# Mamas, don't follow your babies into the men's room **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 13, 2009, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294 "2009-08-13T15:32:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/121 "2009-08-15T00:34:29Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > [snip] because being eaten by a shark plays into some rather primal fears. > > For a parent, having one’s child abducted by a predatory pedophile is about the worst primal fear one could have; like being eaten by a shark for someone afraid of the deep, only times one hundred. So, really, being eaten by a pedophile or else being molested by a shark should be the most terrifying concept imaginable. Next Summer, at a Theatre near you: Jaws the Perv, in 3D. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/122 "2009-08-15T00:45:15Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > I gotta say, I really don’t care how rare you think it is. One out of every 3 girls is molested by the time she’s 18, and one out of every 6 boys. [One cite there are many others](http://72.32.142.202/blog/sex-offenders/child-molestation-statistics/) > > Thank goodness I can use the same bathroom as Celtling, but I’ll be d\*\*\*ed if she’s going by herself any time soon. And if I couldn’t go in with her for some reason, I’d be guarding the door, and God HELP you if you tried to push past me. > > Think what you want; it’s not gonna be my kid, not if I can help it. Then you will get my fucking crutch up your ass, and a call to the cops for assault and battery. When I am going to the john, I have to pee, and I am by fucking god going to pee. The only legitimate time you can prevent someone from going into a public bathroom is if it is a one toilet in the entire room type, and the door locks on those. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/123 "2009-08-15T00:49:28Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > Oh, and as a side note: How do schools monitor whether or not “authorized” people are picking up the students? When I was a kid (born in '83), everybody just poured out the doors. Nobody was walking around with a clipboard saying, “Heeeeey, you’re not Child X’s parent!” When I was in KINDERGARDEN at the age of 4 I walked home for lunch, walked to and from school. It was about 5 city blocks. Actually, come to think of it, the only time I didnt walk to and from school was when I was in a residence private school, or in a private school about 25 miles away from home and I had to either be driven or drive. We never lived a bussable distance from school. ---
**Author:** ![SmashTheState](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@SmashTheState](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmashTheState)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/124 "2009-08-15T00:49:57Z")
> [@twickster](#): > > Cite? _According to the Grimms, the situations in their particular collection were so commonplace that most readers would have no trouble recognizing them as true to life. For an example of the many “basic situations” depicted in the tales, they referred their readers to the case of impoverished parents who drive their children from hearth and home, leaving them to starve in the woods. […] Even as late as 1806, the year in which the Grimms first began collecting tales, child abandonment – along with infanticide – was not so uncommon a practice among the poor as to make its fictional portrayal appear more sensationalistic than realistic. […] Situations that stand as exceptional in our own day and age were not necessarily unheard of in another era. As shocking as the deeds of Hansel and Gretel’s parents may seem to us (especially if we momentarily divorce them from their fairy-tale context), they may have tallied with the cruel social realities faced by readers and listeners of earlier generations._ [INDENT]-- from The hard facts of the Grimms’ fairy tales, **Tatar, M.** : Princeton University Press, 2001[/INDENT] ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/125 "2009-08-15T00:53:37Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > Oh, and as a side note: How do schools monitor whether or not “authorized” people are picking up the students? When I was a kid (born in '83), everybody just poured out the doors. Nobody was walking around with a clipboard saying, “Heeeeey, you’re not Child X’s parent!” (Which worked just fine–I’m not saying it led to a rash of kidnapping or anything.) I think that’s rare now, although my experience is admittedly limited to two schools in the same system. Children who ride the bus are escorted by faculty or staff from inside the building to the bus and watched as they board the bus. Children who are picked up by parents are placed in organized groups (by grade level, by class, or some similar system), and parents drive up one by one to pick their kid up. When a parent arrives, a faculty member calls the child to the car. I think parents get special placards to put in the front window of their car that facilitate the process, but the faculty also learn to recognize the parents, and if someone out of the ordinary shows up, they call the office on a walkie-talkie to verify that that person is on the list of acceptable adults that the parents submitted at the beginning of the year. Once we had a kindly old man come to pick up a kid from my class, only the kid knew nothing about being picked up by anyone else, and we hadn’t received a note from home or a phone call, and you’d better believe that the old man did not get his paws on that kid until we called home, verified that this was gramps (and got the kid’s verification on this score as well), and that mom had just forgotten to tell us that gramps was picking him up that day. It’s definitely a lot stricter than when I was in school. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/126 "2009-08-15T00:55:16Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > When I was in KINDERGARDEN at the age of 4 I walked home for lunch, walked to and from school. It was about 5 city blocks. Actually, come to think of it, the only time I didnt walk to and from school was when I was in a residence private school, or in a private school about 25 miles away from home and I had to either be driven or drive. We never lived a bussable distance from school. I never got a ride to school until I was in high school, and that includes a school bus. I either walked or rode my bike. ---
