I came across this short essay and it could be useful for others in thinking about the responsibilities of employers and service providers so I am posting it here. The idea is to adapt the FRIES mnemonic for defining what genuine consent to sex is (Free, Reversible, Informed, Enthusiastic. Specific) to apply to the consent people give (often implicitly) in situations in which people need bodily privacy:
"Planned Parenthood is a nonprofit organisation in the US known, historically at least, for campaigning for and providing contraception and safe abortion. PP promotes the acronym FRIES as a mnemonic for a set of 5 principles underlying ``sexual consent’’. From the Planned Parenthood website:
“Sexual consent is actively agreeing to be sexual with someone. Consent lets someone know that sex is wanted. Sexual activity without consent is rape or sexual assault.
*Freely given.Consenting is a choice you make without pressure, manipulation, or under the influence of drugs or alcohol.
*Reversible.Anyone can change their mind about what they feel like doing, anytime. Even if you’ve done it before, and even if you’re both naked in bed.
*Informed.You can only consent to something if you have the full story. For example, if someone says they’ll use a condom and then they don’t, there isn’t full consent.
*Enthusiastic.When it comes to sex, you should only do stuff you WANT to do, not things that you feel you’re expected to do.
*Specific.Saying yes to one thing (like going to the bedroom to make out) doesn’t mean you’ve said yes to others (like having sex).”
FRIES is a useful and practically applicable "checklist’’ to aid understanding of proper consent to sex. (Note that the application of these criteria to the buying of sex in the sex trade implies that buying sex is almost always rape or sexual assault. Given the success that lobbying for the sex trade has had in recent years, it is to be expected the Planned Parenthood FRIES definition of consent will gradually be altered, weakened or buried altogether.)
Principles 1,2,3 and 5 (FRIS) on the FRIES checklist can be extended more generally to define consent by service users in the context of services and facilities where someone is partially or fully unclothed, or where bodily functions and personal care are performed, or where someone’s partially or fully unclothed body is touched or viewed by others or when someone will be vulnerable by being asleep. These situations include for example medical examinations, shared sleeping accommodation, toilets and changing rooms. In almost all of these situations, consent and the specific things to which one is consenting are normally implied by one’s actions and the understood nature of the service and situation. For example by entering and using a group changing room in a sports centre one is consenting, implicitly, to be viewed in a partially unclothed or naked state by the other users of the changing room, and also consenting to see those other users partially unclothed or naked (which consent, therefore relies on the principle of consent being Informed, in this case by clear, well-communicated policy of the service provider.) However, one is not consenting to being touched by another facility user.
Notwithstanding that consent is implied by actions in this way and need not be verbalised, the consent must nevertheless be FRIS. This has implications for service providers as in the example above. Providers must be able to demonstrate how they know that the consent of service users is freely given, reversible, informed and specific. This implies that providers must consult widely, with clarity including about the law and about the meaning of any words that might be ambiguous (“informed” and “specific”) and without prejudice or threat (“free”) and must adopt clear policy and communicate that policy widely, about what the service is and who will use it."
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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions
FRIES and the concept of consent
13 replies
begonialover · 07/01/2021 16:12
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