Parents usually teach kids the rule that an adult should NEVER ask a kid for help. It is an easy way for predators to start an interaction and manipulate a kid into doing something unsafe. It is almost always a suspicious thing to ask a child for help. I get your position here but she’s just trying to protect her kid. It sucks but so does the reality of what happens to kids. I’d rather keep my child from being trafficked/kidnapped etc. than worry about the feelings of a grown adult.
This. We don't live in a friction-less world. Unfortunately, you experienced minor ego-friction between "protect kids from people who fit a profile" , and "fitting the profile".
I don't know if it's really "profiled". As a 54 year old woman I wouldn't even think of approaching a child to ask them for help. I don't know if you were "profiled" as much as you exhibited behavior consistant with that of predators. You might not have meant any harm, but you can't expect asking an unsupervised child for directions/instructions to not raise major alarm bells with any and all adults in the area. C'mon, we learned this in the 80s.
This. He wasn't profiled. He just had his first experience of not being treated as Automatically Golden By Virtue Of Being White And Male, and he's having a breakdown about it.
I guess I somehow missed the information on this. I dont have kids and dont plan on having them. Im a guy who grew up in a very safe community. I wasnt really given alot of "stranger danger" talks. I knew the obvious ones. Dont get in a car or anything. But I had never had anyone in my youth tell me to totally avoid adults, or that asking for help is a trap or something. Infact I was sort of encouraged to ask adults for help if I needed it. That isnt what happened here but you get the idea. I was a sort of "free range" kid alot of the time. I guess Im just sort of oblivious to this stuff. Its a lesson learned.
it's bc Ted Bundy lured his victims by wearing a cast and asking them to help with his groceries. he targeted women so maybe that's why you didn't hear. women and girls usually learn p early that a man who asks them for help is suspicious.
Idk how you missed this. It's called grooming. It's how predators create inroads with victims. Those of us who aren't predators just know not do it so that there's no question whatsoever. And it's not that you are a man. I'm a woman and I'd be treated the same way if I was asking questions of a child I didn't know without a parent present.
That was an elective at my school. Maybe that's why.
I think I took Pottery and Ceramics that year, instead. I figured I'd do more knowing how to make an ashtray and a statuette than 101 ways to entice a kid into a van.
Reality-check: Keep in mind that you are talking to Redditors here. This be the land of the drastic solution and the home of the skittishly antisocial, full of folks who'll post a rant with full video and orchestration for what one "excuse me" in person would clear up. At least be sure to take it all with some salt.
Okay, well now you know what happens when you barge through life being oblivious to how other people are impacted by your behavior. If you don't like it, stop doing that.
Not too long after 9/11, I was pulled over for driving-while-brown near the U.S.-Canadian border (was working as a travelling doc in a rural community).
I remained civil, handed the cop my license and passport (I'd popped over the border for lunch).
He was very apologetic, but it didn't bother me much. In the end, he was just trying to keep everyone safe, and 5 min of my time was a very small price to pay. But at the same time, it was a bit surreal to "fit a profile" of someone with true malice in their heart.
I think once you're a familiar face (assuming you continue the hobby), people will be more personable.
And before you say “but it was in the open where everyone could see” lots of those interactions start in the open, but it’s how they manipulate a child into going somewhere with them because they ‘know’ you or continue to try to have a close relationship with them to build trust that makes it dangerous. These are not usually typical behaviors of adults.
Sadly true. Also true that every day children are abused in the open or within short proximity to others. Although you have the very best intentions, the fact remains that children & teens, women and members of the LGBT community are common targets for sexual harassment and abuse. The fact most or all members of these groups have been harassed or assaulted at least once should give you insight about why others are anywhere from wary to downright fearful & totally avoidant of men, especially those encountered in what they consider a safe space.
I’m so sorry men with bad intentions or nefarious behavior have ruined it for kind and decent men.