**Author:** ![twickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/127 "2009-08-15T00:57:54Z")
> [@SmashTheState](#): > > Situations that stand as exceptional in our own day and age **were not necessarily unheard of** in another era. As shocking as the deeds of Hansel and Gretel’s parents may seem to us (especially if we momentarily divorce them from their fairy-tale context), \*\*they may have tallied with \*\*the cruel social realities faced by readers and listeners of earlier generations. > > [INDENT]-- from The hard facts of the Grimms’ fairy tales, **Tatar, M.** : Princeton University Press, 2001[/INDENT] [bolding mine] Not exactly a strong statement – and what are Tatar’s sources? ETA: Plus the second bolded statement refers to the death of the parents, not the abandonment of the children. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/128 "2009-08-15T00:58:08Z")
Incidentally, in trying to track down a realistic statistic for the percentage of children sexually assaulted in the US, I’ve failed. Maybe someone with better Google-fu than I can succeed? But I did find [this sickening report from the US Department of Justice](http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/saycrle.pdf) that surveys a few years of sexual assaults in several states and finds some patterns. Here’s the relevant section, I think: > [@](#): > > Location of sexual assault > Most (70%) of the sexual assaults reported to law > enforcement occurred in the residence of the victim, the > offender, or the residence of another individual. Less than > two-thirds of forcible rapes (64%) occur in a residence > compared with three-quarters of other sexual assaults: > forcible sodomy (74%), sexual assault with an object (76%), > and forcible fondling (74%). Sexual assaults against > females were less likely to occur in a residence than were > those against male victims (69% versus 77%). > Young victims were generally more likely to be victimized in > a residence than were older victims (table 4). The age of > the victim was strongly related to where the assault > occurred. Seventy-seven percent of sexual assaults with > juvenile victims occurred in a residence compared with 55% > of adult victimizations. Older juveniles were more likely than > younger juveniles to be victimized in a location other than a > residence. While just 16% of the sexual assaults of youth > below the age of 12 occurred in a place other than a > residence, 31% of the victimizations of youth ages 12 > through 17 occurred in such locations. The most common > non-resident locations for sexual assaults of juveniles were > roadways, fields/woods, schools, and hotels/motels. For > adults the most likely locations after a residence included > roadways, fields/woods, hotels/motels, parking lots, and > commercial/office buildings. Note the distinct lack of public restrooms on that list–which is, of course, obvious. Predators are generally looking for victims in places where the victims can’t get help. They want to be sure their victim is isolated. A public, multi-user restroom is not anything like an isolated location. The chances are excellent that a parent is, or will soon be, in the restroom. The chance that a predator would choose a public restroom to operate in seems extremely remote. The danger that you’ll screw the kid up with an unhealthy sense of paranoia and an inability to evaluate risks rationally, however, seems quite high. ---
**Author:** ![descamisado](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e480ec/32.png) [@descamisado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/descamisado)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/129 "2009-08-15T01:03:51Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > The danger that you’ll screw the kid up with an unhealthy sense of paranoia and an inability to evaluate risks rationally, however, seems quite high. The woman who takes care of my hair is quite proud that she won’t let her nine-year-old out of the house during the day while she’s out of school this summer (Mom’s at work, of course), won’t let her take swimming lessons, nor allow her to say hello to me (or anyone not family), even when she just walked up with Mom and Mom just said hi to me. That kids gonna be some well-adjusted. ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/130 "2009-08-15T01:50:09Z")
> [@muldoonthief](#): > > So what do you do with your young daughter? Send her to the womens room alone? I always took my daughters into the mens room with me when they were 3 or 4ish - simply because they weren’t totally able to take care of matters themselves in an unfamiliar bathroom. No big deal… I don’t care if men bring their daughters into the men’s room; just keep them from walking up the the urinals and staring. Lockerrooms are a bit more awkward. Anyone ever had seen a woman send her son into a men’s lockerroom/changing room/campground bathhouse then flip out about their being _naked men_ in there :smack:? I have. It was a campground in New York. The men’s showers were communal (or they may have had dividers, but not curtains or doors). I wasn’t in the bathhouse when this happened, but I was in the lobby/lounge/campstore when she came storming into to complain to the managment (another, older, woman). Her son was with her. He looked about _12 or 13_. She kept ranting about how this was “unacceptable”, something about perverts, and that she would “report them” (to who?). ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/131 "2009-08-15T01:51:55Z")
