Stand Up Carolina speaker lectures on healthy dating, preventing interpersonal violence
Sexual assault speaker Mark Dawson of GotConsent.com emphasized practicing safe dating and avoiding sexual violence to a full Russell House Ballroom Sunday night as a part of the interpersonal violence prevention campaign, Stand Up Carolina.
“We’re going to get into some sensitive topics, but we’re going to have fun doing it,” Dawson said at the beginning of the presentation.
Dawson jumped right into the fun; he took many volunteers from the audience, largely consisting of members of sororities, and put them into humorous but realistic dating scenarios, pointing out the sometimes ridiculous aspects of the dating process.
“I always saw the dating rules as being backwards, and this really helped me think of ways to break the stereotypes,” said Felicia Butler, a first-year political science student.
In pointing out some of these “backwards” rules, Dawson focused on the importance of getting consent at every level and emphasized that consent is an integral part of healthy relationships.
Carolina Service Council (CSC) President and fourth-year public relations student Christina Galardi was enthusiastic about Dawson’s presentation, describing him as “very entertaining on a somewhat difficult subject and encouraging students to engage in healthy relationships.”
Formerly a trainer and performance coach in business, Dawson decided to travel the country and speak to college students about respectful relationships and the importance of consent after seeing the effects of sexual assault on a survivor firsthand.
“The reason I started doing this is because a girl I was dating told me that she had been raped in college, and I was the first person she had told. I saw how traumatic it had been for her and that she didn’t even know where to get help, and it really changed my whole life,” Dawson said.
“At first, I didn’t know what to do. Then, I embarked on a two-year path of learning everything I could about sexual assault and sexual violence so I could make sure people knew how to get help.” Though the presentation began lightheartedly, Dawson did not skirt around the jarring facts and statistics surrounding sexual assault and violence; on his accompanying PowerPoint presentation, the fact that one in three women will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime was only one of many statistics presented that illustrated the severity of the problem.
“I learned about what qualifies as sexual assault, and it really opened my eyes to how common sexual assault is,” Butler said. “I knew that it happened a lot, but I wasn’t aware of the exact numbers.”
Dawson ended his speech by imploring the need for a “more safe, more trustful, more respectful” dating environment and presenting a challenge to audience members: “Pick out three or four people you know, and tell them that if anyone ever touches them or hurts them, you’ll be there for them.”
Dawson’s presentation was co-sponsored by the Office of Sexual Assault and Violence Intervention and Prevention, CSC, Changing Carolina, Alpha Chi Omega, Kappa Delta Delta Delta Delta, Alpha Delta Pi and Kappa Kappa Gamma.
In the same vein as Dawson’s presentation, CSC will be sponsoring service trips to a local family shelter Monday, a presentation on bystander accountability Tuesday and a trip to Hannah House, a shelter for women and children, Wednesday.
“Especially after the extremely unfortunate incident with Professor Jennifer Wilson, we felt like this was an issue that we should bring more attention to,” Galardi said. “The bystander accountability presentation will focus on what people should do when something isn’t right in a friend’s relationship, as well as personal responsibility in your own relationships.”
Galardi continued to say that CSC is using the Stand Up Carolina campaign to take this month to explore the issue of sexual and domestic violence by offering service learning opportunities related to the issue.