This is a pretty fascinating one from Transparental, which is a parenting blog put together by, well, what is the vocabulary here? A woman, mother of two, is “transitioning” into a man, and is keeping a blog to document her experiences. (and for those of you out there, I am truly uncertain of the vocabulary; what pronoun? Is she a woman transitioning, or a was she a woman who has transitioned? etc. No offense to anyone).
Anyway, once you get past that bit of context, the rest of the post is rather familiar. Michel leaves her child alone in a cafe for a moment, and when he (help!) returns is mistaken for a predator by a woman sitting nearby. The issue is only resolved when Michel’s daughter calls (Michel–again, vocabulary?) Mama, at which point the woman in the cafe is freaked out, but has to retreat:
No one has ever assumed that I was a dangerous predator, especially in relation to my own children. I wasn’t at all sure how to respond, so I did the only thing I could: I froze in place and waited for her to move out of the way so I could sit down and think about it.
Right then, with perfect timing, Younger called me Mama. The woman, flustered and mortified, retreated back to her table. She assiduously refused to even make eye contact for the rest of the time that we were there.
Sometimes I have male privilege, sometimes I’m Schroedinger’s Rapist. I never know ahead of time which it’s going to be.
Now, I’m not going to condescend and write to Michel, “Welcome to the male parenting world,” but there is always that sense of being slightly out-of-frame as a man parenting a child. Whether the second look is approving or distrustful, there’s often a second look.
Here’s the last from the post, also interesting:
When I told this story to several friends, they came up with some interesting solutions: change body language and attentiveness around children to make the relationship clear, always greet a child immediately by name to establish the relationship, etc. I think they’re all good ideas, it just makes me sad that a woman around a child is assumed to be a mom and a man around a child is assumed to be a predator.
How about hanging a sign around your neck that says “Go fuck yourself.” That’s my instinct.
This whole thing has been pissing me off for a while. How can we expect dad’s to be fully engaged parents if we treat them like predators for doing just that. I’ve heard so many stay at home dad’s say they feel uncomfortable at the park because someone might think they’re a pedophile. Or they don’t talk to the moms at the park because they don’t want to be seen as trying to pick up.
It makes me so freakin’ angry. As a woman I have had my fair share of bad experiences with men but that doesn’t mean I think all men are out to get me. Millions of women who have experienced mistreatment and even abuse from men still have friendships and relationships with men because we know that not all men are pigs and most men are decent, kind and worth knowing. And yet people, many of whom have had no experience with pedophiles or predators, give fathers the suspicious second look for doing nothing other than being alone with their kids.
I wish more people would talk about this, thanks for the post.