Cease Silence

Made Rebloggable upon Request “Boundaries for Children”

fuckyeahsexeducation:

Anon: What does this mean “The way we start forcing our children to go through unwanted contact that teaches them young that their bodies aren’t their own.’

FYSE: (TW: molestation, child abuse) As soon as a child is born they’re passed around. Strangers think it’s okay to come up and touch them, family thinks it’s okay to come up and kiss them even if they don’t want them to (It’s even been used for comedic affect in multiple media). Children grow up thinking they have to put up with touch from adults that they don’t want. They’re taught to obey adults and not question them. Children have all of their control taken away. Growing up, because my mother went through having her older children molested and both my mother and father were both sexually abused as children, I was taught that if anyone touched me in any way that I wasn’t comfortable with to tell them. If I didn’t want to be touched by family members I wasn’t touched by family members. My parents empowered me to be in control of my body. Because of that, when I did receive unwanted touch I told my mom and she told the school and the problem was taken care of. We need to respect children’s boundaries when it comes to physical contact. I’m around a lot of children I’m really close to and I know how tempting it is to treat them like pets and just hug them all the time, which of course hugging is great and healthy as is tickling and physical touch but whenever a child says “no” to touch you have to respect that and back off. We need to empower our children to say no when they’re uncomfortable and teach them to that no is a valid answer.

CO-SIGNED. Personally, before I hug or hold a child, I ask the child first. Even if the child is four months old, I reach out a hand and wait for the child to either respond by reaching back and/or smiling, or by crying/looking away. If the child cries or looks away, I back the fuck off. Children learn about their rights by the way we treat them and the way we treat others in their presence, and I want children to know that they can say, “no, I don’t want you to touch/hug/hold me,” without repercussion. “No” will be respected. “No” deserves to be respected.