I understand what you are saying about my comment, and in that larger sense of “society” I think your analysis holds true. I’ve been the victim of sexual violence as well, and I have healed. However, if at all possible I’d like to prevent my children from ever having to go through that particular hell at any age.

Rape, assault, molestation unlike the death of a friend or parent (death in general) is different. We expect to lose people we love. Death is a natural part of life, and I’ve also tried to teach my children this fact as well.

When I stated that I gave my kids information, it wasn’t just about the stranger on the street, but the gym teacher, minister, or Uncle Bob. I am very aware that most abusers are known to their victims. I just prefer to cover all my bases.

Btw, good discussion everyone.

But they don’t. There’s a disproportionate paranoia about stranger rapes and an even more disproportionate lack of vigilanace about all other kinds of sexual violence–the only notable recent exception being the recent panic about abuse at daycare centers.

I am a parent, by the way. If you’re not, I suggest you stop the prattling about what ‘parents’ want, as though you knew more about what ‘parents’ want than an actual parent.

instead of expecting children and women to just be quiet, cooperative victims

Kell, I don’t know who you’re arguing with here, but if you’d prefer to simply invent things I never said and pretend I said the exact opposite of what I did say, then my presence in any conversation with you is not actually necessary.

Richard, of course it’s wise to be cautious of strangers. The problem is when the woman who is more alert when she sees you walking near her isn’t vigilant when you’re an acquaintance she meets at a party, because she’s lied to about the relative risk of acquaintance rape, and punished if she’s suspicious of anyone but a stranger. (You know the routine: don’t be a paranoid bitch, he’s a perfectly nice guy, why do you assume every guy wants you, blah blah blah.

Similarly, of course it’s smart for parents at the park to be aware of what other adults are there. But your kids are far less likely to be threatened by the guy sitting and reading his book at the park than by their swim coach, or Uncle Bob, or the apartment complex handyman who has keys to every unit in the building.

Focusing on both stranger, and caretaker (i.e. childcare workers, which is a far larger number than that 4,500), and familial abuse and attacks can all happen simultaneously. Acknowledging that most victims will be harmed by family members doesn’t make the stranger & caretaker crimes magically disappear. As you said, let’s “be vigilant for sexual violence and misbehavior in general,” and that includes teachers and child care workers.

You’ve not delineated what practice you’re protesting when it comes to child care. If you’re objecting to background checks and fingerprinting, those practices are extended to all adults, not just men. If you’re objecting to parents not wanting to leave their kids in facilities with men, then your task is to educate them, and perhaps provide better monitoring for kids in particular facilities. (For instance, some centers have a policy that at no time are kids left in the care of just one adult.) If you’re objecting to employers not wanting to hire male child care workers, that decision likely has far more to do with the wishes of their customers than with what they think the reality is.

And, if you’re objecting to the vigilence in childcare itself, I’m saying you’re sadly mistaken. Parents are under no obligation to place their kids at risk of injury or murder just to make you feel better, and those same parents and kids are not responsible for the danger. In this case, your beef is with the criminals, not the victims. So why aren’t you demanding the crimes stop instead of expecting children and women to just be quiet, cooperative victims and pretend everything’s fine?

I don’t know what you’re hearing. It doesn’t appear to correlate with anything I’ve written. Solutions? Stop treating childrearing as inferior “women’s work”; be vigilant for sexual violence and misbehavior in general, rather than focusing anxiety on strangers and ignoring the rapist in the living room.

There’s a difference between being aware of rapes by strangers, and pretending that strangers are the biggest threat–the latter does nothing but protect predators. I suggest you compare your numbers of ‘nonfamily abductions’ to the number of children raped, beaten and killed by acquaintances and family members.

Did you see my post?

What are your suggestions for ways the community can simultaneously foil pedaphiles/rapists/murderers and protect kidswhile also not bothering men more than you feel is fair?

Um, no. Perhaps with the subtext that we need to stop assuming that real, manly men want nothing to do with all that woman’s-work childcare stuff (therefore men who spend time around children are Unnatural and Unmanly, either queer or predatory, perhaps both).

And, perhaps, that we should stop assuming that the only people who are sexual predators are strange loner men. It’s ever so much more comfortable to worry about strangers than to consider that Uncle Bob, or the new coach, or a best friend could be rapists.

Yep, that was the discussion nobody was having but Kell.

