So angry

[wonderstuff]

A boy at my daughter's school has assaulted and made serious threats of sexual assault toward some girls. They are year 8. Dd not directly affected, but I feel I need to talk to her about boundaries and consent and what complete pricks boys can be.
I'm just so angry that we're still here, that boys persist in making school unsafe for girls. Not just school, everywhere. It's going to be this way forever isn't it.
Dd has some lovely male friends, who have called out other boys being rude to her. I have brought her up to believe she can do anything and she does, but there are going to be dicks out there. How do I arm her for that?

Those first two comments. What is wrong with you? Fussing about boys' reputation when girls are being raped ffs.

OP I am so sorry to hear this. I think the only action is to go to the school and raise merry hell.

Its like one of the local schools here. The inspectors were shocked to see girls being sexually attacked while they and the teacher were in the classroom and nothing was done about it.

What Nommo was it mentioned in their report? Can you divulge the school ?

I always thought it was worth making your children cynical about some males.

You need to be able to show your children rubbish sexist and dangerous behaviour - you need to be able to speak about it and let them know it happens.

Your child needs to never feel uncomfortable about challenging sexism.

Yes, I certainly let my daughters know just how predatory boys and men can be. My job now is to protect them and also equip them so that they can one day protect themselves and if people don't like it I can't care less.

Stop with the NABALT brainwashing. It doesn't have to be all boys harassing and assaulting girls for a culture to arise where the majority of girls feel deeply unsafe and are potentially put at risk.

If the culture of the school was as it should be, these individual boys would know there would be absolutely zero tolerance from peers and staff and would not feel confident to cross such firm boundaries.

As with all forms of violence and bullying, it only takes one perpetrator, but you will always find a culture of silence and complicity if you scratch the surface.

OP I'm fuming for you, your dd and the girls directly affected.

It sounds as if a nasty subculture has sprung up among some of the boys. I'm glad it seems to be being firmly dealt with. What a disturbing and frightening thought for all the girls that there is a hit-list circulating for who is going to be assaulted!

I would be suggesting to those boys' parents that the have only a "brick" phone for calling or texting home and be denied internet access, but would the parents do it? At least in school, when they come back from exclusion, they should have to hand in their phones every morning.

I would make sure my daughter's phone could not receive still or moving images sent by another student, too. I'd get her a number change at the very least and have her be exceedingly careful who she shares it with. You can try to shield her from the worst of it.

Sadly, in the Warwick Uni case, the targeted young women thought those young men were their trusted friends.

The fact that most of the boys she knows are decent, trustworthy human beings with sound instincts and good hearts cannot compensate for the damage done by a minority, however small, if they are allowed to organise and rampage. I fear they may have received their education via brutal, degrading porn and their attitudes to girls and women from who knows what cesspits.

@GCAcademic

How depressing that the first two responses to OP immediately jump to NAMALT.

Quite. And on the feminist forum too.

Have the police been contacted?

That stats are shockingly appalling.

It should be girls only schools and schools for boys.

@ChaChaCha2012

A minority of boys are like this. Be careful not to make your daughter as cynical as you, it's not healthy.

A minority of people burgle houses. Does that make me cynical if I moan about having to install security measures? Or does it make me a realist.

Fixed term exclusions? Surely targeting girls on a list as potential victims should result in permanent exclusion? How are those girls supposed to get a fair chance at an education with the boys who have planned that still in the building?

I am depressed that that counts as taking it seriously- goodness knows what life is like in the schools that don’t take these things seriously!

I don’t know which school it was. It was in the local paper after the inspection but thankfully far enough away dd doesn’t ever have to go there. I think it got de-academied or something as a result. Hopefully its getting turned around.

@ChaChaCha2012

A minority of boys are like this. Be careful not to make your daughter as cynical as you, it's not healthy.

What isn't healthy is boys behaving like this and mothers being told they are unhealthy for being concerned, especially when the mother in question doesn't sound cynical, she sounds like a woman who wishes to protect her daughter.

First week at my daughters school she heard a group of boys saying they "rape people for a living."
Two boys in her class brought in violent degrading hentai porn mages and cartoons on their phones.
She's 12.
How long can it carry on?
Schools are impotent in the face of the internet.

It might be a minority of boys who do it, but they can make going to school absolute hell on earth for the majority of girls.
My DS is going to secondary next year. I think it's not enough for us to raise our sons not to be that boy, but also to be the kind of boy who calls that behaviour out among their peers.
Boys that age are far more sensitive to their peers disapproving of them than adults. I think just a few boys banding together to say "this is not okay" can result in a culture change in a year group.

Well said, JustTurtles.

First two responses are fucking shocking. You both should be ashamed of yourselves.

One boy can ruin a whole school. The boy who sexted younger girls at a school near me was made head boy (because that might make him behave more responsibly ffs). Of course it didn't work.

In some schools there is a culture that these boys shouldn't be penalised for such behaviour because of a belief that this kind of thing only comes from boys who have abusive backgrounds, so what the boys need is support and kindness.

There are also campaigns going on to completely abolish both fixed term and permanent exclusions in order to prevent the so-called "school to prison pipeline" for children who behave in anti-social ways.

Schools can and should set their culture. To claim that they cannot is really defeatist.

www.tes.com/news/exclusive-ofsted-failed-act-sex-assault-fears

How appalling!