Dr. Anna Blainey Warner will tell us how women in the 1890s alerted the public to the sexual assault and prostitution of young girls and of the controversy that followed. Anna is a freelance historian whose PhD was on the Australian Woman's Christian Temperance Union in the Nineteenth Century.
It is known that the Woman's Christian Temperance Union was instrumental in giving women the vote. What is less known is its protest against the sexual exploitation and abuse of women and children.
The women of the Victorian WCTU were amongst those women and men of the 1880s and 90s who campaigned to raise the age of consent - from what was then 12 years of age. Once this was achieved they fought to prevent its repeal and to ensure that it was enforced. One group of dedicated women attended court trials of sex crimes in inner city courts to monitor the course of justice. When the women alerted the public to the matter, a contentious debate arose within the Australian public concerning the sexual culture of the time, standards of masculinity and femininity and also of acceptable speech.