To the Belfast rape trial complainant,

I just wanted to say #ibelieveher. I am on holiday atm and find myself thinking of you a lot. I keep reading up on the reports, trying to find a path through your story that makes sense.

I guess my fixation is two-fold, one is that I teach consent to young people and am currently producing resources for others to teach consent. The other part is that I am a Mum to two boys.

At first I thought my contribution to help would be to make sure my teaching was shit-hot. To really engage every young person with the complexities of consent whilst helping them to seek a simple 'Yes, that's great' repeatedly, enthusiastically throughout any sexual encounter.

It didn't seem enough though. Because as I read the WhatsApp messages sent between the defendants I didn't see the cold-hearted predatory rapists who lurk in alleyways, the ones we were taught to avoid. I saw men-boys, raised on porn and stupidity and peacocking machoism and notching up acts. 

I know so so many boys who will be appalled at your story, shocked, declaring it could never happen on their watch. And I truly believe them. But I also believe our culture has no clue of what real consent looks like. A video I get young people to work with shows a young man accused of rape being asked if the young woman responded in any way to indicate that she wanted to have sex with him. He replies 'Yes... no... maybe... But she wasn't upset or anything'. If consent means a partner 'not being upset' that's a pretty low bar.

A 2015 US college survey asked male college students if they would commit rape if they could be guaranteed to get away with it, 13.6% said yes. Which is frightening. But the same group were also asked if they would force sexual intercourse on a woman if they could be guaranteed to get away with it. And 31.1% said yes. Same act, different words. WTF?

This is so screwed. How will we ever unravel consent? 

And then I started to think about my two boys. And that maybe as well as teaching young people who are 15+, maybe my real responsibility is to teach my boys who are 9 and 11.

As part of what I teach young women around consent, we look at the idea that parents teach their girls not to get raped but that maybe it's time parents teach their boys not to rape. It's a good conversation with the group, the young women get a bit fired up. But now, because of you, I see the problem with it. It requires parents to imagine their boys as future rapists! Ouch! Imagining your daughter as a future victim must be an horrific feeling that quickly brings on warnings about dark alleyways, short skirts, and getting drunk or high, ffs. But to imagine your boy? Your sweet darling? No, he would never be capable of that.

But he would, in our current culture. He would be capable of one-upmanship, of show-boating to mates. Of ignoring a partner's discomfort or quiet unwillingness. He would be capable of expecting crazy porn activities without asking. It would probably not occur to him to ask if something felt nice, or would something else feel nicer. He would be capable of focusing solely on his own pleasure.

Not because he's the evil predator, but because we have allowed porn and popular culture to teach our boys about sex. And it's left out all the fun, the deliciousness, the mutuality, the giggly rude delight. And we've left you all clueless on what having a great time really looks like.

So my darling girl, I am so, so sorry for the part we have all played in your story. I pray that you go forward from here and heal and grow and bloom. 

I will continue to teach. But my promise is to push and agitate all parents to be sure that it really won't be our boys - not because we can't imagine it, but because we can. #notmyboy

Am working at the moment on collating all the resources I've written about consent so as to make them available to youth workers, teachers and parents in the near future. I had intended to write some pieces here about girls stuff after starting with boys stuff but am full of consensual thoughts so girls will have to wait...

Above is my favourite consent video, it's funny, elegant, and completely instructional without preaching. Incredibly most young people I come across have never seen it so pass it on if you love it too.

Consent is a gnarly emotive subject and for most adults it's one of the ones we feel at sea about (a lot changed in a short time) and so we don't have conversations with our small ones until it's too late.

We have long taught our girls not to get raped/assaulted. The times (and laws) are changing to focus on teaching perpetrators not to rape/assault. This sounds simple and obvious but actually requires a massive cultural and relational shift and produces surprising reactions in most of us...

Can you be asking for it if you wear a short skirt?
Should you expect sexual activity at the end of a date you paid for?
Can two drunk people consent to sex?
What about one drunk person and one sober person?
If you flirt all night and get into bed with the person at the end of the night, can you still refuse sex?
If you don't hear a 'No', does that mean you're good to go?
Do some women need persuading? Often a 'No' eventually becomes an 'OK then...'

Much more to come....

So it's cute huh? A boy, he's noise with dirt on him. But how many quiet clean boys do we know? And how many noisy dirty girls? And if it's not many then why not? 

Science tells us that this stuff is not innate. It is instilled. By us. And a million trillion billion teeny social factors - for the subtlety of this see the BBC toys experiment - www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWu44AqF0iI - it's only 3 minutes long - I love one of the adults' reactions that she was astounded by her own behaviour because she thought she had a really open mind :D ).

Another factor to consider is that in our current cohort of 16-25's, 20% do not identify as wholly one gender or another. It's a big subject that I'll wonder about in the future but for the sake of this particular wondering :- if 20% of our kids are going to at the very least question their gender, then our stereotypes are really going to annoy them!!

So if we want quiet, sensitive, gentle boys, or bold, loud, whole-hearted girls or just fully alive engaged humans, then maybe we will have to start thinking out of our boxes, encouraging, cheering, cajoling, praising, calling them on to be whatever they are whatever the shapes of their bits...