On The Couch with Katrina Marson Transcript

CONTENT WARNINGS: This episode references sexual assault, sexual violence and child sexual abuse. 

1800RESPECT - 1800 737 732 

Maddy Stratten: [00:00:00] Hi, and welcome to another episode of On The Couch, where we collaborate with experts, practitioners, authors, advocates, and influencers to explore current social themes, sex positive topics, and share stories and insights that matter.

Winnie Adamson: This podcast was recorded on Aboriginal country. We Acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands that were never seeded on which we live, work, and record upon.

Maddy Stratten: We pay our respect to elders past and present, and to those who may be visiting our website or listening to our podcast today

Winnie Adamson: while listening. We encourage you to practice good self-care, and of course, check the show notes for further information

Maddy Stratten: wherever you are, whatever you're doing,

Winnie Adamson: enjoy this episode of On the Couch.

Maddy Stratten: My name is Maddy Stratten and I'm joined today by our guest Katrina Marson. Hi Katrina.

Katrina Marson: Hi Maddy.

Maddy Stratten: So our listeners can read your full bio in the show notes, but as always, we love to [00:01:00] introduce the concepts of fields of existence and coordinates of belonging to help introduce our guests.

So I'll start just by giving a a bit of a background about what these concepts are. They were introduced to us by Leah from co-culture Communication, and they demonstrate that our beings are a field of activity made up of stories that we've been told, our ancestors that have existed, the land under our feet, and the places where we stand.

And all of these forces form who we are as contextual beings. So, Katrina, to start us off, how do you define and locate yourself and what are your coordinates of belonging?

Katrina Marson: Thank you and thank you to, uh, Leah for introducing me to this way of explaining or understanding ourselves. I hadn't come across it before.

Um, and it just seems to sort of really align with a lot of the, other work that you might [00:02:00] find in the sex education space as well, in terms of understanding ourselves as contextual and informed by so much of our, um, context and the relationships we have and our histories. So for me, um, I suppose one thing that really is important to me is the fact that, I, I've lived and worked on Ngunnawal and Ngambri country, also known as Canberra for, um, all of my life.

I am here because both of my parents came to Canberra to study, their degrees in librarianship and that's how they met. Um, my mother is of Croatian descent. My grandfather migrated here in the fifties, under difficult circumstances and eventually was able to bring his wife and my aunt over, and then very soon after my mom was conceived.

Um, so thanks to his forbearance. Um, we are here. On my father's side, um, sort of Anglo convict [00:03:00] extraction all the way back, um, and sort of coming down out of Armidale, uh, in Brisbane. He made his way to Canberra. Like I said, they met doing their, librarian degree. And that's important because, I have a real love of libraries and it seems to, they seem to feature in my work both in a very real sense. I do a lot of my work in libraries. I work for myself and I study and I spend a lot of time in the national library. Um, and I've produced a lot of my work in the national library and in fact the national library is where, both of my parents were working the year that they had me and libraries as the symbol.

Um, not only is the symbol in very real terms as well, but symbolically they are houses of information and they are, safe spaces for people to come and access information. And librarians are traditionally very staunchly anti censorship. Um, they're very, as an industry, it's very, um, pro access to information, which [00:04:00] as you can no doubt tell, really aligns with, my work and my philosophy when it comes to sex education. So I have a real affinity with libraries and I sort of don't think that was an accident. Um, the other, institution moving away from libraries that, that I've really had a foot in is the criminal justice system. Um, I have worked in the ACT criminal justice system for the balance of my career, mostly at the DPP, also at Legal Aid, and I specialized in sexual offenses.

I also then, um, I led the implementation of the child abuse fraud commission's, criminal justice recommendations here in the ACT. So my specialization in sexual offenses, has really taken place in this jurisdiction. And it's been a combination of coalface practice, legislative reform, research, and advocacy.

And that has always been really intertwined with my work on sex education as well. So I, my interest in sex ed began when I did [00:05:00] my honors thesis. So before I went to practice, uh, as a criminal lawyer, and I compared the capacity of the criminal justice system with education to, prevent sexual violence.

And the research is, um, I found was fairly clear that education is more effective than the law. Partly because the criminal law is reactive, by nature and for a whole lot of other reasons. Um, and even though I found that I, I, once I graduated, I went straight to practice in the criminal law.

But it was there as I said that I specialized in sexual offenses. And that really gave my kind of intellectual position that, that the criminal justice system is inadequate in responding to sexual violence or certainly in preventing it. That really gave that experience a human face because of, what I saw at the coalface and the work that's done there.

So um, that sort of ultimately over 10 years sent me back in the direction of sex education and I did a Churchill Fellowship in 2019 and I looked at the implementation of relationships and sexuality education in different parts of Europe and North [00:06:00] America. I really wanted to answer the question of that, um, practicality of implementing good RSE or relationships and sexuality education because in Australia, you know, we've had decades of research and advocacy talking about the importance of sex education, what its protective powers or protective potential can be, and yet it never seemed to translate into actual kids in actual classrooms getting actual lessons or opportunities to have these conversations.

And I just wanted to understand. What was that gap, from a kind of practical policy sense. So that's what I went to explore overseas. I came back and spent a little bit more time in the criminal justice system and wrote a book that really, threaded those two, um, pathways of my research together. And that experience and that process of writing that book, led me to the point where I, I decided I wanted to focus on sex education full time to do my PhD so I could kind of explore some of these things with a lot [00:07:00] more depth and rigor.

Particularly the philosophical and moral questions around sexuality education. And so that's what I'm doing now. Um, so I hope that that's an adequate sort of picture of my journey here and the things that I've been part of and that have been part of me and the things that I love and care about.

