Have I missed something: the men’s protest march against the exclusion of their sex from careers in childcare – the one that ended up in Trafalgar Square?
Surely, there must have been a mass male demo against the iniquity of the gender gap in nursery care and how wickedly blokes are discriminated against?
No. There wasn’t one. Really? Are you sure? You mean men don’t care about having careers in childcare?
So what was all that fuss and furore about after Mrs (where angels fear to tread is my second name) Leadsom was found to have said “most of us don’t employ men as nannies”, if men didn’t care?
Because she was bang on right. Most of us don’t employ men as nannies. Only two per cent of nursery and childcare workers are male as far as I can find out.
She might have posed the question why, but I expect she thought it was self evident.
Maybe because women don’t want male nannies for their babies? Or because only a minority of men would ever chose childcare for their preferred career path?
Unfortunately, she said something a tad more controversial – that the odds are stacked against you if you employ a man for: “we know paedophiles are attracted to working with children”.
“This is an extraordinarily offensive statement”, roared Jon Ashworth, the Labour Shadow Minister for something or other. Peter Tatchell where on earth were you when you were needed to stick up for Mrs L’s right to offend and insult?
Crass maybe and wildly politically incorrect yes, but was what she said true or false? Are there more male paedophiles than female ones? And are paedophiles attracted to working with children?
Yes and yes are the answers.
Although women can be and are child abusers and sex offenders too (I am sure Mrs Leadsom wouldn’t deny that) the best evidence suggests that no more than 8 per cent are. Given the raft of historic child abuse cases centered on children’s homes, schools and teachers (or others in authority over children) her second assertion is demonstrably true as well.
Not that any of that would have got her off the hook for inferring parental distrust of male child carers.
A Pre-school Learning Alliance survey of 1,200 mothers and fathers who used childcare suggests that parents have learned to be more ‘enlightened’ than she. Almost all (97.9 per cent) said they were happy for men (in principle) to work with children aged three to five in day nurseries, falling slightly when it came to infants from birth to two.
This is not the same of course as actually chosing to hire men which, somewhat ironically, Mrs Leadsom says she herself has done.
In the less repressed Australia where parents are less judicious they have taken to online forums to express their mistrust of male childcare workers.
One said: “given the choice between a male and a female, all other things being equal, I’d pick the female carer”, while another wrote: “women seem to have more of a motherly instinct”.
Others said parents had to “put all political correctness aside, and look for what’s statistically the safest environment for your kids.”
But here in PC UK Plc you have to be careful what you say. Psychotherapists might encourage us to listen to our feelings, but the Government via its thought police tells us to deny them.
‘Gender imbalance’ in nursery care needs tackling – it’s official. Defy it if you dare.
If men don’t seem to want to comply with this equality ruling (the evidence suggests they don’t) then they must be made to. Never mind respecting their wishes, just make childcare more attractive to them.
Con them that they will be important as male role models. If that doesn’t bite, then bribe them – offer childcare as a fast track to teaching in primary schools or make sure that these reluctant nannies have man sensitive “forums and support environments” to share their experiences, ideas and challenges.”
Anything, anything, but acknowledge the truth that men and boys don’t want to ‘baby care’ for a career, or that perhaps this is the very reason why parents are hesitant about having them do it.
Such recalcitrant attitudes must be beaten out of them until they succumb to being feminised. That’s what the trashing Andrea Leadsom was really about. No wonder she appalled the sisterhood and their friends in the media. Nothing must stand in the way of ‘significant growth of men in the ‘early years sector’ until role reversal is complete and the norm is for men to look after babies while women dominate the workplace.
What a recipe for male depression.
Remember that sad ex-serviceman in the audience of the main BBC Brexit debate who asked the panel what sovereignty meant to them? David Dimbleby asked what he’d been doing since leaving the army? Working in childcare he replied dully.
My heart bled for him. And for the ex miners and steel workers who have this work future thrust on them. I wanted to shake my fist at David Cameron and Lucy Powell and their crazy school of male and female interchangeability that would risk the army front line with weaker women; that forces once strong men to look after babies but exiles the mums babies need to cash till purgatory.
But dare to say any of this is perverse, wrong or against nature and you are in for it. Calls for your sacking, if you have a job, will soon follow.
