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Consent, relatives, and “being overly woke”: erasure poetry.

 Alright fam it’s time for more erasure poetry! It’s 5:52 am, what a ripe time to be alive and full of mild irritation at the New Zealand Herald, and more specifically, the people who love sharing their bigotry in the comment section.

My favourite time of the day!

Sarcasm aside, as soon as I read the headline I knew that the comment section would be a goldmine. And I have some pretty strong feelings about this topic too, so it’s a win-win from both the poetry and the rant perspectives. What a glorious niche this is.

The article is titled Aussie mum refuses to let family touch baby daughter unless she gives consent, and this choice of title is a can if worms in itself. Obviously, whoever had the job of making the headline as inflammatory as possible did so remarkably. I love how it instantly centres the mother as the source of blame, presumably for not letting the elderly relatives ever bond with her daughter. And what’s even better is how clear it is that so many people don’t actually read the article, and instead run wild and free into the comments, complaining about “woke mothers rejecting  grandparents”, when this actually isn’t what the article is about at all.

So without further ado, let’s get into the gristly rant. To address the many I-severely-lack-the-ability-of-good-judgement commenters, AKA the “so if your kid was about you fall off a cliff, you wouldn’t want anyone to catch them??!?” group: you really need to work on your basic understanding of judgement and common sense. Maybe start with some sudoku or a crossword? Obviously, the topic the mum is discussing is consent. The article isn’t about a miscellaneous array of emergency and life-threatening situations, where obviously, yes, you would appreciate someone looking out for your kid. Why do I even have to spell this out? There’s a rather large distinction between a child not wanting to hug goodbye at Christmas lunch vs someone saving them from drowning. Yikes.

Anyway, next! Another large subset of comments discussed elderly relatives supposedly getting shunned by these terrible, progressive modern mothers, who clearly have no respect for the manners and politeness of the good old days. And to this, I’ll try keep it short: a child not wanting to receive physical touch from anyone trumps hurt feelings. Always. Respecting the boundaries of the child and the basic notion of consent is immensely more important than avoiding upsetting someone because the child wouldn’t give them a hug on a particular day. Teaching consent starts young and this is a perfect way to do it. It’s also a perfect way to teach your child that if anyone says “no”, then they must respect this too, regardless of if their feelings are hurt in turn. Feelings are always secondary to consent. To those that feel hurt and rejected by a child not wanting a cuddle, it’s time to sit with those feelings. You are not owed their physical affection and “being polite” shouldn’t be the most important thing in these situations, even if it was in the past. Surely this is a classic, know better do better situation, right? 

A child being made to give you a kiss goodbye shouldn’t be the basis of your relationship with them, anyway. Surprisingly, there are a plethora of other ways to build a relationship and often the physical affection will develop naturally with time anyway. Also, there are plenty of alternative greetings to offer if someone doesn’t want a hug. How about a high-five, a big wave, a handshake, blowing a kiss, a fist bump, or singing a song? It’s almost as though it’s not that hard to show you care about each other, while respecting boundaries! What a magical medium!

Thankfully, there was also a significant subset agreeing that consent is rightfully in first place here, with feelings coming second. It’s always refreshing to see these viewpoints in the New Zealand Herald, as it’s all very often a millennials-are-the-root-of-all-problems-stop-eating-avocados-jacindamaniaaaaa echo chamber (and that’s on a good day).

And on that note, onto the poetry. Enjoy the squiggly lines, folks. It’s now 3:24 am (on a different day, but it all blurs, so really it’s just one, endless night over here)  and I’ve just finished ordering our groceries online. What a day, what a day.






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