Right: Victorian Education Minister James Merlino announces compulsory sexual consent classes in Victorian schools.
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Arguments against compulsory education in sexual consent
1. Sexual consent is best taught within families
It is generally acknowledged that there are key areas of a child's life, especially in areas such as values education, where the parent has the determining role in deciding what the child will be taught. This applies obviously in areas such as religious education. However, it is also argued by some that sex education, particularly as it involves values and the development of human connections, is best taught within the intimate circle of relationships established in a child's family.
Australian public schools acknowledge that parents have a primary and central role in the sexual education of their children. They are seen as the first influence on their children's sexual development. The South Australian Government's guidelines to parents on 'Children and learning about sexuality' state, 'Learning about sexuality means learning about bodies, babies, puberty, gender, relationships, feelings, making decisions and family values. Children build their understanding of these things bit by bit as they grow up...
Children learn from parents - their first teachers. What you think and feel about sexuality has a big influence on how you deal with your child's sexual development. What your own parents said and did, your religion, cultural background and feelings all affect how you approach it. You can help your children to feel healthy and good about themselves and their body by what you say and do. Children also learn from how they see their parents treating each other...'
A primary reason why many believe that sex education (including consent education) is best conducted within families is that parents are most well placed to gauge when their children are ready to receive such education. On August 13, 2018 Family Org New Zealand published an article titled 'Sex education: four reasons why parents are better'. The article argues that parents are the best sex educators because 'School-based sexuality education can only ever provide a blanket-based approach, yet it is far more advantageous when sexuality formation is individually tailored and focused'. The article also maintains that 'Parents know their child far better than any school ever will' and that 'Sexuality education is an area of fundamental human formation, and... [is] the primary responsibility of parents.' The article expands on these arguments stating 'The simple fact is that sexuality education can never be tailored to the needs of the individual child in a classroom setting. Not every child is ready for sexuality education at the same age and time, which means classroom-based sex education fails miserably in this regard because it can only ever provide a one-size-fits-all option.' The article further notes 'Any parent with more than a couple of years of parenting experience under their belt can tell you that one of the biggest components of good parenting is nuance - knowing the when, how and what that is right for each individual child. This ability to parent with nuance only really comes about as the result of a strong awareness of who a child is, and that awareness exists solely because a parent will spend more time with their child than any other person will.'
The same view has been put by Paul Nuttall, the Deputy Leader of the United Kingdom Independence party, who has stated, 'Some parents might want to teach their kids about sex, if the individual child is ready to learn that, but not all children are. The state shouldn't be teaching such things at an age where many kids just aren't ready for it.' The Western Australian guide to parents on children's sexual education quotes one parent of an 11-, a 13- and a 16-year-old boy explaining how he supplies information to his sons when they are ready and as opportunities present themselves. He states, 'I've probably never sat down and discussed the birds and the bees. It's not been like that. They're boys, and you go, we'll have a bit of a chat about that now. It's not even if they ask, it's as if something goes "ping" in my head, and I can connect bits of information. It's been little bits of information as they are ready to absorb it really.'
In an ABC Q & A program televised on March 18, 2021, one of the panellists, Joe Williams, a former NRL player and a mental health advocate also argued that parents know their children best and so are best placed to educate them about consent. Williams stated, 'I know with my kids that I'm going to have more intimate conversations with my kids than a teacher can ever have, because I know my kids. I know their persona; I know everything about my kids. So, we need to get to the point, I believe, that parents are starting to educate their kids...about respect for other people.' A substantial Australian study of parental attitudes to relationship and sex education in schools found that those parents who objected to schools taking on this responsibility were concerned that their children would be introduced to this material before they were experientially ready to do so. These parents believe that they know their children well enough to judge when they are prepared to receive this information. The study referred to parental 'fear about the differing maturity rates amongst children and the type of knowledge that they might be subjected to in school-based sexuality education programs. There was a strong fear that if children accessed certain information about sex and sexuality before they reached "maturity", this would result in their having too much information, too early, to be able to handle this knowledge appropriately.'
2. Compulsorily teaching consent in schools may discourage parents from broaching the issue
Critics of schools assuming responsibility for instructing students in sexual consent argue that this emphasis will encourage parents to feel that they are not capable of supporting their children in developing appropriate sexual attitudes and behaviours. It has also been suggested that some parents may use these school programs as a way of avoiding their responsibility to help their children develop appropriate sexual values and behaviours.