That’s bordering on pathological, in my totally unmedical opinion. I do hope that her sort of neurosis never becomes the norm. ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/132 "2009-08-15T02:03:12Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > You wanna know something _really_ scary? Over 98% of child molesters are humans! So make sure that your poor child doesn’t have any contact with _that_ scummy lot! Now, for me, the really scary thing is the other 2%… ---
**Author:** ![Flutterby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Flutterby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flutterby)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/133 "2009-08-15T02:03:41Z")
I’m not so worried about my son being molested in the bathroom as wandering off when something (or someone, he’s a little chatterbox and likes to tell his life story to random people, adults and children) catches his eye and Mommy comes out of the ladies bathroom and waits patiently outside while he’s God knows where lost in the store (or even, yes, kidnapped). So he either comes with me into the ladies (where he usually goes in his own stall), or if I don’t have to go I stand outside the door waiting for him patiently and only call in if he’s taking more than say… five minutes which should be enough time to do business. He’s 5, I give it a year or two before we’ll be able to go our separate ways and be able to trust him to stay outside the bathroom doors if I have yet to come out. ETA: I remember being about his age and going to the men’s room with Dad. Actually, he took me on a camping trip and I remember sitting in the changing area of the shower playing with a doll while Dad had a shower! I think I startled a few men… That was the mid-eighties. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/134 "2009-08-15T02:07:04Z")
> [@Indistinguishable](#): > > Now, for me, the really scary thing is the other 2%… They’re the ones wearing mommy’s skin. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/135 "2009-08-15T02:27:20Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > Then you will get my fucking crutch up your ass, and a call to the cops for assault and battery. When I am going to the john, I have to pee, and I am by fucking god going to pee. The only legitimate time you can prevent someone from going into a public bathroom is if it is a one toilet in the entire room type, and the door locks on those. We’re talking, what, three minutes here? I’m certain you’ll survive the wait. What do you do when there’s a line, beat up everyone in front of you? What if the janitor has it blocked off, do you knee-crotch him and charge on in? Please! ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/136 "2009-08-15T02:33:22Z")
You have no right to ask anyone to wait a single second. If you ever tried to physically block anyone from using the bathroom, you would be guilty of a criminal assault. ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/137 "2009-08-15T02:33:28Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > We’re talking, what, three minutes here? I’m certain you’ll survive the wait. > > What do you do when there’s a line, beat up everyone in front of you? What if the janitor has it blocked off, do you knee-crotch him and charge on in? > > Please! No, but those are good reasons to wait. Waiting because some parent has a messiah complex about their little one is a stupid one. Your kid isn’t so hot that he/she will turn normally sexed people into pedophiles. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/138 "2009-08-15T02:58:48Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > We’re talking, what, three minutes here? I’m certain you’ll survive the wait. And your kid will survive ONE encounter with somebody who has to REALLY go to the bathroom. ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/139 "2009-08-15T03:06:07Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > I gotta say, I really don’t care how rare you think it is. One out of every 3 girls is molested by the time she’s 18, and one out of every 6 boys. [One cite there are many others](http://72.32.142.202/blog/sex-offenders/child-molestation-statistics/) I like the way that site puts it: “The statistics say that one out of every three to four girls has been sexually assaulted by the age of 18. One boy out of every six will be abused by the age of 18. Although we have some reports and convictions to base these statistics on, they are actually not accurate.” Granted, the next sentence clarifies “So many cases of child molestation go unreported each year, so we really cannot estimate the real numbers.”, but, still, my confidence in the usefulness of the numbers for any purpose has already been shot by then. (Indeed, I’d still like to see some description of where these numbers come from. Putative statistics without accompanying details of methodology are worse than useless.) ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2009, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294/140 "2009-08-15T03:10:03Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > We’re talking, what, three minutes here? I’m certain you’ll survive the wait… TruCelt, it’s a fucking public restroom, not your own private little kingdom. If it was a single-user setup you’d have a point. Since it’s multi-person setup you don’t have a leg to stand on. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mamas-dont-follow-your-babies-into-the-mens-room/506294.md?page=8)