What I’m seeing are some men complaining because they think they’re at risk of being wrongly accused as abusers or sexual criminals. (With the subtext that, therefore, the degree of caution exercised to protect women and children from abusers and sex criminals is unfair, unreasonable and excessive, and we need to go back to the prior level of greater male “freedom” — and greater female & kid levels of danger. In other words, men matter more than women and kids, and their concerns should take precendence in every circumstance.)

I’m saying that the existing level of caution is fair and reasonable (personally, I think we need to do even more) considering the extraordinary level of risk of death and injury forced on women and kids. At least 25% of women will be sexually violated at some time in their lives; the number for boys is at last one in ten. In other words, so long as we’re at war, this is the way we’re going to have to live. Men, certainly, are welcome to offer ideas for refining or improving methods for increasing women’s and kids’ safety, but anyone claiming that their need to feel “accepted,” or to not be bothering by formal and informal security checkpoints (i.e. background checks for getting jobs, or being watched closely by parents at a park) supersedes women’s and kids’ need for safety is not only out of line, he’s also SOL.

As for the bricklayer guy, his trying to blame his lack of action on the fact that kids and women need to protect themselves is simply specious. No sympathy, here. Taking a reaonsable idea (i.e. communities keeping an eye on kids and their welfare) to an absurd conclusion (accusing a guy of being a criminal if he calls the police or otherwise tries to help a lost kid) is a passive-aggressive and illogical attempt to attack the rights of women and kids to have control over their own bodies. He’s claiming that he didn’t help the kid because other people’s perfectly reasonable precautions somehow intrude unreasoably into his life. I don’t buy it.

Looking out for strangers really isn’t very effective at all.

On another and more happy tangent I cannot walk out the door here in Sweden without seeing daddies pushing around babycarriages on the streets. Things can, and do, change.

It IS a backlash against a society trying to make a safer place for women and children.

If you are doing NOTHING WRONG then why so uptight about it? The fact is women do not want to accuse men of abusing when they have done nothing wrong!!!!!!!! You see, this is what I don’t like. This new idea that women maliciously go around making false accusations all the time.

SOME women might make false accusations. Yes. I have dealt with somebody in the past who made up lies about being raped etc. It didn’t take much pressure (direct questioning) to get the truth out of her.

However - the vast majority of women and parents in general just want their children to be safe!! You protect your children to the very best of your ability. If failing that, there is EVIDENCE that something awful has happened, THEN you look into it. And yes - you DO keep your eyes and ears open and you do need to be aware of more ’subtle’ signs that something is wrong. It might not be sexual abuse. It could be bullying at school, or anything. As parents you need to be aware of ALL the dangers your children could encounter.

A grandfather innocently hugging his grandchildren (Males do not just abuse females and females do not just abuse males. That’s ridiculous) has nothing to worry about. If some ‘bad seed’ in the family decided to make up lies about him the rest of the family would gather around and support his innocence. THIS HAPPENS OFTEN ENOUGH WHEN THE PERSON IS ACTUALLY GUILTY!

The fact remains — FAR more paedophiles and abusers will never see the inside of a prison cell than those who DO.

Err on the side of caution. Use common sense.

There is no need to get all pissed off because society is trying to actually protect our kids now.

Incidentally I am a survivor of chronic sexual abuse/incest. I have a young daughter. My husband has NEVER felt like he would be ‘accused’ of anything. Know why? Because he is of excellent character and he *would never abuse somebody*. Hence, he has a clear conscience and nothing to worry about. If the grandfather has a clear conscience — go ahead and hug your grandchildren for goodness sake! The ‘risk’ is miniscule and yes — if you are truly concerned, hug them in full view of everybody.

Point: the man driving by did a terrible thing, by his own description. To see a very young child walking down a street alone and to decide it’s too risky to his reputation to help was wrong. Any decent adult would let his reputation go hang to make sure a toddler stays safe, and the truth is his reputation was never in any real danger anyway.

What I was saying is that predator’s use opportunities to abuse. Good parents (oops!!! value judgment!!!) provide them with as few chances as possible.

My point was that I think its better to have people a bit suspicious of men, even men who have no sexual (power?) interest in children, even if it makes some people feel bad.

Where did I make excuses for pedophiles? I said that its too bad that some men get accosted when they’re with children, but its better that way. Come to think of it, I don’t see that McElroy did either.

I don’t see how society encourages pedophila, but that might be because I don’t have a hair trigger temper.