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#trending: 2-year-old girl in China refuses to let father bathe her after mother’s sex education talk

A video of a teary two-year-old toddler refusing to let her father bathe her after learning about male and female body parts has gone viral in China.

A toddler from China (pictured) called her father a "hooligan" when he tried to bathe her.

A toddler from China (pictured) called her father a "hooligan" when he tried to bathe her.

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  • A video of a teary two-year-old toddler refusing to let her father bathe her after learning about male and female body parts has gone viral in China
  • The girl cried and called her father a "hooligan" after he asked her to take her clothes off to wash her body
  • Her mother had told her that she "can’t allow other males to touch (her) body" earlier that day
  • Online users showered the mother with praise for teaching the young girl about consent, although some disagreed

TIANJIN, CHINA — A video of a two-year-old girl in China refusing to let her father undress and bathe her after learning about the differences between the sexes has gone viral on social media.

In a video making the rounds on Chinese social networking sites, a teary-eyed toddler can be seen sitting on a low stool in a bathroom while her father prepares to bathe her.

The daughter is heard calling him a “hooligan” while avoiding eye contact with him.

In an attempt to reason with her, the father replies off-camera: “Doesn’t your father have to take your T-shirt and shorts off to wash you? I’m not a hooligan.”

Speaking to Bailu Video, the father, identified only as Mr Guo from Tianjin city in northern China, said that he was taken aback last Friday (Sept 16) when his daughter refused to let him bathe her as he usually does. 

He said that everything had gone smoothly as he helped the girl with brushing her teeth and washing her face. However, she became upset and resisted when he asked her to take her clothes off to wash her body. 

“She burst into tears while pulling her shorts back on and she called me a hooligan. I was stunned,” Mr Guo said.

Hearing the child cry, the mother then came over to explain that she had read a book about the human body, as well as male and female reproductive parts to her daughter earlier that day.

The woman had told her: “You are a girl, so you can’t allow other males to touch your body.”

Apparently, the toddler had taken those words seriously.

Mr Guo said that although he was initially surprised by his daughter’s reaction, he agreed that it was good for her to learn from an early age.

“The earlier she has the sex education, the better she can protect herself. I will be careful about my manners,” he added.

A Weibo post of the video has garnered more than 7.17 million views and 10,115 comments.

Online users showered the mother with praise for teaching the young girl about consent and body safety skills. 

One top comment with 43,000 likes read: “Education is right, very good! (She’s) entering kindergarten soon, (she) can better protect herself.”

But not everyone shared the enthusiasm.

One person questioned: “Then should a mother give a two-year-old boy a bath? When I was young, my father also bathed me. Now that I’m grown, I don’t have any lack of awareness. Stop scheming up ways to leave the matter of childcare to mothers only, alright?”

Most social media users, however, took the mother’s side.

One user wrote: “(I have) seen too many news stories about children getting molested, I feel that there is no problem with the parents’ education. If the mother is busy and only the father can bathe (the child), (he) can tell the child that bathing a baby is not hooligan behaviour, and obtain the baby’s consent (before doing so).”

A fellow mother wrote: “I stopped bathing my son after he turned four. Since then, my husband has taken over the responsibility.”

Citing data from China’s Girls’ Protection Project, South China Morning Post reported that 68 per cent of 9,151 mainland Chinese parents surveyed in 2018 did not provide any sex education to their children at home.

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