So, yeah, I hope that that gives you a sort of useful insight to contextualize the conversation we'll have today.

Maddy Stratten: Yeah. Thanks, Katrina. I think it's just such a, a, a better experience hearing it from you than from me reading out your bio because we really get an idea of, of the journey of how you have landed where you are today and doing this in really important work.

But, before we get into talking about this advocacy work for comprehensive sexuality and relationships, education or as you said, we'll call it RSE today, I recall hearing you, um, talk about libraries and that really being an important place, in your own [00:08:00] experience of sex ed.

Can you start by reflecting on your experience of sex ed?

Katrina Marson: Yeah. Actually, funnily enough, and I hadn't put this together yet, my story of it actually starts in a library. So I, I hadn't put this together. I obviously talk about them a lot, just like subconsciously just, um, my focus. I remember being in year four, so like nine or 10 years old, and we were read, um, Where Did I Come From?

A lot of people would remember that book, A Picture book. I think it was written in the seventies. Um, that's very much about the, I guess the process of reproduction, but it also has all sorts of other cultural messages that are, um kind of invisibleized in it, in terms of heteronormativity, um, everyone in it is white, for example.

It really focuses on, this being something that happens in the context of, a monogamous relationship, presumably a marriage. And in the [00:09:00] context of love and that sort of thing. But it was my first recollection of sex ed in a school setting, certainly. And our teacher read it to us and we were all really intrigued.

And this was before the age of the internet being in our pocket. So if we wanted more information, it wasn't like we could kind of go and look for it ourselves except in perhaps a library. And so my friends and I would go to the school library where this book was, we knew where it was on the shelves, and we would kind of sit there in a circle, reading it over and over again. Like, I dunno what we thought, what extra information we thought we were gonna get for, or maybe we were just kind of like curious and, and intrigued by it. I just, and it was this sort of clandestine thing, like we didn't wanna get caught by the librarian doing it 'cause we knew that there was something sort of embarrassing and taboo about it.

But I just think that that really depicts a lot of the, um, issues with sex ed back then. And, you know, for a lot of people in Australia, not much has changed for a lot of young Australians, but the fact that it was kind of hidden [00:10:00] that there was like a limited source of information, um, that we were kind of hungry for more information but weren't able to access it.

We had limited agency, I suppose, as seekers of this information. So I I find that quite a, um, useful illustration I suppose. And then I remember getting in year nine, maybe like condoms on bananas sort of thing. And I'm sure there would've been other little bits and pieces along the way, but nothing that really stuck in my mind apart from those two, uh, incidents.

One in year four and then the lesson in year nine. And it was really focused on, what my colleague Jackie Hendrix calls bugs bodies and babies. Like, it's really that reproduction. Don't get an STI don't get pregnant. And that was sort of the limited focus of it.

Maddy Stratten: Yeah. I think, um, many people who are listening probably had a very similar experience.

For me it was those quiet chats in the quad in like recess and lunch being like, oh, but have you had this? And like, did you know that actually you could put your mouth on this genital and it [00:11:00] actually does this? And I'm like, no. Really? Yeah. Like, is that what happens? Like it's just so hushed and the learnings that we had in school were, were driven by us, like the conversations that we were having in the quad or for you in the library. So I think it's really interesting to be able to have this conversation now . Um, I'll move into kind of our first question.

So with current strategies for sex ed, really adopting a lens of risk aversion, preventing s, STIs, pregnancy, and sexual violence with a focus on harm, how do we advocate for pleasure within an already packed curriculum?

Katrina Marson: Yeah, so Australia has, and, and many other, um, jurisdictions around the world has a long history of a kind of reactionary approach to sex education, like you said, that risk aversion, and it's understandable in one sense.

But it fails to recognize what I consider to be the kind of foundation of comprehensive [00:12:00] relationships and sexuality education, which is that it is a right, that young people hold or that the, what we might call the addresses of the education, hold because it's not just about children having the right it's children as future adults as well.

Because what we know about sex and education, when it's comprehensive, when it starts from a young age, and is consistent and repeated and a sort of strong feature of their education, is that it can help support sexual wellbeing, health, self-determination over the life course. And it works less effectively, if at all arguably if we just sort of wait till the age of consent or after someone's left school, or we have to do all of this work and learning in adulthood. So it is really important that it starts at that young age if we want it to do that work. I think it's really, there are ways that, you can introduce a positive approach to sexuality, including the consideration of things like pleasure, and that doesn't even need to be in a sexual context.

That conversation around pleasure and joy [00:13:00] and positive feelings can happen in a desexualized sort of context as well. Those things can well be introduced, um, into even a lesson that you might think of as having the goal of, sexual violence prevention or one of those other risks that you referred to that you're trying to avert.

But it's also possible to introduce these topics and the conversations about it across the curriculum. It doesn't have to all be in a sex ed lesson that usually is lumped on the PE teacher, for example. You can introduce it into other lessons. English is a very, obvious example to me in terms of the texts that are, uh, discussed and the things that might be focused on in those texts.

Even if we're doing Shakespeare, there is a lot that you can, talk about in terms of relationships and norms, gender dynamics when you're looking at even Shakespeare. I dunno if anyone's seen the discourse, for example, about, Taylor Swift's new album and the song Ophelia and how it completely misunderstands the, role of Ophelia's [00:14:00] character in Hamlet and what it was trying to say about gender at that time.

So there's a lot that you can do in other, in other lessons as well. And you know, once I asked some teachers, I challenged some teachers to think about how they might introduce sex ed content or RSE content into other disciplines. And the music teacher suggested, oh, maybe we could look at lyrics of songs.

