Opinion: Beating sexual violence starts with boys and their peers

The real cure for rape culture starts with boys and their peers, and a Brisbane student has emerged a shining example, writes Kylie Lang.

A consent app is not the answer to preventing sexually assault. Peer pressure is what is desperately needed.

While I sympathise with the reasons behind the NSW Police Commissioner’s now widely derided proposition – Mick Fuller was flagging something new because existing methods are failing – the notion of consent won’t be any less complex or better understood because of an app.

If anything, it stands to be a licence for perpetrators to get away with sex crimes, because, “Hey, look, she ticked ‘yes’, so even though she said ‘no, please stop’ while I was on top of her, I knew she really wanted it.”

The secret to changing an unacceptable culture of power and control lies within close friendship groups, and the values young people bring to those groups from their experiences at home.

School-based programs and costly government campaigns certainly can’t hurt, but the real shift in mindset hinges on daily interactions with trusted others.

Deakin University senior research fellow Josh Roose, who specialises in masculinity and extremism, says there is a “really strong, underlying normative anti-woman attitude in society”, particularly among younger men.

Men over 55, who’ve grown up around the first wave of feminism in the late ’60s and ’70s and “seen the before and after picture of what rights were and what they are now”, hold more positive attitudes on women’s place in society, Dr Roose says.

Brisbane Boys’ College captain Mason Black has spoken about his mother Michelle Monsour's experiences with sexual harassment and abuse. Picture: Instagram

Younger men, he told ABC Radio National on Thursday, are subjected to a variety of other influences, including online porn, and view women as being “given a set of rights or entitlements they haven’t earned”.

Critically, Dr Roose’s research has found the greatest influence comes from peers and parents – and not from education campaigns.

“Boys are bringing the attitude of their home life to school, of their parents and particularly their male role models, so we need to start working on what parents and close friends are saying and thinking about women.”

You’d be hard pressed to find a better example of a young man championing change than Mason Black.

Mason is the school captain at Brisbane Boys’ College and on Thursday night, his proud mother Michelle sent me a link to the powerful speech he gave to his peers.

I watched it over and over, appreciating not only the message but the courage it would have taken.

“Too many of my friends, our friends, too many of my loved ones, your loved ones, and too many women around Australia are victims of sexual assault,” Mason said.

“The narrative needs to change. Boys, it feels like no matter where we look, this issue is not at the forefront of everyone’s mind, but why not?

“How can it be that even with all of our money and laws every day women around our country continue to be abused, raped, psychologically vilified and denied the basic human rights that most males take for granted?”

Referencing the idea of a consent app, Mason said he understood the good intention but “has our society degraded so far that in this day and age, women have to have an app to say no?”.

Brisbane Boys’ College captain Mason Black spoke about his mother Michelle Monsour's experiences with sexual harassment and abuse. Picture: Instagram

“What you really need is a basic acceptance and respect and that, boys, is on all of us.

“Boys, if a woman wants to say no, and she says no, we have to listen, understand and accept this.

“This rape culture is so deeply ingrained in today’s world, and it needs to be addressed.

“As good as this message is coming from public speakers or staff, it’s up to us: the boys.

“It makes me feel sick and it makes me feel embarrassed that our school is featured in the testimonies of young women who are victims of sexual assault,” he said, referencing a recent report in The Courier-Mail.

“If you have ever objectified a woman based on her looks, talked about females in a misogynistic way, or taken advantage without consent, you are part of the problem.

“Stop being boys, be human.

“This starts with putting an end to slurs and derogatory comments about women.

“It means standing up to any man, no matter how big they are if we see it happening, and we have to keep our mates accountable, no matter where it may be.

“Each and every one of us have an obligation to each other to not follow the ways of the past, and to take our future on a new path, a path that uplifts and values women for who they are, appreciates their intelligence, strength and inner beauty, and most importantly empowers them to live a life where they can walk at night without fear, they can wear whatever they want without judgment, and they feel supported to be themselves not to change to be anyone different.”

Mason’s speech has, as they say, gone viral. It has had more than 400,000 views on Instagram alone.

It deserves to go around the globe a million times over.

Change will happen fastest when young men accept it is necessary and just, and act accordingly.

Kylie Lang is associate editor of The Courier-Mail