Jeff Zaslow’s Wall Street Journal column continues a discussion about how society is teaching kids to fear men.
As the father of an eight year-old boy, this topic hits close to the mark, doubly so once I read Zaslow’s piece, which is based on feedback he received from readers regarding his first column on this topic. Snip:
Frank McEnulty, a builder in Long Beach, Calif., was once a Boy Scout scoutmaster. “Today, I wouldn’t do that job for anything,” he says. “All it takes is for one kid to get ticked off at you for something and tell his parents you were acting weird on the campout.”
It’s true that men are far more likely than women to be sexual predators. But our society, while declining to profile by race or nationality when it comes to crime and terrorism, has become nonchalant about profiling men. Child advocates are advising parents never to hire male babysitters. Airlines are placing unaccompanied minors with female passengers.
Child-welfare groups say these precautions minimize risks. But men’s rights activists argue that our societal focus on “bad guys” has led to an overconfidence in women. (Children who die of physical abuse are more often victims of female perpetrators, usually mothers, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.)
Coincidentally, I am now, also, the adult leader of my son’s Cub Scout Den. Before I can fully assume those duties, I must first take the BSA’s online course in child protection and in addition, I must allow the church which sponsors the Pack to conduct a background check on me to ensure that I am not a predator/scofflaw/deadbeat. If I do not give them permission to investigate me, I will not be allowed to perform any functions with the Den. Period.
In some ways, I can appreciate the scrutiny. Screening for creeps is probably long overdue and, given the potential for legal liability, regrettably necessary.
Still, it leaves me cold, and wondering whether all this scrutiny — however well intentioned — doesn’t reinforce the perception that all men are suspect. My son and I have a good relationship (he still calls me DaDa… at least when none of his friends are present). And he still holds my hand, whether we’re crossing the street, or simply because he feels like it.
It’s a small, but very touching gesture. One day, he’ll stop doing it and that will be a sad day, indeed.
But now I wonder…do others who see me holding his hand think I’m some sort of trench-coated creep who ought to be reported? Does it help that our own Attorney General has made a virtual crusade out of tracking down online predators — a crusade that’s repeatedly reinforced by a stream of breathless press releases?
No, it doesn’t. While there can be no doubt whatsoever that depravity exists and that predators, creeps and weirdos can and have inflicted great pain on so many innocent lives, they are are distinct, deserved minority. Society has the right and the responsibility to punish them.
But in doing so, it does not have the right to make suspects of us all.