The Victorian Opposition leader, Michael O'Brien, stresses that parents, not schools, have the primary role to play in this area and that any action taken from schools must not serve to diminish the importance of parents in assisting their children to become responsible sexual beings. Michael O'Brien has stated, 'There's more that can be done in the classroom but let's not sideline the role of parents. Ultimately, parents have got the primary job to talk about values with their kids. They can be supported by what happens in schools, but let's not cut parents out of the process.'
The situation in Ireland seems to reinforce Mr O'Brien's concern. Referring to sex education for students in Ireland, the Irish Times has stated, 'Many parents who are in favour of mandatory RSE (Relationship and Sex Education) are delighted to pass on the responsibility of sex education to teachers... The difficulty for many parents...is that they feel teachers are better equipped to deal with the dramatic changes in sexual knowledge that have occurred among children of all ages.'
Similar comments have been made about the situation in Rwanda. The New Times has quoted Aflodis Kagaba, the coordinator of Rwanda's Health Development Initiative, who has claimed most parents are uncomfortable when it comes to talking to their children about sex due to the fear of exposing them to early sexual activities. He has claimed parents shy away, hoping that whatever needs to be learned will be done at school. With this, they do not make time to sit down with their children and properly discuss this subject.
Some psychologists and social commentators have criticised Australian parents for their readiness to offload their responsibilities to help their children mature sexually. Adolescent psychologist Dr Michael Carr-Gregg has claimed that too many parents outsource their children's moral and cultural development to schools. He has stated, 'There are teenage boys who have never had boundaries set. Their parents are clueless narcissists who lavish attention on their kids without ever holding them to account.'
Carr-Gregg has further stated, 'Perhaps it is time we named the catastrophic spinelessness of some parents to set intelligent limits, boundaries and consequences when it comes to the behaviour of their boys...
While schools do need to re-examine what they are doing in terms of sex education and when they are doing it, it is time for parents, grandparents and adult carers to exert a steadying influence, to become the voice of reason to counter this culture of misogyny, entitlement and indulgence.'
Carr-Gregg argues that parents must not either blame or hand over their responsibilities to schools. He has stated, 'It is an oversimplification to point the finger at the education system. Yes, it has a role, but what... [is happening] should be both a warning and a clarion call to the parents of Australia.
It's time to overthrow the republic of weak-willed parenting and reinstate the forgotten pillars of parenting: respect for all, wise, firm, fair and prudent governance.'
It has been argued that children and adolescents look to their parents as role models in sexual relations and as primary sources of guidance. A 2017 Harvard study found that young people want support and information from their parents regarding relationships and issues such as consent. It noted that what they sought from their parents was more guidance on 'how to have a more mature relationship' and 'how to avoid getting hurt'. The lead author of the study, Richard Weissbourd, an American child and family psychologist on the faculty of Harvard's Graduate School of Education, noted that parents tend to assume that their children 'are going to learn to love naturally, or that they will magically or organically figure this out.' He warns, 'There's a lot of evidence that's not the case' and urges parents not to surrender their responsibility to schools or popular culture.
3. Many teachers may not be sufficiently skilled or confident to teach the material
Opponents of compulsory consent argue that many teachers will not be able to deliver the program effectively.
It has been claimed that many teachers are uncomfortable dealing with the more complex and values-based aspects of sex education, such as consent. Jenny Ackland of Sex Education Australia, an independent facilitator that delivers age-appropriate sex-education programs to primary and secondary schools, as well as universities, has claimed that teacher discomfort has led schools to simplify their sex education classes to avoid more controversial material. Ackland has stated, 'Many secondary schools feel safest sticking to what we call the "nuts and bolts" topics, like how not to get pregnant and maybe reproduction-those are a lot easier to talk about because they're black and white, they're fact-based. When you get into other areas like sexual consent, talking to young people can be really difficult and quite uncomfortable.' Ackland suggests that this discomfort dealing with some materials leaves schools conducting a more minimalist program so that they can claim to have met their curriculum obligations, without broaching more complex materials. She explains, 'I think there's fear. Some schools will be ticking boxes.'
A 2020 study conducted by the Durex Network which involved surveying 1,400 parents, teachers and school governors found that teachers' lack of confidence in their own understanding of sex was a major obstacle to effective school-based sex education. A range of reasons have been given to explain teacher discomfort in delivering sex education, including consent education. One of these is that teachers are often apprehensive as to how the material being taught will be regarded by the wider school community. A 2015 University of Newcastle study into teaching sex education in Australian schools found that many teachers were reticent to address more 'sensitive' issues, sometimes because they feared parental disapproval and other backlash within their local communities.