Um, and I think they said Taylor Swift songs and I think, you know, you could have a useful conversation, for example, just that example I, I gave what are, what representations of relationships and maybe gender norms are we seeing in this music or whatever it might be. So it is a packed curriculum and that's one of the difficulties that teachers in particular face, but the idea of a comprehensive RSE course is that it would spread across the curriculum.

But the other thing is, you know, we, in fairness to teachers and educators in schools, the emphasis on particular areas like academia, like sporting achievements is [00:15:00] sort of a cultural norm that is very strong. And it might take a little bit of reshuffling of our priorities culturally speaking, in order to make room for something like RSE, which we know from a lot of young people is just as if not more important than some of those other things that they're learning about. And like you said, we see them, I see them all the time at university when I deliver, um, consent and wellbeing workshops, say to me, I wish we'd learn this at school. So yeah, I think it's a bit of being creative in terms of getting it across the curriculum, which is what you would wanna do in a comprehensive RSE course anyway, and recognizing the broader cultural, priorities that might need a little bit of rebalancing.

Maddy Stratten: Yeah. And it's that ongoing approach to, it's not just one conversation. We've had it, we've tick box, we've done that sex ed, we've covered RSE. Well actually it's, it's across all the different subjects and ongoing, and how can we [00:16:00] build that in. Yeah. I think thinking creatively should be like an exciting challenge rather than like a thing of anxiety, of pressure, of needing to be like, how am I gonna cover consent in a history class? Well, actually there are ways to do that.

Katrina Marson: And the, problem with creativity, unfortunately, as I'm discovering, as I try and write my second book, is that it does need time and space and teachers don't have time and space because they are just one of our most overworked professions, and undervalued.

And so I recognize , that the stress might emerge, like you say, from feeling like they don't have time even to be creative. 'cause it takes a bit of time to sort of sit with something and think about it and they just don't have that. So, like I said, there are systemic factors, and as much as we can talk about how we could fit change into those systemic constraints, which I think we have to, because we have to recognize it. Unfortunately, some of these things would require systemic change and that will take advocacy and other [00:17:00] work. So yeah, it's a bit of , recognizing the limits on what we can do now and what might need to change in a more aspirational sense.

Maddy Stratten: And that leads really perfectly into this next section, that I've prepared here because I was really thinking about the audience that we have today and the people who are listening and, and we're all working towards this common goal. Right. So many of us have multiple hats. Some listeners here, maybe teachers, um, may be working in the community space and are also parents or are also young people themselves.

So can you share with us your thoughts on how a whole of community approach can support RSE? So we're not talking specifically about schools, but this whole of community approach, um, and not solely relying on systemic changes. How do we practice a shared responsibility of RSE through schools, families, friends, community groups, and the law?

Katrina Marson: Yeah. Um, one of the central tenets, I [00:18:00] suppose, of the philosophy that underpins RSE is the importance of communication, and being able to communicate our thoughts, our feelings, our ideas. So even just acting that out. Um. And having these conversations. It has like a dual effect, I suppose. Having these conversations when the opportunities emerge and they will emerge at surprising times, unexpected times, and I would say that to teachers as well in a school environment.

They're not all gonna turn up in the sex ed lesson. They will come up in the corridor as so too with all of us in different areas of life. And it doesn't necessarily have to be conversations with young people because this is lifelong RSE is a lifelong enterprise.

Um, and so there's importance in having conversations as adults as well, or, searching for information ourselves, whether that's online or through other fora. Having these conversations is both allowing. [00:19:00] Our own and others' ideas to grow, to reflect, to engage in some of that critical reflective work that's really important.

Um, and the ability to understand other people's perspectives and, think about it for ourselves and how it might work in our own life, or think about reconsider how we might have approached something. Whether we hadn't considered a perspective in an experience in our past, those sorts of things. So it, presents a really important opportunity in that sense.

But it also normalizes the act of talking about sex and relationships. Those hush conversations you were talking about having in the quad, and mine in the library, what we really wanna do is reduce that shame around talking and thinking about sex, sexuality, bodies. Um, not to say that it's all we need to be talking about, and we can sort of, you know, we would say to young kids, it doesn't mean you go into the playground and yell penis and vagina just to be silly.

It's about being able to have real respectful, conversations [00:20:00] about something that is a fundamental dimension of human life. And being able to do that without shame. That's very hard for us to achieve when we've been brought up inside the shame. So I'm not, asking for people to just wake up and suddenly strip themselves of all of that shame. I get on stages and talk to strangers about this stuff. And sometimes I will still find myself blushing, uncontrollably. And it just happens , if I say penis, vagina, or orgasm, sometimes I will start blushing and it's like I can't quite control it 'cause it's so deeply ingrained.

So something I always think to myself, and the advice I give is that it's not about removing the awkwardness, it's about talking and communicating through the awkwardness in spite of the awkward awkwardness. Even naming it sometimes, just saying, oh God, this is embarrassing to talk about, but it's important that we talk about it, whatever.

So having those conversations, like I said, it does two things in terms of what learning opportunities or opportunities for reflection, it gives us, whether we're talking to another adult or to young [00:21:00] people. And it does something to that shame and taboo that we know is so, is such a contributing factor too sexual violence, poor sexual wellbeing, the fact that we don't know enough about these topics by the time that we get to university, for example, that lack of knowledge is largely because of the silence around it. So trying to, um, combat that silence with our own respectful noise and conversation is doing something important there.

The other thing , a third thing. When we practice talking about it, when we model talking about it, we are modeling what we would want to see people, do in a sexual encounter. We would want to see that capacity to talk, to ask, to consider, to navigate uncertainty, and to do that when it all feels confusing, maybe awkward, vulnerable, those sorts of things.

So it actually does three things. So if that present some hope to people and we can't combat all the [00:22:00] structural things in one go, just having conversations as much as you can is really valuable.

