The consent workshops for first-year students begin in Trinity Hall today and will run over the next week. The workshops were proposed last year by then-Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) Gender Equality Officer, Louise Mulrennan, and myself, and were passed almost unanimously at a meeting of the union’s council in January.
The passing of this motion mandated the TCDSU Welfare Officer to help organise these workshops for students in Trinity Hall for this academic year and to extend the workshops to all incoming students in future years. Current Welfare Officer, Aoibhinn Loughlin, the JCR of Trinity Hall and the College’s Counselling Service should all be commended for the work they have put in to organise these workshops.
As President of TCDSU, I’m really proud that Trinity is standing up as a university that recognises sexual assault is still a problem within our society and we are tackling it head on. These workshops have undoubtedly been controversial. Many publications, from the Guardian to Waterford Whispers News, have covered the idea of them over the last few months in both a positive and negative light. The union was even accused of being “creepy” on live radio.
They are for male, female and non-binary students equally, and their role is not to “blame” anyone or prescribe certain behaviours
The consent workshops have previously been reported as being “mandatory”. They are optional. They are for male, female and non-binary students equally, and their role is not to “blame” anyone or prescribe certain behaviours. The goal of the workshops is to open up a conversation about what active sexual consent is. We all know of situations where it is at least questionable if consent is given. It is about identifying what to do in these situations. That is all.
I often hear the argument that people don’t have to be taught how to have sex. That’s true. We also don’t have to have 25 per cent of female students in Trinity experiencing a non-consensual sexual experience. I, unfortunately, wasn’t even surprised at that statistic when it was revealed by a survey carried out by the union in 2014. I know four close female friends who have been raped.
I have been sexually assaulted as well. It was May 2015, a couple of days prior to the marriage referendum. I left a club with a boy who I knew. We ended up kissing in an alley. He went further. I said no. He stopped. Then he proceeded again without my permission.
I remember the cold fear shocking me out of my slightly drunken state. I remember screaming. I remember running away. I remember him saying hello and smiling at me a couple of days later. For him, nothing had happened. He didn’t realise what it felt like for control to be wrestled away from you. I remember not speaking about it and spending June of that year feeling erratic and fearful, my anxiety spiking. I remember eventually telling a friend after a day of feeling like I couldn’t talk to anyone. It just burst out of me.
I am someone who could have ended up in much more severe circumstances. I don’t have to feel afraid walking home at night, like many of my female friends do
I am someone who could have ended up in much more severe circumstances. I don’t have to feel afraid walking home at night, like many of my female friends do. Telling my story is an attempt to begin a conversation about sexual consent within Trinity and the wider community.
The consent workshops do matter. I know many people who believe passionately in them, as I do. They might not make a huge difference in the number of sexual assaults in Dublin. But they are an attempt to stop a problem that is very real, and they sure as hell won’t hurt.
Kieran McNulty is President of Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU)
