A high school lesson around cybersafety had raised at least one complaint after a group of Year 8 students were taught about sexting in a way that appeared to be victim-blaming.
At least one parent has lodged an official complaint to the University High School in Melbourne, a co-educational public school in Parkville, after students were taught concepts such as “There is no such thing as safe sexting”; “If you take or send these photos, you’re publishing them”; and “As an adult, if someone forwards these pictures, no one can stop them. It’s no longer illegal.”
A 13-year-old student at the school told PEDESTRIAN.TV that in Thursday’s health class – i.e. on International Women’s Day – students watched a video called Tagged.
“It was your run-of-the-mill, don’t cyber bully video for about twelve minutes, but the last four took a 180 turn into ‘don’t sext ever’,” the student said.
“In the last section, the character Kate’s sexts were released online by her angry ex Jack. Though he was in trouble with the police, he didn’t get in trouble for this, and Kate had to change schools to ‘escape her shame’.
“After the video we had to do a few ‘CyberSmart’ activities related to the video such as writing a Facebook friend request between Kate and her old friends, including Jack (the ex who had posted revenge porn of her).
“When I asked by substitute teacher about the exercise, he told me that they ‘aren’t supposed to make sense, they are meant to make you think.’ I told him that it made me think that CyberSmart wasn’t a good program.”
Her mum, Amy Gray, a prominent feminist writer and digital rights campaigner, told P.TV that she was “stunned this victim-blaming rhetoric” was taught to her child.
“While we are all aware teachers are under pressure to quickly deliver lessons with little time or resources, more thought needs to be given to the impact of their lessons because that’s the big issue here: today 26 kids learnt today that we should blame girls for their agency and not boys for non-consensually sharing intimate images,” she said. “The impact of that is staggering: if those girls actually experience the crime they will feel too isolated to tell anyone because they just had a victim-blaming PowerPoint slide and sad little youth video created by the Australian government.”
https://twitter.com/_AmyGray_/status/971519790945771521
Tagged, a short drama, was created in 2012 by the eSafety Commissioner. Its aim is to teach young people about potential risks and consequences associated with negative online behaviours, and has had positive impact from independent reviews from both students and teachers.
It also comes with resources and lesson plans to allow teachers to select the activities they feel are best for their students.
“We regularly educate our students about the dangers of sexting, cyberbullying and what constitutes a respectful relationship using the range of Department and Government resources available to us,” school principal Heather Thompson told P.TV.
“We’ve spoken to a parent about their concerns and are moving forward to resolve the issue. If anyone else has any concerns my door is always open.”
A spokesperson for the Victorian Department of Education told P.TV that it’s “important to educate and empower students to respond to issues such as cyber bullying and how to be safe online. Many students encounter these issues in their daily lives.”
“While Tagged is a resource from the e Safety Commissioner it has won a number of national and international awards and the Department links to it from its Bullystoppers website and supports its use in schools,” they said, adding that the department is investing a further $2.5 million into accessibility for an online cybersafety program.
Gray tells P.TV that while she accepts the school’s apology and understands that schools are under-resourced, she’s keen for the programme itself to change, and has suggested workshops that deal with sexting in more forward-thinking, 2018-friendly ways.
“We change the culture by changing our standards and actually doing something,” she said. “This isn’t just about [my daughter], it’s about those kids who went through that lesson and it’s about any kid who witnesses this teaching material and feels isolated as a result.”
If you are dealing with issues around revenge porn or bullying, you can call the Kids Helpline (ages 5–25) on 1800 55 1800.