Maddy Stratten: Yeah. And I think as well, like not putting so much pressure on those conversations, needing to know all the things about that one topic before we start talking about it.

Like, I think for us, you know, we work in this space, we're , quite knowledgeable about what we do. And so when I'm sitting at the dinner table and I'm, having dinner with my family and I'm talking about things, they're like, oh my gosh, like, how do you even know all this stuff? Whereas when they might be talking about it with their peers they can only kind of go with what they know and they're still continuing to build that knowledge base.

And it does make me think about, you know, how services are doing things differently. So, we had an episode with the Sexual Assault Support Service in Tasmania about their podcast Sticky Q's so our listeners can jump back in and listen. If you haven't already.

But Sticky Q's is a, is a really great podcast that reaches parents, and supports them in [00:23:00] answering sexuality and relationships, questions from there young people, and they kind of give you like a, a short version and then a long version because not every conversation that you have with a young person or a friend you really have space to kind of go into a big conversation about consent.

And I think that that's, yeah, kind of what you were talking about before. Mm-hmm. Um. Winnie and I recently saw you present your work at the World Association of Sexual Health Conference in Brisbane.

Um, you were speaking about RSE and preventing sexual violence. I also wanna make a, a note here that this is one of our most popular, ticketed events of On The Couch. So we've had, a really, uh, broad range of people who have, got tickets for this live recording. And I think that really, um, speaks to this topic, resonating with people across many different sectors, and [00:24:00] of course wanting to hear, more from you and your work in this space katrina.

Um, your website states that you advocate for universal access to comprehensive sex ed, to promise young people a future where their sexual experiences will be free from violence and their sexual wellbeing safeguarded, we can see this through all of your work. You've mentioned before your, 2019 research report, which was titled Ignorance Is Not Innocence, um, which was on the implementation of RSE, overseas on a Churchill Fellowship. Releasing your book, which I have here with a million dog tags, Legitimate Sexpectations, the Power of Sex Ed, that was in 2022, and that was the same year that you delivered a TEDx talk on Why Consent Education Isn't Enough. And also, of course your current PhD work in sex education and human rights. There are some real strong themes throughout your advocacy, and I'm keen on chatting about this and also hearing [00:25:00] about your upcoming work.

I heard you mention that you're working on a second book, which I wanna hear more about that as well. Um, but can you take us back to those early conversations, conceptualizing these pieces of work? What led you from your 2019 Churchill Fellowship to publishing your book? Was the book already in works?

Katrina Marson: Sure. So, you know, I had kind of not, thought about sex education and continuing my advocacy there or doing research in it after the honors thesis, uh, in any great detail, I, I would go to universities with a colleague of mine, and we would deliver, like I said, workshops around consent and wellbeing and ethical behavior and communication and those sorts of things.

And I would occasionally write, op-eds in what was then Fairfax. But I hadn't kind of committed to it, like comprehensively, and then I had a conversation with a colleague at the DPP who mentioned this thing about Churchill Fellowships. I'd never heard of them, but she told [00:26:00] me that, basically, you can propose a research project of any type of any subject matter.

And if you can convince them that we need to go overseas and learn how people are doing something differently to here and that we would benefit from it in Australia , they'll fund you. They might fund you to do this research so. I looked it up and I thought to myself, what do I care about more than anything?

And it's sex education. And so why don't I start that research, pick up that research again. And so that's how I found out about the Churchill Fellowship. And I honestly, I can tell you, I've, there are a few things in my life where I've really wanted something that bad. Like I have since I've recently discovered I have ADHD, which explains my procrastination over the course of my life in everything, even things that matter. But this was one thing where I like prepared and I was so hell bent on getting this fellowship and I'm so glad that I did because it gave me the opportunity to go to these other places, and learn about how they did sex education there.

And I really went with this posture [00:27:00] of, you know, sex ed as a prevention of sexual violence. 'cause that's what I'd done in my honours thesis. And I was working in sexual violence and, you know, it was a bit of an emotional response. Um, I don't mean that pejoratively, uh, I just mean that quite literally with an emotional response to constantly, um, holding the pieces of lives that have been ruined by sexual violence and not being able to put them back together no matter what happened in the courtroom, no matter if we got a guilty verdict or whatever, we couldn't put these pieces back together.

And I was so frustrated at the resources that were being poured into this system that is faulty in many respects. And I couldn't see the same level of investment in preventing these people from ever having to come to the courthouse in the first place. And so I was really kind of single-minded about the sexual violence prevention aspect.

Which is why I say it's really understandable the kind of the way that sex ed traditionally is a risk averse strategy. I understand it, I really do. But it [00:28:00] was on this fellowship that I talked to, um , some of the world leading, policy makers or sex ed designers or researchers in at least the parts of the world that I was visiting. Um, which is not, you know, those parts of the world do not have a monopoly on good sex ed work. But in these parts of the world that I kept talking to people who sort of had to try and explain to me that it's not just about preventing sexual violence, sex education is kind of, the Germans explained it the best to me, I think, in a way that I could understand, which was that sexual wellbeing is the baseline that we're aiming for.

And then sexual violence prevention is supplementary to that . As I've since described it myself, it's like if you're just aiming for sexual violence prevention, you tend to focus on that line between violence or not and we might deprive ourselves of the opportunity to think about what does a positive sexual experience look like or what, what does it mean to shoot for the other end of the spectrum rather than just this side of legal or not?

And [00:29:00] those of you who have taught kids, particularly in the last five years or so, you will be familiar with the experience that when you're trying to talk about, um, some aspect of relationships, sex and sexuality, they will ask questions that really focus on that legal line.

