Prime minister Scott Morrison will discuss reforms to combat rape culture with Chanel Contos, whose petition calling for earlier sex education in schools prompted hundreds of testimonies from former Sydney schoolgirls about sexual assault earlier this year.
Speaking after briefing other federal MPs on Thursday, Contossaid concepts such as sexual coercion are still “not understood by the wider community” although policymakers, including the curriculum authority, were now taking them seriously.
Currently studying in London, Contos shot to prominence in mid-February when a poll she conducted on social media asking whether any of her friends who attended Sydney private schools had been raped or sexually assaulted went viral.
The societal focus on eliminating sexual harassment and assault has only grown stronger due to the federal government’s handling of Brittany Higgins’ allegation she was raped by a fellow Liberal staffer, and public controversy over an education campaign that included a video teaching sex consent through milkshakes.
Contos is also petitioning the New South Wales parliament for earlier, holistic consent education in the NSW curriculum and is just 4,000 signatures short of triggering a parliamentary debate on the proposal.
On Thursday Contos spoke to a group of 10 to 15 federal MPs, in an event organised by Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young, Liberal MP Dave Sharma and Labor deputy leader in the Senate, Kristina Keneally.
Contos set out the need for a shift away from a culture in which rape is pervasive and normalised due to societal attitudes about gender and sexuality.
“The concept of rape culture, although it sounds extreme, is completely valid,” she said, citing the fact that sexual assault is common among young Australians’ early sexual experiences.
While the prime minister did not attend the briefing on Thursday, Contos said she had been notified he had agreed to her request for a separate meeting. A time and a place for the meeting has yet to be finalised.
Contos wants high schoolchildren to be taught about concepts including sexual coercion and “fawning”, a strategy in which potential victims are nice to a perpetrator to survive an ordeal such as sexual assault.
“We need to tell them from a young age that sexual assault includes oral sex,” she said.
“That the rapist to most worry about is not the one that might jump at you in an alleyway but the person you trust, who you might kiss consensually earlier in the night.
“We need to teach them about intoxication, that if a person is intoxicated they cannot consent. If your tactic for a night out is to get someone drunk, that is not consent.”
Sex education is currently taught too late, with 50% of children already sexually active when it begins in year 10, Contos said.
Similarly, given the average age for first accessing pornography is 11, children need improved literacy that “consent isn’t exhibited in porn but is important”, she said.
Contos said Alan Tudge, appointed education minister in the March reshuffle, had been proactive in response to the “milkshake video disaster”, removing problematic material from the website.
Contos was also heartened by a review currently being undertaken by the Australian Curriculum and Reporting Authority, which she was confident would emphasise consent at a younger age.
While primary school aged children would learn about respect and empathy, early high school students would learn about consent, with concepts like power and sexual coercion introduced by years 9 and 10.
Hanson-Young said Contos’ voice “needs to be heard by every member of parliament” so she, Sharma and Keneally will share the recording with them.
“Chanel made it quite clear the issue is widespread and insidious and there’s an underlying problem with respect for women and an issue with understanding consent,” she said.
“But there is a solution. Chanel’s plea to us as members of parliament today was that the solution isn’t hard, it requires well-resourced, effective education in all schools.
In addition to “holistic consent education”, Contos wants “policy change, legislative change, resource reallocation and to engage youth experts in community … for a cultural shift”.
In the budget’s women’s economic statement the Morrison government allocated $4.7m over two years to strengthen criminal justice responses to sexual assault, sexual harassment and coercive control.
This will reportedly include a scoping study into specialist courts to deal with sexual assault cases and pressure on the states to standardise penalties for rape.
Contos said she was “100%” in support of specialist courts, arguing they were “essential to getting a safer environment”.
“But the focus needs to be on prevention, it’s already too late if they’re in courtroom.”
