I was having a chat with a friend of mine about giving consent in sex and the importance of understanding it. He jokingly asked me if I want a cup of tea. I had no clue what it was and answered, “Thanks! Maybe later.” He busted out laughing and showed me a video. Turned out, that was a metaphor used to discuss about consent, which was quite funny.
A delight metaphor for consent
“Tea Consent” is a hilarious video made by the Emmeline May and Blue Seat Studios featuring stick figures. I don’t know why but some people really have a problem understanding the fact that before you have sex with anyone (EVERY SINGLE TIME, NOT JUST ONE!) you have to make sure they want to have sex with you. This goes for men, women, and everyone.
In the video, the narrator lists out all the possibilities that can happen when we’re dealing with sexual consent, of course by using the imagination with a cup of tea. Basically, instead of initiating sex, imagine yourself making a cup of tea and offering it to another person. In the most simple situation where the consent is not given, in a-cup-of-tea case, it is, “No, thank you, I don’t want tea now”, you cannot force that cup of tea down that person’s throat because you feel like they are obligated to take it because you make it for them.
Is this a stupid analogy? In your head: Yes, you know this already—of course, you wouldn’t force someone to drink tea because they said yes to a cup last week. Of course, you wouldn’t pour tea down the throat of an unconscious person just because they said yes to tea 5 minutes ago. It’s pretty transparent, you have no right to coerce someone into drinking that cup of tea, no more than the right to force someone to have sex with you. If you still think this is irrelevant and consent is more complicated than that, you might just need to take a course on sexual consent!
Consent is everything, tea or sex! So my friend and I were giggling the whole time when we watched the video. He said because of this video, now he cringes whenever he hears “a cup of tea”.