And so trying to move the conversation to more, uh, considerations of what is ethical and what, might make people feel good and happy. And this sort of wellbeing approach is really important. But it wasn't until I was on that fellowship that I kind of understood that, and it was the last person I spoke to who said to me that, um, access to information that can be used to make autonomous decisions is a right.

And it was then that my kind of pragmatic inquiry about like, how do we kind of shift policy to get more kids into sex ed classes took a bit more of a moral or philosophical turn. And I started to think about it in terms of rights. Um, I swear I am answering your question. I'm just doing it in a long-winded way.[00:30:00]

Um, and so that kind of shifted my thinking and really I haven't finished resolving that question or being able to articulate that. My perspective about that or the position. And that's really what the PhD is trying to do. And so between the Churchill Fellowship and now as you mentioned, I did write a book, um, that was not in the works.

I'd never thought of writing a book. I was approached by someone, on Twitter as it then was who was basically like a, um, commissioning editor for a publishing house. And he'd seen me on a episode of The Project write after the Chanel Contos survey and the Teach Us Consent stuff started to really kick off. Um. In 2021, I think. And I was just on a very short snippet talking about the power of sex education in the prevention of sexual violence.

And so he contacted me and suggested that I think about writing a book. And I hadn't thought about it [00:31:00] before, and it took a, it took a while, for the idea to take shape. I ended up with a different publishing house in the end, Scribe, who I'm like so, so happy that I ended up there. My editor was just amazing in terms of understanding the issues and, helping shape it in the form that it came out in, in Legitimate Sexpectations.

But you'll note that in that book, it really ends on that question of rights and I kind of attempt to explain why it's a right rather than this kind of, policy mechanism or strategy to prevent something or produce a particular outcome or produce particular behavior. And I, as I say, I sort of attempt to make that argument and I don't think I did it, uh, well, or at least not with the kind of rigor and time and dedication that I now have in the PhD to actually kind of explore the theoretical and philosophical arguments for that and to better explain what I mean when I say it's a right, rather than just a thing that we kind of [00:32:00] do as a community, as a society, as adults in particular, to achieve a particular outcome.

Because that locates the power or the entitlement around sex ed away from the recipients and more to the sort of community and society and that misunderstands, where I think the right to it does, does reside, which is in its addresses, its recipients. So that's kind of the journey, both of my thinking and, and the kind of the different steps along the way that you asked about, and the way that they're so intertwined.

Maddy Stratten: Yeah, it's really cool. I mean, I almost need a, a whole blog post of the journey of how you've landed, where you are and, and where you're going next because it is such a natural and organic story. And I think a really important one. And yeah, thanks for sharing that.

I wanna talk about, one of the biggest achievements, has been mandatory consent education in schools. Yeah. So for our [00:33:00] listeners , um, we have released a couple of On The Couch episodes focusing on consent. So we've got an episode with Dr. Joy Townsend, CEO, and founder of Learning Consent, discussing consent and pleasure.

We have another episode with Axel, Nathaniel Rose, discussing trans healthcare and medical consent. So I'd encourage you to go back and have a listen to those episodes to really get a foundational understanding of consent. I'd like to, add to this important discussion thread in our On The Couch episodes with you, Katrina. Um, your TEDx talk, you talk about consent and consensual practices being the key element of sexual wellbeing and the importance of including pleasure in this definition, free from sexual violence, harassment, and unwanted sexual experience.

We know that each state and territory has its own legislation defining consent, including detail of what is not considered consent. All state and territory definitions state that consent must be free and voluntary, [00:34:00] all jurisdictions except for Western Australia. Outline provisions about capacity to consent. And ACT New South Wales, Queensland, Tasmania, and Victoria explicitly state that consent must be actively communicated.

Katrina, can you talk us through how the work in education and advocacy space has impacted the legal definitions of consent and the changes to the law around things like stealthing and strangulation, for example?

Katrina Marson: So there's sort of, um, there's a massive history of advocacy around the way that the law deals with sexual violence, and gendered violence in particular. So we're talking about decades and decades of work that is, um, of a global scale as well as in a more local sense.

But, you know, I lecture, in the criminal law and the evidence law courses at the ANU. I deliver the lecture about sexual violence or the lecture about the evidence rules that tend to [00:35:00] relate to, witnesses giving evidence in sexual violence matters. And I spend a fair bit of time with my students taking them through some of the history of the way that the law has dealt with these things because it is not so old.

It's not so long ago that some comments have been made by judges, in explaining what the law is or interpreting the law that we would rightly feel quite confronted by, today. And the reason that we feel confronted by it and that there has been any changes because of the work of advocates both in the education space, in the legal sphere, in the community sector, it's just relentless hard work by, advocates.

Uh. Usually, yeah, almost invariably in the grassroots sense. So, um, it's been sort of a collective push, I suppose, and it's, it's really iterative and it's never ending. It's constantly ongoing. And we did [00:36:00] see things like, for example, the Child Abuse Royal Commission. That was perhaps, um, more of a kind of formal mechanism that resulted in all of these recommendations, but , again, those recommendations were made after a lot of research and a lot of evidence was given by people who were survivors of child sexual abuse.

Um, and so again, we see, you know, I always say that the benefits or the, the, reforms to the law, each provision you might see in legislation that, for example, says, um, you know, if, if, uh, someone is asleep, they're not consenting, for example, or if there's some sort of misrepresentation of a fundamental fact that induces their consent in inverted commas. That's not consent. Each of these provisions has come at a cost. It's like it's got a, it's got a price tag on it. And that price tag is all of the people who have, experienced sexual violence in those ways and then been failed by the legal [00:37:00] system that has failed to recognize that as sexual violence and then the advocacy and reform that has come after that.