Another reason for teacher unease is that the material is so values-based that they are not sure of the place of their personal attitudes and beliefs in the teaching of this content. An extensive British study conducted by Keele University in 2003 found that many teachers 'were anxious about being criticised if their own values showed.' Part of the reason for this apprehension appeared to be concern that their values may be in conflict with those of some of their students' families and that parents would reject the school's and teachers' intrusion in what they saw as a parental responsibility. It was further noted that individual teacher's previous life experience and personal predispositions significantly affected their ability to teach the subject. The Keele University study concluded, 'Some key factors in teachers' degree of comfort with Sexuality and Relationship Education included their own degree of openness as parents, their personalities, and the nature of their subject disciplines.' A similar conclusion was by a 2018 Grand Valley State University literature review on sex education which concluded, 'In many schools, sexuality education is offered through health classes and research shows that many teachers, regardless of specialization, lack confidence to address issues of sexuality both inside and outside of the classroom.' The same literature review further concluded, 'In a study of elementary teachers' techniques in responding to sexuality related questions, many teachers felt that they could not adequately address issues, and 46 percent of the teachers sampled reported that they felt pressured from the community, parents, or schools to be particularly cautious about providing answers to sexuality related questions. Teachers also report feeling discomfort about the subject of sexuality, and some studies show that teachers resist formal policies and agendas.' It has been claimed by some that the unease of many British teachers conducting sex education has made the programs difficult to administer. One British Sex Education coordinator was quoted as saying, 'No, I wouldn't do it again. It's a lot of hard work, very little appreciation from anybody else, and because there's a lot of staff who don't feel comfortable teaching it, you're the one who gets it in the neck at the end of the day because they're angry about it. Where staff or pupils aren't happy about it, or are threatened by it, it can come out in aggression.
Teacher discomfort appears to impair their capacity to deliver lessons effectively, with another United Kingdom study finding that 'many young people reported disliking having their teachers deliver Sex and Relationships Education and...found that key messages could become lost when interpreted by teachers.'
Dissatisfaction with the way sex education is delivered by teachers was shown by a 19-year-old Bulgarian student interviewed as part of a 2010 study conducted by the Durex Network. The young man stated, 'Our sex education sessions at school were provided by Y-Peer, the Youth Peer Education Network that works with young people in lots of countries. It was good, much better than I'd expect teachers would have handled it.' Critics of the compulsory teaching of consent education in schools argue that it will be difficult to find sufficient teachers able to effectively teach the subject.
4. There is no evidence that consent education reduces instances of sexual assault
Critics of increased consent education in schools argue that such action is misguided because there is no clear evidence that this measure will have any impact on sexual assault.
Opponents of consent education in schools argue that there is no evidence of its effectiveness. On March 9, 2021, Mark Latham, a New South Wales MP and the state leader of One Nation indicated that he had serious reservations about the likely success of consent education in schools. During an interview on Sky News with Paul Murray, Latham stated, 'Is there an evidence base to say you can teach behavioural change effectively in schools? Is there an evidence base that says that you can teach what they call "general capabilities", you know, collaboration, being a better person, and so forth in our schools? And there's a whole series of research reports saying that these are low impact programs for whatever reason.'
Latham went on to cite a report dealing with behaviour management in New South Wales schools which concluded not that behaviour management programs were ineffective, but that there was insufficient evidence to gauge their effectiveness. Referring to consent education specifically, Professor Kerryanne Walsh of the Queensland University's Faculty of Education has suggested that consent education may be a simplistic and ineffective solution and that before schools across Australia focus on consent there needs to be evidence that such education has a positive effect. The professor stated, 'Consent education is not the single silver bullet we need. It risks narrowing multi-component sexual violence prevention education down to one single component. We need to know that consent education will reduce the problem.' Some opponents of consent education claim that there is evidence to suggest that it does not work to reduce sexual assault. The first nation-wide survey in the United States on sexual assault among university students, including its connection with consent education, found that consent education did not appear to reduce the incidence of sexual assault. The 2017 Maclean's Student Survey polled 23,000 undergraduate students at 81 campuses. 60 percent of the students surveyed said they had received some instruction about the definition of consensual sex from an official university source; however, these students were no less likely to be assaulted than those who had not received instruction. The only difference appeared to be that those who had received consent education were more likely to report their assault.
