Herland
Why are there so few male teachers?
by L. J. Williamson
August 11, 2008
"In general, we have a family policy against leaving our children alone with men," wrote one "mom blogger" to a chorus of agreement from commenters. "Background checks give me very little reassurance . . . there's always a first offense and small children are easy prey…. the stigma about male childcare workers . . . is not just a stigma. It's a statistic. A child is nearly nineteen times more likely to be molested by a male than by a female. We find it easier to make a blanket policy and weed out 95% of our chances for problems."
Of course, there are statistics to support virtually any position, including those that show that in a majority of sexual abuse cases, the offender is a family member, or that the overwhelming majority of the world's population has never molested a child. But reading this blog and its enthusiastic responses made me wonder why the concern over sexual abuse, which is correctly described as a primarily male domain, in some circles seems to trump concerns about any other form of child abuse, which could be committed by either gender. The recent case of "extreme ritualistic torture" involving a Los Angeles boy at the hands of three women who cared for him comes to mind. Of course, no parent wants their child to experience any kind of abuse, sexual or otherwise, but it seems that abuse of the sexual kind remains disproportionately at the forefront of many parents' concerns.
"If parents want to avoid male caregivers, that's their right, but collectively, it creates an enormous stigma and stereotype that is unwarranted and has significant ramifications for our larger cultural narrative," says Marsiglio. It's telling that the need for protection from false accusers is every bit as pressing as the need for protection from child molesters."I can appreciate the strong sentiment of being protective of one's child, but to some extent, our perceptions of the risk have been distorted by the media. Yes, there are pedophiles, and one needs to be attentive, but the risk of one's child being abused is distorted by the media's repetitive presentation of these kinds of cases, running them over and over again, until males are tainted with this blanket brush as being very dangerous."
The practice of discouraging males from undertaking child care duties often starts at a very young age. Also echoed by many was the mom blogger's sentiment that babysitting, that mainstay of teenage female employment, was too risky an undertaking for teenage males. "When my sweet boy is a teenager, I will not let him baby-sit for other people's children, for his own protection. An accusation, even one that is later proven false could be life-destroying."
It's telling that the need for protection from false accusers is every bit as pressing as the need for protection from child molesters. "When we have men in our program, I'm more protective of them, because, you know, McMartin," says Bowin, alluding to the infamous child molestation case that's been described as "a modern witch hunt." Says Bowin: "There's a real bias that it couldn't be natural for a man to be interested in young children, or that any man interested in children is a pervert. We need to change that stereotype — just like if a little girl might want to be a firefighter, and that's not typical, but we have to encourage her."
©2008 L.J. Williamson and Nerve Media
About the Author
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L.J. Williamson is a writer from Los Angeles. Her complaints have been printed in The Los Angeles Times, Salon.com, and Utne, to name a few. She lives with her husband, Monkey Man, and their two children, Fifi Bird
and Sugar Guy. Her website is ljwilliamson.com. |
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