So, um, you know, it's a very costly process in that sense, and it, as I say, it's never ending. We keep going. Um, and it is iterative and I think that's really important. I really think that it is valuable for institutions like the law to have a humility, and look at themselves constantly and the way that they can do things better.

And it's not just the legal institution, it's others as well. Maybe the education institution too. Certainly certain, um, religious institutions that ability to reflect, to listen, and make change, um, justifiable change. Is really important. So the law, um, traditionally can struggle with that. It is very, in some respects quite conservative.

It is a system that is based on this idea of precedent. So it by nature tends to do things because that's how it's been done. Um, and that, and that's kind of just [00:38:00] built into its DNA, if you like. So, um, trying to achieve reform in the sexual violence space in particular tends to happen through legislative reform because politicians are answerable or the legislature is answerable to the people, whereas the legal institution is more informed, arguably by sort of precedent and those sorts of things and perhaps a life experience of the person who is doing the interpretation of the law and creating the case law that might be applied.

Um, so I think that's a helpful kind of explanation of the, the interrelationship between advocacy and reform. Um, and as I say, it's got um, there's a hard, there's , there's a sadness to it because of where a lot of this reform has come out of and the advocacy that has gone before it.

Maddy Stratten: And the stories of the people who have got it to where it is now, as you say, I think, often gets [00:39:00] missed and not recognized. So yeah, thanks for drawing attention to that. Um, kind of keeping in talking around sexual violence prevention, you know, de-stigmatizing sex is a sexual violence prevention strategy.

I've heard you say that before. And you, you know, earlier spoke about sexual violence prevention and sexuality education, and the difference between the two of those. Can you elaborate more on this for our listeners and I guess build our capacity around better using these terms to create impact in the work that we do?

Katrina Marson: Sure. So I wanna be really clear that, comprehensive RSE is not a silver bullet to sexual violence. It's not, um, I used to, I used to think that it was, I kind of wished that it was, I suppose. Uh, but it's not, it is just a very central or integral part of, a sexual violence prevention strategy.

But it's more than that. So the way that I can best explain it is that if we got [00:40:00] to some kind of utopia where sexual violence, we'd eradicated it. We prevented it successfully. Young people would still have the right to comprehensive RSE because it's accessing information, developing skills, knowledge, and even values that will allow them to safeguard their own wellbeing, um, to achieve self-determination in the sense of, agency autonomy, and understanding what it is they want, what they have a right to, what their obligations are.

Um, and kind of a, uh, an ethical approach to their relationships and their relating, uh, rather than just a legal approach in terms of, it just makes sure I stay on this side of legal. So, um, it is really important that we see. The capacity for sex education to have a, uh, protective effect in terms of preventing [00:41:00] sexual violence.

But that's not all it does, and that's not the only goal. So I think for me at least, just sort of swapping that around and seeing that sort of sexual wellbeing is like the overarching goal because obviously sexual wellbeing implicates, um, a freedom from sexual violence. But as I often say, we don't wanna just teach young people that they should expect futures that will be free from sexual violence.

We want them to expect futures that will be far from violent. So, you know, like I said, just all the way down the other end of the spectrum. So for me, just kind of seeing that sexual violence prevention as part of the, piece, but not, not the whole. Story was really just a really important reframe for me.

And I think it sort of organically shifts how you start to think about it, what things you emphasize, what you want to talk about, um, and the sort of resources you look to. And that's not to say that consent isn't an important part of conversations about [00:42:00] pleasure or some of those wellbeing aspects.

Of course it is. Um, it's just not the only part, that's all. So even being able to talk about, pleasure and joy is something that we can consider outside of the sexual context or, without a consent kind of angle, if we're thinking about self-pleasure, for example, and that doesn't have to mean masturbation.

It might mean just understanding what makes us feel joy, what feels good, what do our bodies feel like that kind of embodied experience is something that we don't, um, really prioritize learning about in this culture. Um, so, an example of a lesson that I saw or heard about in the Netherlands that I love was with quite young kids they'll get them to touch different fabrics or different materials against their skin, like steel wool or feathers or sponges, and ask them to describe how it feels. How does it make them feel? So that exercise of thinking about how the body feels and the relationship with [00:43:00] another object or thing. And then being able to articulate it in some way, communicate it in some way, put words around it, is a really important skill that we don't just kind of develop by osmosis.

But there is this sort of received wisdom that that's not something that you need to learn, um, or practice, but it is something that can be practiced. And so, like I said, that's not at all sexual, but just learning about that kind of embodied experience and feeling in, into our bodies and understanding things and then being able to articulate it if needed is, is obviously you can see the connection between that and, um, the skills you might need in a sexual encounter with another person.

Uh, so , I hope that's a useful example in maybe how we reframe beyond just consent. Um, and think about it in the context of that approach that would look to wellbeing and a more holistic kind of understanding of the subject matters that are relevant to a CRSE, uh, program.

Maddy Stratten: Hmm. Yeah.

[00:44:00] Great. That's a really clear example I think for our listeners um. You've explained a little bit of the law system already, and I don't wanna dive into a 1 0 1 lesson, but I do think we can chat a little bit more around the misconceptions around consent, sexual violence, um, I think especially in a time where rough sex and strangulation or sexual choking is becoming more mainstream, but I guess the knowledge of the risks are not. Um, so thinking about informed consent here and how, without understanding the risks of these practices, how can affirmative informed consent really be given?

Um, if these acts were outside of sex, would they be more commonly recognized or considered as violence? And when they're within the sexual context, it's kind of considered as normal. And then how those, gray areas are in the legal system. Um, we've recently, engaged [00:45:00] with a training around non-fatal, strangulation by It Left No Marks.

Um, and we've, dived into their website and thinking about, you know, if we were to, put together some pieces and resources for, professionals, how does that look when we have to also understand the legal system behind it?

