims were and what age they were. I know how sex offenders' minds work because I have interviewed them, worked with them and read pages and pages of CPS evidence about what they have done. They will take opportunities where they find them, and an unaccompanied child, naked in a changing room, is an opportunity.

What's your cut off age, then, honey? Given a few girls start their periods at 8 or 9 and many are in bras by 10?

"we're talking about pre-pubescent children. the idea they can't get changed in the same room with adults present is tragic."

Not all 9 year old girls are pre pubescent.

And not a bloody tragic as the paranoid assumption that a 9 year old boy is at risk of sexual assault in the changing room of a swimming pool.........

So dispise all your extensive specialist knowledge, even you have never come across a case of a boy being sexually assaulted in a swimming pool changing room. Thank you- that's what I was asking.

*"The risk of being assaulted in the men's changing room may be small, but it's a lot higher than the risk of it happening in the women's changing room."

Really? I think it's about the same, actually. About zero.*

You're incredibly naive.

*Bertrand" having worked within child protection for many, many years I can tell you that I have heard just too many stories about young children being exposed to risk when entering male only facilities (particularly toilets but not exclusively).

That's why my ds will continue to use female toilets until he is old enough for me and dh to have certain conversations with him about risk and personal safety. It also why my dh chooses to use family changing cubicles when swimming with our dd aged 5.

I do not have statistics at my fingertips. Maybe I am.risk adverse because of what I've heard from survivors over the years.

incidentally my 8yo son doesn't want to look at the naked body of you or your daughter. he is a normal 8yo who is likely to be disgusted by the idea. things is he'd be disgusted by the idea of seeing naked men walking around too and having to cope with that alone in a strange place full of strangers would be totally too much for him even aside from arguments about risk.

maybe other children are different, maybe children who have fathers are different, who knows. i only have the one child to go by and he has never lived with a man. he is not disabled in any way he is just a unique individual and they mature at different rates, are able to cope with emotional or physical or organisational skills/scenarios at different rates etc.

this idea that you can say at 8 years old a child can and SHOULD do x, y and z is totally opposite to what people would normally say where we all remind each other children are individual and do things in their own time.

it's this 'as soon as they're 8 they should be out in the cold and tough shit if they can't cope with it' attitude that stuns me. oh and if they're not then stay home till they are.

Elizabeth is it likely that the child and the predator are the only ones in the changing room at that point? And the predator knows a parent will be knocking on the door or sending in a staff member soon, or that another man could come in!