Consent is Every Child’s Basic Right

In recent years, consent has grown to become a much-discussed topic and rightfully so. While we particularly encounter consent-based discussions in the context of women and minorities, it is very important in the context of children as well. In the case of children, when we tickle, hug, kiss, pinch their cheeks, or play pranks on them, consent is an important aspect to be considered. How we consider a child’s consent in these simple acts, as a parent, could go a long way in empowering them to speak for themselves in challenging situations when they grow up. Parents have a big role to play in helping a child learn to say no, and set boundaries, and in ensuring they have consent-based interactions with others. It’s also the responsibility of parents to consistently remind children that they don’t have to politely oblige to someone who is making them feel uncomfortable.

What is consent?

A yes in any form from a child, in response to a specific act, is consent. In other words, consent is something the child is comfortable with. Consent can be verbal or non-verbal. For instance, let’s say you are tickling a one-year-old child. Now if the child is smiling and giggling, it means that the child is enjoying the act of tickling and communicating non-verbally to you that you have their consent to carry on the act of tickling. However, if the child begins crying or starts moving away, then the communication is that you do not have the child’s consent. An older child, like a five-year-old, would respond verbally and say “Stop tickling!” indicating that you do not have their consent. Or they may say, “Tickle me more”, which implies you have their consent. A very young child, who can’t communicate yet, is especially vulnerable and therefore, it is important that you pay keen attention to the way children express themselves to a certain act done by you or other adults around them.

Why does a child’s consent matter?

As adults, when we hug children or kiss them, play pranks on them or pinch their cheeks, tickle them or make them sit on our laps, we may be doing so as a fun way to bond and connect with them. Engaging with a child in these ways is, of course positive, if we have the child’s consent and therefore, the child is enjoying the act with us. However, suppose the child isn’t having fun with what we are doing, then without a doubt, we are violating the child’s boundary; be it a parent or any other adult who is interacting with the child, not listening to a NO is clearly an act of disrespect towards the child. And this is why consent really matters – it helps us be mindful and ensure that a child’s physical, mental, and emotional boundaries are not violated when we interact with them. Consent is every child’s basic right.

There’s another reason why consent matters: An adult interacting with a child typically expects the child to respect them. However, it is the adult’s responsibility to earn that respect from a child and not the child’s job to grant respect by default, just because someone is an adult. So, in order to gain that respect from the child, we need to give respect to the child. One of the ways to respect a child is to respect their boundaries. Therefore, a child’s consent is an important way for a parent or any adult to gain that child’s respect.

Consent is also crucial because interactions done keeping a child’s consent in mind, turn out to be enjoyable and fun, and eventually, this helps build connection.

Violating a child’s boundaries – how it happens

Very often when we parents or other adults interact with our child, we knowingly or unknowing violate their boundaries.

Let’s go back to the example of tickling. This is something many grown-ups, including parents, tend to do with young children. Now, different children have different appetites for tickling. Some may enjoy it, some may be neutral about it, while some may not like it all. It is important to understand a child’s temperament towards your action, and act accordingly. If a child hates getting tickled, and an adult still goes ahead and tickles the child, they are violating the child’s boundary, and this may result in anger, resentment or helplessness towards the adult they are interacting with. This is especially true when adults who are uncomfortable with sadness try and make a sad child happy by tickling. Even though the child may laugh as an immediate response to the tickle, when a grown-up forcefully converts sadness to happiness without letting the child process their sadness, they are violating the child’s emotional boundary. A respectful adult, on the other hand, will gently tickle a child and wait to see the child’s reaction before proceeding further.

Another situation where a violation of a child’s boundary may happen is pranks. Pranks are a great way to have fun and connect with a child. But before we play a prank on a child, we should understand the child’s tolerance level towards pranks. Therefore, it is important to have a conversation around pranks with a child to gauge their appetite for the same. One of the ways to do this is to show them YouTube videos featuring different kinds of pranks and ask them, “Do you feel this is fun?” and based on their response, understand the level of pranking they enjoy, or if they don’t like pranks altogether.

As a parent, when you have conversations around pranks with your child, does it take the fun element away? Not really. In fact, it makes you more aware of their consent and tolerance. When a prank is played on a child who dislikes them, it is clearly a violation of the child’s boundary and the prank may even scar them for life. On the other hand, once you have ascertained to what level the child enjoys pranks, by having such conversations, you can still plan it as a surprise, but by being mindful. Then it becomes a great way to have fun and connect with them.

