Uptakes in Relation to Youth Mental Health Rhetoric

Partners for Youth retweeted a post that focused on consent when it comes to sexual activity between its citizens. The percentage of residents in Canada reaches over 50 percent and is a very important topic that needs to be talked about for youths and adults alike.

In class and through a reading, we talked about "uptakes" and how posts, movements, challenges, etc... can be taken out of context and/or have its initial meaning changed with popularity or if it reaches people that can latch onto a specific topic and twist its meanings.

This can have ties with the post mentioned above especially because it is one that was posted on Twitter. Twitter typically has people that will take things and twist them into a meaning that doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the actual topic at hand.

I have seen posts such as this that typically gains traction rather quickly. There are takes where people are genuinely concerned about this statistic and want to do more in terms of spreading information to help those understand what consent is and how important it is to gain it before engaging in anything that could potentially be uncomfortable for the other party.

Uptakes in this case could be the fact that many people assume that the post is talking mainly about victims that are women (even though it says "people.") and typically can become combative in their reply. This energy could be used to help spread information to help more people become informed. But, instead a take like this can cause friction in the comments because of the focus on who are actual victims. (Everyone can be a victim, therefore this information is not harmful and should receive attention that is positive.)

Another uptake that can come out of this post spreading would be that there are people who view consent differently. There could be blurred lines between what people perceive as actual consent. There are those that believe coercion is okay since in the end a "yes" is what they need to consider as consent. There are also those who think that marriage implies that both partners are always consenting properly. Takes like these can cause more friction in comments and between people because some are inclined to believe that there are different ways in receiving consent from the other party.

Bottom line is, either way, information about proper consent between two people needs to be expressed before engaging in any kind of sexual activity. While there are people who don't agree with what consent actually is, there should still be sources and safe spaces for people who would like to inform themselves on the topic. Youths need to be informed especially because of how young and impressionable they can be. In order to help them in situations like this, it would be better for them if they were made aware of how to properly give and gain consent.