Arguing that asking someone if they want to have sex with you lacks dignity is akin to arguing that we are all entitled to each other’s bodies at all times as long as the other person looks at us in a particular way. Bodies are personal, and women’s bodies in particular need to be reconceptualised as something other than public property.

When I hear that half of young people are significantly dissatisfied with school sex education it makes me believe even more fiercely that a national sex education curriculum is well and truly overdue. Ideally, this education would be comprehensive and inclusive, covering topics ranging from sexually transmissible infections (STIs), biology and pregnancy prevention to sexual assault, sex and pleasure, intimacy and diverse sexualities.

Africa, Africa. South Africa around Johannesburg, Botswana in the village near the border with SA, the Kalahari desert, Uganda – the airport, the city of Kampala, the Village of Katebo near Lake Victoria … on my mind. Like tears. Like hundreds of faces. Like hundreds of small children spontaneously cheering, celebrating a gift of two […]

One of our esteemed Overland bloggers, Trish Bolton, has an opinion piece about sexual harassment in the workplace in today’s Age, ‘Women are no longer prepared to put up and shut up’: HE CORNERED me at the back of the shop, stood over me and ripped open my vest, swearing when he saw I was […]

James Frey says: fictional characters – homo fictus – are not identical to flesh-and-blood human beings – homo sapiens. One reason for this is that readers wish to read about the exceptional rather than the mundane. Readers demand that homo fictus be more handsome or ugly, ruthless or noble, vengeful or giving, brave or cowardly, […]

Nudes are in the news again. Specifically, under-age nudity has reared its terribly inappropriate head recently with the abolition of the artistic purpose defence in child pornography cases. It’s never been more exciting, or perhaps dangerous, to be doing stuff in the buff. The reforms to current child pornography laws emerged from the NSW Child […]