by Alison Tennant

Created on: January 10, 2009

Not on a bus or on a guided tour around a stately home, NO!

But elsewhere - into a drain, against a hedge (but not too close to a prickly one!), off the side of a small boat, or into a hospital 'bottle', YES!

Let's look at three "reasons" for this:

If a little boy NEEDS to go, he really NEEDS to go. I've looked after enough little boys in my life to know that they'll tug on their pee-pees, they'll writhe in agony, they'll yell, they'll cry. There's obviously a reason for that. As girls, we have stronger pelvic muscles (in later life they're to aid childbirth), and our equivalent is to just cross our legs and hope.

Soi better let the boy relieve hinself.

Secondly, a trickier "reason". A balancing act. We don't want boys to whip their pee-pees out whenever they feel the urge, BUT we certainly don't want them growing up thinking we SHOULDN'T see what they've got.

If they think THAT, they're liable to see them as like gold (i.e highly-valued and sought after by girls), something which society will deem to be worth more than a million dollars. Because it will!

So somehow we need to teach our sons, nephews, boys we babysit that the penis is an item with a purpose. And at their age, that purpose is simply to aim their pee. THAT is most definitely what they need to be taught!

As a childminder, I've read enough books and websites to know that, when raising or looking after kids, the penis is easily the most controversial thing.

OK, you may be thinking, that is putting it into the exalted position I was trying to avoid.

No, the reason it's controversial is because we shy away from it and don't teach boys to see it as a body part with a reason. A nose we blow and wipe, a nail we trim and smooth, a penis should be aimed and dried.

If I'm sounding clinical, I mean to.

Teach a boy that, and you have the makings of a man: one that understands that his penis isn't an item that girls are scared of, but one that we've necessarily (as sisters, cousins and mothers) seen and had to 'deal' with.

I'm sure I'm confusing things, but even I have to tread carefully when on this subject. Some girls reading this probably think I'm talking about things I shouldn't be talking about.

But that's the point. If I was meek and pretended penises (penii?) don't exist, then I'd be seeing them as special, and saying that little boys should keep them hidden when desperate.

Oh yes, the third reason?

Well it re-establishes our superiority! I certainly wouldn't suggest that a girl should relieve herself in public, but it's unlikely that she would need to.

My mother says that I and my sister were always able to wait whereas our (male) cousin used to relieve himself openly.

If you need a fourth reason - well, it's fun!

Not to see MEN relieving themselves, but to see little boys is. (Hands up any woman who disagrees.)

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