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    Toolkit / Chapter 12 / Activity 12.01

    To consent or not to consent?

    Worksheet.5.1.pdf

    Methodology inspired and adapted from the activity ‘The matter of consent’ from the  manual ‘It is all one curriculum: Guidelines and Activities for a Unified Approach to Sexuality, Gender, HIV, and Human Rights’, 2009 , Available for free download at:  https://www.ippf.org/resource/its-all-one-curriculum

    Duration of activity: 60-80 min (depending on whether the videos will be shown)

    Learning objectives:

    • Understand what consent really means 
    • Explore the conditions necessary to have clear, free, informed and meaningful consent

    Materials needed:

    Recommended prior reading:

    • Section 5.4: Creating a safe, comfortable and inclusive space
    • Section 5.6: Teaching about sensitive and controversial issues
    • Section 5.7 : Dealing with difficult questions
    • Section 5.8: How to respond to disclosure of violence
    • Section 5.9: Further facilitate participants’ path to safety
    • Section 7.4: Tips for engaging participants online (if applicable)
    • Section 7.2: Creating a safe, welcoming space for participants online (if applicable)

    Step by step process of the activity: 60 min

    1. Introducing the topic by asking young people to brainstorm on what consent is
    2. Probe young people further by asking them to think of the conditions that are necessary for a person to have consent. Introduce the concept of free, informed and meaningful consent. Write young people’s responses on the board/flipchart (5-10 min)
    3. If not mentioned , make sure the following are written down. More specific explanations of these are included in the theoretical background above
      • Consent is active. It is verbal and given as a clear, unmistaken ‘yes’
      • Consent is a conscious choice. This needs to be given with a clear mind (not under the influence of alcohol or drugs) and with a clear understanding of what the sexual activity entails.
      • Consent is based on equal power: In many cases, the degree of controlor power a person has is unclear or may be open to negotiation. In some situations, it can make a difference just to remember you have the right to decide for yourself whether or not you want to participate in a particular sexual activity
      • Consent is a process: you can change your mind any time. You need to be in a situation where your decision will be accepted and respected
      • Consent is always necessary
      • The absence of a yes is always a ‘no’
    4. Separate the plenary in 6 groups in a fun, interactive way
    5. Give 2 scenarios in each group and invite them to discuss whether the conditions for free, informed and meaningful consent are present. The groups have 5-10 min to do so
    6. Come back to plenary and ask the groups to present each scenario, discussing their opinion on whether free and meaningful consent was given in each case. Open up the discussion in plenary to see if other young people think differently. 
    7. Wrap up the discussion of each scenario by going through the conditions for free and meaningful consent and trying to see if they’re present in the story (20 min)
    8. Once the scenarios are presented, ask young people to go back to their scenarios and think what the people in the story could do to ensure clear. free and meaningful consent. Invite them to write their suggestions and then present them in plenary (10-15 min)
    9. If you have the time, close the activity by showing the following videos (or only 1 or 2 of them) and discuss their key messages in plenary (20-25 min)
    Take home messages and activity wrap up:

    The take home messages of this activity are the conditions under which free, informed and meaningful consent can be given and which were discussed in the beginning of the exercise. You can wrap up the activity by asking young people what the take home messages were for them and what new knowledge/new understandings they gained. You can go through the first flipchart of the conditions for free, meaningful consent once last time as a reminder.
    Tips for facilitators

    Consent is not always a black and white concept for young people (even though in reality it is) and young people may be ‘fuzzy’ or resort to grey areas, trying to justify situations where there is no free/active/meaningful consent on account of these ‘fuzzy’ lines . Such ‘fuzzy’ areas may be the absence of a no to mean a yes, difficulty to understand how trying to encourage a partner to have sex by being ‘nice’ and buying them presents is in fact manipulative and coercive, considering previous sexual relations with the partner to connote consent or mistaking compliance in a marriage/long term relationship to suggest consent. It is important to explain and emphasize that consent is present only when it takes place in the absence of any coercive/manipulating situations, when it is completely free, clear, emphatic and active.Some young people may also bring into the discussion the fact that it is emotionally difficult or disappointing to hear your partner say ‘no’ to you, as this may be internalized as rejection. You can acknowledge these feelings and then focus the discussion again on the key message of this activity: that in a relationship, things need to be equal and both partners need to feel safe, respected and their needs need to be acknowledged. In this lens, even though it sometimes may be disappointing for one partner, overstepping the other partner’s boundaries is not an option and it is actually a violation of their bodies and human rights.

    Tips for adapting the activity and follow up:

    Select case studies that reflect common situations in your local setting and adapt them by changing names or other details to better fit your context and your group. Also feel free to develop alternative case studies that may be more relevant to your local context.

    Adapting the activity for online implementation
     
    ● For this activity, you can use only the stories or only the videos to generate a discussion on consent. If you have time, you can use both, starting with the videos and moving on to the stories (or vice-versa too).

    ● Before you go on to the video, it is important that you provide some conceptual background about consent, helping participants distinguish between consent and non-consent. You can do this by facilitating a brainstorming session over your preferred online platform (Whiteboard, Padlet, Mentimeter, Slido etc.) and then a hold short discussion afterwards.

    ● When you get to the stories, you may opt to show them one by one on a PPT slide and discuss them in plenary. Pick the ones that most appeal to you and would also appeal to your group. A good idea is to ask one of the participants to read through the story from the slide, as this will engage the group more. To create more interaction, you can ask participants to ‘vote’ on whether consent was present either by using the thumps up icon or by raising a coloured piece of paper in front of the camera, to indicate their response. 

    ● Alternatively, you can break the plenary into smaller groups in breakout rooms and allocate them a different story for discussion. A follow up discussion can take place in plenary on each scenario, and facilitators can provide the key messages.

    ● A more interactive adaptation of the activity entails turning these scenarios into an online quiz (using Quizziz for instance) with participants voting on whether consent was present or not. When you’re setting up the quiz, please remember to pre-program enough time to allow participants to read the scenario properly and take in the required information.
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