Katrina Marson: Um, I think you raise a really interesting point about, how informed could we say consent is if there's a vacuum of information. And I think that's true across the board. And one way of thinking of it, if we are focusing on something like autonomy and agency and the ability to consent to something, how can you, what kind of choice is it if you dunno what it is that you're choosing or what choices you have available to you?, That might be in a socially, constructed sense, you might not feel that you're able to say no or reject someone or, um, advocate for your own interests, or you might feel pressured to [00:46:00] do a particular thing because, the other person seems like they're enjoying it, whatever it might be.

So yeah, I think that's, you've really, identified the issue, which is that, consent. If it's not informed, if we don't have that information, what quality of consent are we really talking about? Um,

I just, I suppose I just wanna flag that having this conversation, if anyone needs to dip out or anything because of the subject matter, feel free. 1800RESPECT obviously is a number that you can call if anyone, um needs to in the context of this conversation, um, I think my concern with the rise of, strangulation in sexual encounters, as with any activity in a sexual encounter, is the rate of people reporting it happening without having the opportunity to, decide, make a choice about it?

So the hands just go on the throat, um, without any opportunity to, uh, as I say, make a decision about that. And certainly that might [00:47:00] be because the other person thinks that that's kind of in the normal normative range of sexual behavior because it has become more normalized. And I say all of this without any, um, kind of kink shaming, sort of posture or attitude behind it. It's just that it has become quite, uh, ubiquitous such that it has, I think, moved into, I think you used the word mainstream. Um, this idea of what's in the kind of normative palette of, sexual activity, which, you know, if we look at normative palettes of sexual activity, um, throughout different generations, it might have been that missionary was kind of the only thing that was part of a, of a sexual encounter.

And then that's all sort of like the discourse around sex and what it looks like and what happens in sex and the roles that people play does shift and change. And it has done that with respect to strangulation. But my concern is twofold, I suppose, as you say. Um, I think we don't have a matching discourse that explains the, risks [00:48:00] associated with strangulation that are not limited to just oxygen deprivation, for example. They're also associated with, um, pressure on the arteries on the neck, for example. And also, as I say, my concern is that there is data that shows that a lot of people are experiencing this without ever having the opportunity, without ever being asked.

And it just happens. And, you know, that's too late to see if someone wants to engage in a particular practice with you is by the time your hands are on their neck. So, um, I suppose, yeah, that, that's my concern.

In terms of the legal system. I suppose the legal system tries to draft laws or rules that are broad enough to cover whatever kind of , circumstance may arise. And that's true of every offense type. You know, in some senses it gets a bit more specific with something like stealthing, for example, although arguably the laws around. What it means to withdraw consent or what it means to know that someone isn't consenting to a particular act. Say they might have consented to sex with a condom, and then, you take it [00:49:00] off.

I would argue they haven't consented to that particular sexual act. And so the, the sexual violence provisions as they were already drafted could theoretically capture that. But the concern of the legislature when they introduced quite specific, offenses or offense types is because they're concerned that the courts won't interpret it that way.

Um, and so they wanna be really clear and they have to get quite specific, which is why we have a list in so many, uh, so many statutes around the country of things that are not consent. And you as a lay person might read that list and go obviously, but it wasn't apparently always obvious to people who were sitting on a bench or in a jury box

it had to be explicitly put in the legislation so you can kind of see that interaction, as I alluded to before, between the legislature, which kind of represents, I would say, a, a sort of broader, it's got broader interests in, in representing the community versus, the more narrow. Possibly more narrow approach of, of the court in determining or interpreting [00:50:00] things.

Um, so I'm not sure if strangulation has made its way into legislation , I mean, apart from, as an offense, regardless of whether it takes place in a sexual setting or not. Um, as with most, as I say with most sexual practices, it will be about, what can be proved of the consent or lack thereof to that particular act.

Um, and the thing that always bears remembering about the criminal justice system is because of the presumption of innocence, the prosecution has to prove all of the elements beyond a reasonable doubt, which means they have to prove the non-consent . So it sort of feels like a bit of an inverse. They have to prove the lack of consent of someone and that the other person knew or was reckless as to the fact that they weren't consenting.

And some of the reforms have done a reasonable job of shifting how we would assess whether someone had turned their mind to whether someone else was consenting. But um, certainly some , uh, strong and credible advocates would say we haven't gone far enough. And I defer to their [00:51:00] expertise about that.

But, yeah, we're seeing that attempt to wrangle the law to deal with, these different experiences and the different kind of, um, I suppose life experiences of different demographics, even not just at the individual level, but as a sort of social, social group level. Um, and it doesn't always achieve it, unfortunately.

Maddy Stratten: Mm-hmm. Yeah, and I think it's interesting, even when I was preparing for this episode and having a look at, those definitions for each state and territory about what is not considered consent. And, I had to read it a few times to actually understand what it was saying about what is not considered consent. 'cause I'm like, just gimme a definition of consent. But what is not considered consent? Yeah. Was it the way, the way they framed it? And that makes a lot of sense, what you've just shared there.

Katrina Marson: Yeah. What would happen is people would come to court and they would argue, you know, the, the defense would basically argue that it was consent because of X, Y, Z, or, [00:52:00] or that at least if they weren't saying it was consent, they were saying the prosecution couldn't prove beyond reasonable doubt that it was not consent.

Right. And that's where that, that standard and that presumption really plays a part. Um, and, you know , the presumption of innocence is a really important foundation of our criminal justice system, but it has, these are some of the effects of it when we're talking about something like sexual violence. Um, and as I say, it means that the legislature has to get in there and kind of spell it out for everybody, that if someone's asleep, they're not consenting like we would all go, duh.

