My best babysitter of all time was a male one! Let's call him Bradley (not his real name, but I want to preserve his anonymity). My parents always talk about how giddy and excited I would get whenever I heard Bradley was coming over to babysit. We'd play with my action figures, throw a nerf ball around, watch cartoons... I remember one time we watched Animaniacs on full blast and sang along with the theme song at the top of our lungs This other time he brought over some Buncha Crunch, and he'd toss the candies to me and I'd try to catch them in my mouth. I don't think I have a single unhappy memory that involves him.

Also, a few years ago I got a job as an intern at his father's law firm. True story.

So to answer your question, no. They're not weird, they're awesome. It sucks royally that men in any child rearing capacity are looked on with suspicion; it's such an insidious double standard. If my parents had actually bought into that garbage, I never would have met Bradley.

And it's funny, because just earlier today, when I brought up men's issues in another thread, I was met with scorn and derision. Guess what? THIS is one of the issues I was talking about.

I was a male babysitter when I was in my teens. Most relatives and family friends though. I was very responsible

I was kind of a babysitter a few years ago. NEVER AGAIN

Yes

No.

OMG

What? Male teachers are completely normal. Granted, less common with younger grades but

And yeah I feel sorry for gay teachers too. They can't openly talk about their loved ones or anything but straight ones can.

I guess there's a stereotype that men don't care about kids/aren't naturally nurturing like women are, so when men do show interest in caring for young children people find it odd or out of the ordinary. If a straight man that I wasn't related to wanted to watch over a child that I had, I'm gonna be honest I'd pause at first too because I'd wonder why he wanted to do that. When it comes to gay men I'd feel more comfortable, I guess because gay men are thought of as more feminine or more "womanly" which is kind of problematic

Yeah, people tend to think adult male + young kid = pedophile which is dumb, and it's not like there aren't females that are pedos/abusers. Like I'm female, and I can straight up go up to random kids and have conversations with them and 9/10 times the parents don't think of me as threatening, they're just like aw look you made a friend. But lord knows if I were male and even so much as looked at a kid in public for longer than 2 seconds people would be screaming pedo

I also know a guy who was molested by a female babysitter when he was little. He's in his late 20s and still struggling with it.

I also agree about the sex offender statistics. It's the reason I totally get why parents would be more apprehensive about having a male babysitter.

I have a 1 year old and tbh I wouldn't feel comfortable leaving him alone with a male or female stranger but if I had to choose, I would go for a female. I have no problem leaving him alone with males in my family like my dad, my brother, my boyfriend's dad, or my boyfriend's brother but I couldn't leave him alone with a male stranger.

They're just trying to get paid, tbh.

Yes, they are weird.