If a schoolboy can call out misogyny on a bus, so can experts on reality TV

A schoolboy calling out misogynist behaviour by Wesley students has set an example ‘experts’ on the TV show MAFS must follow.

To the young, male St Michael’s Grammar student who called out the “disgusting” behaviour towards women of a group of fellow private school boys on a bus this week, you are our hope and light.

Proof of the turning tide which means many men will no longer stand by and watch others insult and humiliate women, as the group of boys from elite Wesley College did on Monday, following the March 4 Justice.

The boys club is fracturing and falling apart.

Led by courageous women like sex abuse survivor, Australian of the Year, Grace Tame, and former Liberal Party staffer Brittany Higgins who has alleged rape at Parliament House – and supported by an ever-louder chorus of voices demanding change – the time is up for tacit consent of sexism and misogyny.

Sex abuse survivor Grace Tame is leading the charge for change. Picture: Sam Mooy/Getty Images

That the 16 year-old St Michael’s student’s letter to Wesley College was quickly acted on by the school principal Nick Evans, who labelled the behaviour of the students “highly offensive” and “disrespectful”, in a letter to the school community, shows the change is being driven from the top down as well as from the bottom up.

“I am sad because this is indicative of behaviour I have witnessed too often from too many men. Casual misogyny and sexism are so often expressed in all male conversations. This episode is no exception. I am ashamed not just because this reflects poorly on a school I love, but also because there have been times in my life, particularly my youth, when I was a bystander of such conversations and thus helped perpetuate them,” Mr Evans wrote to parents on Tuesday afternoon.

“However, I am also hopeful because young people, young women and young men, are not prepared to be bystanders any longer. I am hopeful because this may presage the change required in society.”

Actions speak louder than words, however, so let’s hope the perpetrators are, the very least, suspended.

The women subjected to disgraceful behaviour by the Wesley College students on a bus on Monday were coming back from the March 4 Justice protest. Picture: Matrix Media

The St Michael’s student called out the misogyny, the male bus driver acknowledged the discomfort the targets of the abuse were feeling, and supported them to leave, and the male school principal labelled the behaviour of students of his own prestigious, private school, shameful.

It’s progress.

But it’s progress which is sadly let down by television shows like the ratings juggernaut Married at First Sight (MAFS), which sees women delivered relationship advice from so called “experts”, effectively encouraging them to stay in toxic environments, in the hope they get better.

Humiliated and badly treated MAFS “brides” are consistently advised to ‘look for the good’ in their angry, rude or disrespectful partners, and persevere in “the experiment”, which sees them wed to complete strangers, because things might turn around, in time.

Maybe, tomorrow, you will edge slightly upwards in your “husband’s” esteem, and he’ll be a little nicer to you? Just a little less disrespectful and rude. And then, maybe, the next week, he won’t put you fourth in a line-up of women he finds most desirable on the show?

Married At First Sight’s new sex coach Alessandra Rampolla. Picture: Channel 9

Try some “intimacy exercises”, courtesy of our very own sexpert, and see if that helps things along? Try and understand where he’s coming from. Tolerate the intolerable just a little bit longer, and live in hope he may treat you with more respect one day soon.

That’s the message consistently being given to the show’s nearly one million – many young - viewers.

So what is the culpability of hit reality TV shows which treat women like meat?

TV relationship shows have formed part of our popular culture, which provides them with a unique opportunity to send a clear message to viewers – humiliation and abuse of women, in any form, will not be tolerated.

Watching women being humiliated is not entertainment, on a bus, on the street, in a pub, at Parliament House, or on TV.

If a 16 year-old boy on a bus can call it out, surely so too can psychologists with a platform like MAFS.