Should Kids Have to Hug Relatives?

This week in ‘things-you-never-thought-were-an-issue’ is a fairly new but very topical debate surrounding children and their personal boundaries. Over the festive period, it is custom to visit relatives or attend parties and it is even more common to be expected to show some affection to your family, usually through the means of hugging or kissing. In a recent post on the US Girl Scouts’ blog, the organisation issued a warning to parents that forcing your daughter to give hugs could give her the wrong idea about consent in the future. This was the reasoning:

“Have you ever insisted, “Uncle just got here—go give him a big hug!” or “Auntie gave you that nice toy, go give her a kiss,” when you were worried your child might not offer affection on her own? If yes, you might want to reconsider the urge to do that in the future.

Think of it this way, telling your child that she owes someone a hug either just because she hasn’t seen this person in a while or because they gave her a gift can set the stage for her questioning whether she “owes” another person any type of physical affection when they’ve bought her dinner or done something else seemingly nice for her later in life.”

While I feel that the best type of affection is that which is offered without being prompted by parents, I don’t think it is sensible or appropriate to equate your mother asking you to hug your granny with rape culture. It is human instinct to want to nurture children by embracing them. The notion that we should be expected to ‘high five’ or ‘air kiss’ younger or older relatives (mentioned later in the same post) is ludicrous.

It is also unhealthy to treat family- extended or otherwise- as strangers. You wouldn’t ask your child to show physical affection to somebody they’ve never met but aunts, uncles and grandparents shouldn’t be treated as strangers. You can’t treat everybody as a potential abuser or threat.

Physical affection is something used across all species to strengthen bonds in families. A hug or kiss is a quick way to express love and belonging.

In the majority of cases, when kids don’t want to hug relatives it’s usually because they’re shy, they want to be left alone with their Christmas presents or they think that old people smell of cabbage.