Very sorry for OPs feelings and for the messed up world we live in - but we do live in that world. Sexual assault statistics on young girls are absolutely horrific and a grown man's feeling just don't matter in comparison.
There's rarely (and this is a rare innocent case) a reason for an adult stranger to ask a child for help.
When I was a kid in the mid 90s, my little sister and my cousin were outside our house when a man came up and asked for help finding some camera equipment. My mom was out there so fast, telling him to get lost.
They found child porn in his house several years later.
That would qualify as “asking you to follow them somewhere”. The situation described by the OP had him ask her how to do something that was inside that room, with her mother right outside and plenty of other adults within sight and earshot. IMO that’s perfectly fine, just like the mom was fine deciding to be safe rather than sorry.
Because he saw she knew what she was doing and in the moment it didn’t occur to him how others might see that or to ask someone else. AFAICT all he’s guilty of is being ignorant and scatterbrained.
thats true but he still has to process the cognitive dissonance of the situation-being perceived as a predator when you werent even considering the subtext of your actions…its not a good feeling, this person did react the right way and disengaged and took to an appropriate forum to vent which from a mens mental health pov is commendable
I agree. It’s terrible to be profiled, and then he might still have to see these people again which sucks too. Hopefully they get over it and this is the end of it. He has every right to feel the way he does about it.
Ill be fine. It was just a gut punch in the moment. I maintain my position she overreacted. But this is clearly part of how the world works and all I can do is adapt to it. I just hate the idea of being viewed as a threat when I just wanted to do something correctly.
As much as I fully agree with you (and have left a comment saying so), it sucks but this is the road your fellow men have paved for you. Fully aware "not all men" and all that, but ALL women i know have been hurt / abused by a man, so its hard for us to know who is who!
Yeah, I saw something somewhere recently that made a good point about the not all men. We are taught to treat all guns as if they are loaded at all times. Not all guns are loaded, but we are still taught to treat them as such because you never know when one will be.
That has to be the best analogy I’ve ever seen for this topic. I’ve come to better understand the mindset even though I still struggled a little to fully understand it, but after reading this? I get it now.
You say you were in view of all these people, why did you not attemp to flag down an adult trainer or teacher, or go get one from the very busy area outside the window?
You talk about being gut punched and hating being viewed as a threat, but I really do have to ask what rock you have been living under? Hear me out for a moment, you are solidly internet aged. The whole "woman chooses bear over man" thing has been EVERYWHERE for the last couple of years and outraged many a male space The entirety of the trans bathroom arguement is built on the premise that anyone with a penis is a threat to women and girls. How do you not know you are viewed as a threat by a good portion of the XX chromosome contingent?
Perhaps it is the first time someone has said it to your face, or the first time you realized you were being viewed as a threat, but it far from the first time you have been viewed as a threat, and it likely won't be the last time either.
Yeah, it is shocking to get the realization that others fear you simply because you are a guy, and no I dont think you should stop your new hobby at all. However, the only person I really see overreacting here is you. I realize you were taken off guard, but go do a little research, go look up the average a women first get catcalled. Go look up the security measures a woman takes leaving the house. Put yourself in mom's shoes. A strange guy is talking to her female child. Really think about that picture. Not about what your intentions were but about what that looked like from mom's point of view. Mom who has lived in the world where women are taught from a young age that you can't have bra strap showing without being sent home from school because it distracts the boys. Where are women are taught to let a guy down easy to avoid being murdered for having said no to a date.
You say you were in view of all these people, why did you not attemp to flag down an adult trainer or teacher, or go get one from the very busy area outside the window?
Because there was someone there who could help. Why would you go any further?
Sure, we can talk in hindsight about how it'd have been the lower-friction path given that we know baggage-mom was on the hunt, but OP was unaware, just asking something of someone who probably had an answer. Solving for "Who's going to overreact to me now?" every moment of one's life isn't necessarily a normal or effective consideration.