How can a parent ensure that a child’s boundaries are not violated?

A child, in their day-to-day life, usually interacts with many other adults apart from their parents. As a parent, we would want people to be mindful of what they do or say in front of our children. So what can we do? We can take a strong stance and say that “I will do my best for my child to have consent-based interaction with other adults, as much as possible.” This may be difficult in certain situations but not completely impossible.

There are two ways by which you can help ensure that your child’s boundary is not violated.

1. Be your child’s voice: Sometimes it helps to speak on behalf of your child to an adult. Let’s say you have an elderly aunt visiting your home and she wants your daughter to sit on her lap as soon as she comes in. Now, if your child is shy, she may not want to sit on the aunt’s lap. And if the aunt is insistent, she may grow uncomfortable because the act doesn’t respect the child’s boundary. So at this juncture, you can step in and perhaps say to the aunt, “We are delighted that you are visiting us, and it’s so good to see you. My daughter is a little shy and takes time to warm up to people. So whenever she is ready, she will come to you.” It is important to be respectful to the other person while being your child’s voice, and state things in a matter-of-fact way. This is because the other adult may be still coming from a positive space of love and connection; it’s just that the way they express it could be overwhelming for the child at that point. When we repeatedly be our child’s voice, they see us as their role-model and learn to articulate themselves in a respectful fashion whenever they feel their boundaries are threatened. Thus, being our child’s voice empowers them to stand up for themselves.

2. Help your child with consent-based interactions that will empower them to set/state their own boundaries: Having such interactions will empower your child to find their own voice. This is a simple step but takes a lot of repetition to ingrain in the child. For instance, a line I ingrained in my daughter right from the time she turned one is, “It is Ok to say NO”. I persistently talk to her about what saying NO means – that it is stating the same in a respectful, matter-of-fact manner.

Let’s take the case of Yuvaan, a teenager who doesn’t enjoy rough play. So, when an uncle of his insists on a rough play (say wrestling), Yuvaan’s father senses that he is feeling uncomfortable. So, he asks his son, “Yuvaan, I see you are getting uncomfortable with this. What do you feel about this activity? If you don’t want to do it, it’s totally OK to say NO.” The father empowers Yuvaan to go and tell his uncle that he doesn’t want to play the game. Now suppose, for some reason, the uncle keeps insisting in spite of Yuvaan saying no and tells, “Come on, be a man,” the father can intervene and say, “Yuvaan isn’t feeling comfortable playing this. I would really appreciate it if you can respect that and drop it.”

In this case, in addition to empowering the child to speak up for himself, the father also becomes his son’s voice when the need arises. Please note that a parent can be a child’s voice even when they are a teenager or an adult if the situation demands. While it is true that we can empower our child more and more to stand up and speak for themselves as they grow older, we can still be their voice if required.

While acts like rough-and-tumble play, tickles, pranks, pinching cheeks and hugs may seem trivial things that don’t deserve too much attention, these are important because when we pay attention to small things when children are little, it helps them face big things when they grow older. Further, while these may seem small to us, they are big for them always. The practice they gain through consent-based interaction right from a young age will help them stand up to a bully or set a boundary with someone much older than them.

Last but not the least, as a parent, it is very important for us to follow consent-based interactions ourselves. Doing so reinforces the fact that consent is every child’s basic right. In fact, the more fun and connection we seek with our child, the more we need to have a consent-based approach of interacting with them. Through this approach, we can learn from the mistakes we make when violating our child’s boundaries, as they will correct us. When we interact with being mindful of consent, we can tell our child that they can say no, even if we are their parent. When they say no to us, they gain good practice in articulating and setting boundaries in a safe space. So later, when they have to set boundaries themselves or say no to someone else they aren’t comfortable with, they have a lot of experience to fall back on.

This is why parents have a huge role to play in helping their child understand the value of consent and how, when, and where to exercise it for their own good. Remember, when we make consent an integral part of our child’s life from a young age, first, we are letting them know that we value their need for respect and second, we are laying the foundation for them to stand up for themselves with great confidence when they grow up. And that I am sure, is what one would want as a parent, for the well-being of their child.

(Edited by Anupama Krishnakumar)

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