But you know, it wasn't always like that.

Maddy Stratten: Yeah. And it's, that's come from somewhere, unfortunately . So thank you for sharing that Um, I wanna leave some space for you to share with our listeners about what we can be doing to put these new schools of thinking and perspectives into practice, recognizing that young people hold the right to comprehensive relationships and sexuality education, and that we aren't gatekeepers, right?

So how do we [00:53:00] normalize, prioritize, and emphasize the right to be curious and engage with sex education? How do we communicate through the awkwardness and the discomfort and navigate these conversations with young people and our teams who work with young people?

Katrina Marson: Yeah, I mean, you've sort of expressed there in the question , which is having those conversations, as I'd already talked about before.

But not only that, if you are, I don't know if you're a parent, talking to the school, I mean, schools so often hear from those who don't want sex ed, which are, we know, a, a minority, but they're very vocal. So, um, I would love schools to hear more from parents who want them to do better on comprehensive sex ed you can certainly right to your ministers as well, because there is a degree of political courage that is required for sex ed to become prioritized, and understood, as I said, as a right

you know, writing to them is not unhelpful. I really mean that. And I went [00:54:00] overseas and I saw that there were groups there who had created templates for people to write, letters to their members about the subject matter. So those sorts of things, I wouldn't dismiss the, the importance of advocating to institutions that have some part to play.

Um. Particularly if you are a parent to the schools. I think if you're not a parent at a school, maybe don't write to them saying, are you giving kids more sex ed? They might find that a bit odd. But, so that's one way that we can do it. And then I suppose just having these conversations amongst ourselves in our industries, in our work, being able to, if you, if you have the time and the capacity keeping on top of the research around sex education and some of the, academic work that is done about it.

So for example, I was involved in some research recently, where we interviewed quite a number of, parents across Australia and the results were that they were overwhelmingly supportive of better sex ed in schools, which, you know, we might not have understood that, that we might have [00:55:00] a quite a different impression about parents' attitudes to sex ed in schools.

It was like 90% nearly of parents wanted better sex ed in schools. And we asked them about like the topics. It wasn't just sort of sex ed in general, whatever that means to you. We asked 'em about things like, masturbation, pleasure, those sorts of things. And the support was significant. So keeping on top of research like that, I have a colleague who's had some really useful research come out recently about what young people say about what they didn't get in school, and they talk really eloquently, better than I could ever, about how they focused at school so much on consent and it kind of made sex feel like this scary thing as opposed to something that they could be curious about or that was something that might bring some positivity to their life. So looking at research like that can be really helpful both to expand your own understanding, think about how you rephrase things, and thinking about the advocacy work that you do.

So I'm constantly kind of adapting my position, and the things that I say based on these different [00:56:00] perspectives or different research that I read. So I think that's also really helpful. Um, and like you said, just even reframing ourselves not as gatekeepers, but as guides, I think organically will shift the way that you engage with this particular, um, issue and the way that you talk to each other and the decisions, even the organizational decisions that you make if you are in the business of delivering sex education, for example.

Um, yeah. There's a sort of patchwork quilt of different, um, tips or strategies to leave you with.

Maddy Stratten: Resources or anything that we can include in the show notes for our listeners to dive into a little bit more after this episode?

Katrina Marson: Yes. I think I sent you a list I remember that Bloom-ED was on there, which is a bit of a hub of resources and advocacy for sex education. Um, so it's a group of people in the sex ed space. Sexologists, [00:57:00] researchers, people who educate in sexuality education. And they've got some really good resources, both in terms of content, but also advocacy, um, from a parental perspective, always promoting Talk Soon, Talk Often the WA government, resource that is fantastic in terms of, uh, for, parents, uh, wanting to talk about sex education, but we can all learn something from it as well. Even if we aren't parents. Um, also SECCA SE double CA, which is also WA based. And that's in relation to they do work in relation to sexuality, education and people with disability. Um, Mooditj is an aboriginal organization that, delivers sexuality education or relationships and sexuality education to, young Aboriginal kids in also in WA um, WA does a lot of great work, and they also have some really u useful resources there too.

Um, did I have anything else on that list? Maddy?

Maddy Stratten: You had Sex and Ethics.

Katrina Marson: Oh, Sex and Ethics by Moira Carmody is just a really [00:58:00] great place to start and to start thinking about it. Beyond that consent, aspect. Also though, um, I have heard, although I haven't finished reading it, that Betty Martin's Wheel Of Consent, uh, understanding and receiving giving and receiving consent is, a helpful resource on that particular topic.

Maddy Stratten: That one has been mentioned by previous, guests On The Couch as well. Um yeah, it has been a really interesting and in-depth episode of On The Couch and one that I think that we will all be coming back and doing a re-listen.

I just wanna hand over to you, Katrina, to send us on our way with some final thoughts to wrap up this episode.

Katrina Marson: Thanks, Maddy. Um, well thank you so much all for, tuning in and listening. I hope that it was helpful, in some way. And I often say to people, if we just even grow our understanding by 1%, then we've achieved something.

So, I hope that it was helpful. I've really enjoyed the conversation. Thank you, Maddy. And, I suppose just to emphasize what I've said a few [00:59:00] times, now that these conversations, participating in them, thinking about them, reflecting on them, and then going to have further conversations with other people, in your life, is such a powerful, resource for all of us.

So I, please, please, I encourage you to keep doing that as much as you can.

Winnie Adamson: Thanks for listening to On The Couch. We create this podcast because we are allies in actively challenging discrimination, microaggressions and exclusionary behaviors.

Maddy Stratten: We wanna create spaces where people feel safe to share their thoughts, knowing that they'll be heard and respected. Such an environment fosters collaboration, innovation, and contributes to a more inclusive society.

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