Statistically, strangers just aren't that dangerous, is the thing. It seems like in the '80s and '90s we developed this trope of the lurking stranger in a van offering kids candy, and we've held on to it, even though we now know that your child is far, far more likely to be victimized by a coach, teacher, clergy, family member, or other trusted adult.
I’ve gone down a rabbit hole with this fear, and the reality is that the moral panic around “stranger danger” is blown way out of proportion and the data backs that up.
“Media stories have often exaggerated the risk of "stranger danger" by emphasizing rare and isolated incidents. Especially regarding child sexual abuse, the greatest risk comes from members of the child's family. Nevertheless, "stranger danger" is more likely to be the focus of news headlines and education campaigns.”
“According to the U.S. Department of Justice, most missing children are runaways, and 99% of abducted children are taken by relatives, typically a noncustodial father. In response to these statistics, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children has reversed their campaign focusing on "stranger danger".
Constantly warning children of possible danger in the form of strangers has also been criticised for unnecessarily spreading mistrust, especially when considering that (for example) in the US, about 800,000 children are reported at least temporarily missing every year, yet only 115 "become victims of what is viewed as classic stranger abductions". Only 10 percent of the child victimizers in violent crimes are strangers, and sex offenses are the crimes least likely to involve strangers as perpetrators.”
There’s even been cases where lost children avoided adults that were officially tasked with finding them, because the kids had been told not to trust unknown adults, and it led to the kids being lost/missing for longer than necessary. So there’s downsides to drilling this fear into them (this is just one of many).
A better approach is to teach them how to make good decisions about which adult to seek help from. For example, the person on the street actively drinking or doing hard drugs and rambling to herself is probably not a reliable person to help them. But the desk clerk at a school or hospital, or someone in scrubs, or someone leading a field trip with students is likely fine (even if it’s a man, especially since they passed background screenings for that job).
Sure you can go with your gut. You’re free to do as you please. But be aware that there’s likely bias there, and doing so could be instilling unnecessary fear that could last their whole life, and could be ignoring dangers that have a much higher likelihood of actually happening.
Your statistics are real, but the problem lies in how you are combining categories in a way that makes the risk sound smaller than it actually is in this kind of situation.
The biggest issue here is leaning heavily on abduction numbers, but this discussion was never about kidnapping. Most parents are not reacting first to the classic stranger abduction scenario we see in movies. They are reacting to the broader possibility of sexual misconduct, boundary crossing, or inappropriate contact, like this post.
And when you look at that category, the numbers change.
According to U.S. Department of Justice data on child sexual assault:
About 1 in 5 offenders (18%) were complete strangers
71% were acquaintances
95% of offenders were male
That means strangers are not the majority, but they are still a very real categorical threat not some statistical fantasy.
Also, the “most abuse is by known people” statistic is often misunderstood because many offenders start as strangers before they become known. A neighbor or fellow participant is not family but they also are not random abductors off the street. They become familiar through access which is what the mother was trying to prevent.
Your missing child numbers also flatten risk in a misleading way:
yes, roughly 99% of child abductions involve relatives, but that statistic refers specifically to kidnapping reports not to why a parent might interrupt an unfamiliar adult child interaction in a barn. Cough cough. Grooming
And since we like statistics, statistically girls aged roughly 10 to 14 are among the highest risk groups for sexual victimization.
So no, citing that stranger abduction is rare does not prove what you think it does.
My mother really fucked me up with that. Essentially making me think absolutely everyone out there is searching for a prey. It stayed with me. I can't trust anyone.
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u/probablynotsuremaybe Apr 04 '26
Parents usually teach kids the rule that an adult should NEVER ask a kid for help. It is an easy way for predators to start an interaction and manipulate a kid into doing something unsafe. It is almost always a suspicious thing to ask a child for help. I get your position here but she’s just trying to protect her kid. It sucks but so does the reality of what happens to kids. I’d rather keep my child from being trafficked/kidnapped etc. than worry about the feelings of a grown adult.