Another 2017 study appears to also indicate that consent education and an 'affirmative consent policy' does not reduce the incidence of young men engaging in sexual activity with young women who had not clearly consented. The study was conducted by a PhD candidate at the University of Michigan who interviewed sexually active heterosexual undergraduate men at a large mid-Atlantic university. The researcher found 'Overall, the way the respondents sought consent in their sexual encounters did not match up with the strategies they claimed to invoke. Respondents were much less likely to ascertain explicit verbal consent and relied on their partners to initiate a conversation about sexual expectations. Most commonly, respondents relied on physical and nonsexual cues like eye contact or an accelerated heart rate to indicate consent, despite the many nonsexual scenarios in which these actions commonly occur.' The researcher further noted that her male subjects 'often assumed consent to one sexual activity communicated consent to all sexual activities. In general, the men in this study did not reliably apply what they had learned about affirmative consent, even though they insisted that they did when expressly asked.' The study concluded, 'College men are receptive to the idea of affirmative consent, but struggle to apply it in their sexual encounters.' Critics of consent education argue that there is no evidence that it is effective and that some studies indicate it does not result in a reduced incidence of sexual assault. Studies conducted at universities in the United States where consent education has been given and where consent policies are in place have found that they are not protective for women, who may subsequently report having been sexually assaulted but were not able to prevent the assault occurring; while university men seemed unable to properly implement the behaviours they had been taught or to recognise when their behaviour was coercive.
5. The school curriculum is already overcrowded
Many of those who oppose consent education in schools argue that schools are being diverted from their main business of instructing in skills such as literacy and numeracy by being required to address a wide range of social issues which would be better dealt with elsewhere.
Some social commentators have argued that schools are being used as stopgaps to address social problems and that their focus is being taken away from their primary purpose of imparting skills education and knowledge. On March 9, 2021, Mark Latham, a New South Wales MP and the state leader of One Nation stated, during an interview on Sky News with Paul Murray, 'It's an interesting aspect of every single social issue...that there's got to be a school-based program to deal with it...Maybe, Paul, at the end of the day you are better off teaching literacy, numeracy, history, science and geography...'
This concern has been expressed for more than a decade. In 2010, Max Angus, Professor of Education at Edith Cowan University, indicated his belief that interest groups were pushing their causes on to schools to solve a variety of social problems. The Professor stated, 'The people who want these things, they're well-intentioned of course, are trying to have the school make up for what previously we expected parents and local communities to teach out of school time.' The then Western Australian Director of Education, Sharyn O'Neill, similarly stated, 'All of these issues must be approached also by parents, by social groups themselves, by other aspects or areas of government.Education plays a large role, and we are very conscious of our responsibility in that, but schools cannot shoulder the burden of all the challenges of society, so we are very keen to work with other groups, other individuals to ensure that young people have all of the education and learning and development that's available to them, but we certainly can't do it all.
Teachers do a fantastic job, but they're not the only ones who have responsibility here.'
The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority published a report in 2018 which stated, 'There is evidence that school curricula tend to be 'crowded' with content that teachers are expected to cover. This is a major focus of the OECD Education 2030 Project, as researchers and educators attempt to address the concerns coming from the field regarding the density of content and the temptation among teachers to 'tick off' items they have taught rather than aspire to providing students with deep learning in fewer areas.'
Some critics have claimed that crowding the curriculum with additional, non-essential content has resulted in students' basic skill level declining. This point was made by the then federal Minister for Education, Dan Tehan, who in 2018 stated, 'Teachers tell me that there is too much being taught and we should be concentrating on developing a deeper understanding of essential content...That is not to say there is not a role for developing skills like problem solving, critical thinking, creativity and teamwork, but those skills cannot be applied if someone doesn't have the basic skills of literacy and numeracy.'
The same point was made by the current federal Minister for Education, Alan Tudge, who, in a March 12, 2021 interview, stated, 'I think that the curriculum has become way too cluttered and maybe taken our eye off the ball on the reading, and the mathematics, and the science, and those core subject areas.' The federal government is currently conducting a review of the national curriculum intended to remove extraneous material. Apparently addressing this problem, a New South Wales curriculum review, to be implemented in 2022, has resulted in what its developers claim will be a stronger focus on key skills. The review found most syllabuses are 'overcrowded' with content and need to be stripped down to focus on what is essential in each subject, while students need more time to master a syllabus before moving to the next one. The New South Wales premier, Gladys Berejiklian stated, 'For our youngsters, the curriculum needs to focus on core subjects of English, Maths and science.' The proposal that consent education be taught in schools has been seen by some critics as an example of less essential material being introduced into school curriculums at the expense of more significant content. On March 12, 2021, Sky News commentator Andrew Bolt cited consent education as an example of what he termed 'peripheral stuff'. Bolt stated, 'Right now there's a petition signed by thousands of schoolgirls calling for better and earlier sexual consent education in schools. Is that really what we need, more lessons on consent rather than on Maths?'