Caution: This interview references sexual assaults.

TM: With sexual assault and the physical nature of it … how difficult does that make it for people to report? 

SF: Sexual assault stuff just is a long way behind. People generally don’t report sexual assaults or molestations and things of that kind. Because women are so used to it, a lot of them don’t. The experience a lot of sexual assault victims have of the justice system is that it’s all about the person who did it and getting the evidence, no one’s really asking them how they’re feeling. The person whose suffered the wrong in that is usually the one with the least voice in [the process]. 

TM: Do you think there’s a lack of understanding around the definition of sexual assault?

SF: Yeah. A lot of people say, ‘oh, he only grabbed you here’ or ‘he only did this’. What people don’t get that a lot of women, if that happens to them in public, they won’t go to a public event like that again. They just stop going, or feel really unsafe. I have come across people who have had anxiety or fear, or they’ve been molested as a kid … finally getting to the point and then something like that happens and they won’t go out again and they don’t. The psychological impact it can have is phenomenal. You don’t ever know what someone’s situation is, so what someone might think is minor even though it actually is a sexual assault, can be a massive thing for them.

TM: What are some of those effects you see? 

SF: I’ve seen people with fairly strong post-traumatic stress disorder, I’ve seen people who won’t go out to public events, who won’t join groups of friends going out. A lot of them will just blame themselves … because of the messaging society gives women, they blame themselves. 

TM: Is the reporting process disempowering for women? In terms of convictions, is it adequate? 

SF: I think if you get the right police officers it can be a very empowering thing. If you get the right response it can be very empowering … if you look at the police response to Falls, they wanted to get these people, they wanted to find them. I think the disempowering thing that can happen is that victims, if it goes to a hearing, it’s sometimes somebody’s word against the other person, so you know you’re going to get put on trial and that’s the bit that turns a lot of people off. I’ve sat with women who have been through some fairly brutal stuff and they have actually opted not to go through the criminal process, and that’s because they don’t want to be put on trial, and they don’t want to risk someone giving them the message that what happened to them didn’t happen to them. That’s always a really hard decision. I prefer to see people be held accountable and not think they can do it again, but I also understand some people might not want to do that. 

TM: How often do you see sexual assault complaints at the legal service? 

SF: We don’t necessarily see sexual assault complaints ... as the primary thing. We see a lot of women who have been sexually assaulted, but it’s a bit like family violence, a lot of the time it’s not the reason they come to see us, but it comes up in the conversation. It’s like family violence, a lot of people, men and women, who have been sexually assaulted feel immense shame. For men it’s very hard, because a lot of people don’t believe that men can be raped when obviously they can. It’s one of those things that people are starting to talk about more … women are going ‘enough’s enough’ and reporting it. 

TM: Do you often deal with people who have been sexually assaulted in a public place, or is it predominantly by someone they know?

SF: Predominantly it’s someone they know that we would deal with, because a lot of it happens within a family violence context. All the really serious rape and sexual assault stuff that I’ve dealt with, they’ve nearly all been by someone that the woman knows, like an intimate partner or a past intimate partner … that also makes it really hard to report. It’s actually a really worrying thing that in this day and age we’re having a conversation going, ‘people actually think it’s okay to grab someone, grope someone’ … in a mosh pit at a music festival. What actually makes someone think that’s okay, that you can do that to a complete stranger?

TM: What do you think needs to change about society to stop that kind of behaviour? 

SF: People need to bring their kids up knowing that’s not okay. If someone touches you, report it, don’t touch someone that way. And also, if you’re out with a group of friends and one of the people is in the mosh pit doing that or at the bar doing that, tell them to cut it out. And that’s a hard thing to do … basically if people don’t start calling people out then they’re going to keep doing it. A lot of people just don’t understand how unsafe you can make a woman feel by the fact the conversation we’re having is ‘how can women protect themselves in public?’.

TM: Legally, in terms of targeting perpetrators … the move to void aggravated sexual assault and broaden the definition of rape, do you think that’s a good move? 

SF: The rape laws need to change. It’s a significant problem … people use all sorts of things other than a penis to rape someone except it’s “not rape” if it’s anything other than a penis. Two women in a relationship, or even two women in a nightclub, one “can’t rape” the other one because there isn’t a penis involved, but the impact is the same.

TM: Is there anything else you’d like to add?

SF: I would just really like to see a shift in the dialogue away from ‘what can promoters, what can women, what can everyone else do?’ and really emphasise that the people doing this are acting in a really criminal, really entitled manner and we should be looking at them. 

This interview was edited for length