Education Dept to update ‘archaic’ sex consent lessons after child safety advocate Sonya Ryan warns teens’ attitudes warped by porn

SA’s Education Department has ordered an immediate curriculum overhaul after experts warned online pornography is warping kids’ concepts of sex and consent.

The state’s education department will strengthen the way sexual consent and respectful relationships are taught in all public schools, including an “immediate update” to ‘Keeping Safe’ curriculum.

The measures were announced Wednesday by Education Department Chief Executive Rick Persse in an email to government school principals and preschool directors at about 900 sites.

It comes as hundreds of secondary school students from across Adelaide are expected to converge on Victoria Square on Thursday calling for sex education reform to end ongoing sexual violence and harassment at schools.

The state’s curriculum has been criticised as “archaic” and in need of urgent update by child safety campaigner Sonya Ryan who warns teenagers are hurting themselves in violent sex acts normalised via pornography.

Sonya Ryan, the mother of murdered teen Carly Ryan, has spent years trying to improve cyber safety for young people. Picture: Matt Turner

The new department measures include:

■ Issuing an immediate update to Keeping Safe, which teaches respectful relationships and child safety, to better highlight consent, with refresher training for schools;

■ Greater practice support for teachers, particularly in secondary schools;

■ A planned review of Keeping Safe content to make sure it’s relevant.

The new measures will be developed with schools, students, parents and Commissioner for Children and Young People Helen Connolly, Commissioner for Aboriginal Children and Young People April Lawrie and Equal Opportunity Commissioner Jodeen Carney.

Ms Ryan said inadequate sex education was compounded by the fact many teens were oblivious to what sexual consent is and ill-equipped with the skills to assert.

She said children as young as 12, particularly girls, were regularly disclosing being forced to engage in violent sexual acts.

The mother of 15-year-old murder victim Carly Ryan and Order of Australia recipient said concerning sexual activity reported included choking and demeaning acts, which required medical treatment and police intervention.

“It’s very, very common for girls to report that they think letting the guy choke them or slap them during sex is what they should be doing,” Ms Ryan said.

The Carly Ryan Foundation was started by Carly's mum, Sonya, to create awareness and educate children and parents using the internet.

“And a lot of it comes from access to pornography and an archaic curriculum not equipping them with the tools they need to know what consent is, feels like and looks like.”

The disclosures are being made during and after online safety and healthy relationship sessions run in state and public upper primary and secondary schools across the nation since 2018 by the Carly Ryan Foundation.

The foundation was established by Ms Ryan in memory of her daughter, who was murdered at Port Elliot in 2007 by a serial paedophile who groomed her online.

“Consent and sexual violence is a massive, massive issue. It’s out of control and it’s tragic,” Ms Ryan said.

“Kids are being left to fumble through it on their own and the result can be self-harm, terrible anxiety and serious physical and emotional damage.”

More than 7500 signatures have been added to a petition set up by Adelaide High School students calling for an end to sexism and sexual assault in schools. One of the online petitioners says: “Sexual ed taught me about wet dreams and not consent. Our sex education is … around the male experience and there is not adequate education on rape and sexual assault.”

Pressure from partners and peers, and fear of exclusion, rejection and bullying were commonly reported by students as reasons for engaging in sexual activity, with which they were either fearful or uncomfortable

“The dialogue we hear is ‘Suck it up’, ‘Accept you will lose your virginity’, ‘Do what he says’ and ‘Don’t be frigid’,” Ms Ryan said.

She said updated sex education to include real-time consent issues affecting children today also needed to be backed up with reform of sexual consent laws.

If you or someone you know needs help, call Yarrow Place Rape and Sexual Assault Service 1800 817 421 or Kids Helpline on 1800 551 800.

For resources visit https://www.carlyryanfoundation.com/resources/fact-sheets

CALL TO CHANGE LAWS TO REQUIRE ‘AFFIRMATIVE CONSENT’

South Australian sexual consent laws need updating in line with interstate plans to ­introduce “yes means yes” legislation, legal, political and child safety leaders say.

Women’s Legal Services SA chief executive Zita Ngor said more women had reported sexual assault and harassment since Covid-19 and that the state’s sexual consent laws were failing them.

“Even if they are successful in having charges laid, often the focus of the legal process in SA is on the victim and the victim is persecuted for things they have or haven’t done, like failing to cry out for help or immediately reporting to police,” Ms Ngor said.

Women’s Legal Services SA chief executive Zita Ngor.

She said affirmative consent laws, similar to those being proposed in NSW, put the onus of responsibility for consent on both parties, making the court process far less adversarial for the victims.

“Perpetrators are then not able to escape responsibility by claiming that they didn’t know consent was not being given,” Ms Ngor said.

Affirmative consent means the individual seeking to have sex with another person must obtain clear, expressed consent before, and while, engaging in a sexual act.

Under SA laws, sexual consent happens when people feel safe being sexual without pressure, fear, manipulation, or threats, understand and are awake and in control of what they or the other person wants and are the legal age to consent, which is 17 or older.

Child safety advocate and founder of the Carly Ryan Foundation, Sonya Ryan, said: “There is a real need to increase understanding of all the conditions that need to be met in order for consent to really be achieved and, equally, the conditions which can compromise consent.”

Attorney-General Vickie Chapman has sought advice from the Director of Public Prosecutions and SA Police on current consent laws in SA and those being proposed by NSW.

“If there are loopholes, grey areas or weaknesses identified in our state’s sexual consent legislation, rest assured, we will do what we can to address them,” Ms Chapman said.

Opposition status of women spokeswoman Katrine Hildyard is pushing for a parliamentary inquiry into whether existing sexual consent laws, education and programs were adequate and well understood, and what changes might be required to strengthen rights.

SA Law Society president Rebecca Sandford said the principle of an affirmative model of consent had “significant merit” but needed careful thought to ensure fundamental legal rights were protected.

She said while it was impossible to predict if an affirmative consent model would lead to better outcomes, explicitly entrenching those expectations in law could reinforce the standards of sexual consent that should be observed and expected.

If you or someone you know needs help call Yarrow Place Rape and Sexual Assault Service on 1800 817 421, or RESPECT on 1800 737 732