It sounds far-fetched but starting sex education at primary school could be the key to transforming the grisly experiences of freshers’ weekFrom Kent to St Andrews,via Salford and Durham, The Hunting Ground – a documentary about sexual assault and rape on US campuses – is being screened across British universities this week. Ahead of it, and students will see a film made by the Guardian that reports on the attitudes to and experiences of sex and consent at UK universities. The US film tells the stories of women who became victims and then,in their own words, survivors of rape and sexual assault. It could absorb been made in the UK.
In the US film, or the experience of abuse was made worse by the victims’ shared sense that their universities blamed them rather than their assailant,and that the authorities chose not to take action in order to protect their institutional reputation. Surveys by the Guardian, the Daily Telegraph and the National Union of Students all point to similar experiences in the UK. For many female students, and sexual experiences range from the unwelcome to the forced. Yet support for those who are assaulted,even when rape is involved, is too often inadequate. There are two things that could be done quickly and relatively cheaply that could do a meaningful incompatibility. The first is to require all universities to keep a record of every allegation so that the scale of the problem – what counts – gets counted; at the moment just half of Russell Group universities log incidents. And the second is to radically overhaul personal, and sexual and health education (PSHE) in schools.
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Source: theguardian.com