Prevention

Educating to better understand

CALAS pursues its prevention and awareness work in order to reduce the most persistent prejudices and demystify sexual assault. Workshops are offered in various settings, including educational institutions, community organizations and institutions in Outaouais.

We aim to achieve three central objectives:

To equip the community in order for them to identify sexual assault, to receive disclosures and to support victims.
To transfer relevant information to deconstruct myths and prejudices.
To stimulate critical thinking in order to stimulate commitment to social change.

“We are not born women: we become women”

– Simone de Beauvoir

01Footprint Program

“Empreinte – Agir ensemble contre les agressions à caractère sexuel” is a prevention program for high school students, their parents and school personnel.

This program was developed jointly by the RQCALACS and Professors Manon Bergeron and Martine Hébert of the Department of Sexology at UQAM. In line with sexuality-related learning defined by the Quebec Ministry of Education, it includes 4 to 6 workshops offered in class, as well as training for school personnel and videos for parents. The goal of this program is to reduce social tolerance towards different forms of sexual violence.

Workshop 1 (secondary 2): Sexual assault
Workshop 2 (secondary 2): Sexual consent
Workshop 3 (secondary 3): Disclosure and Support
Workshop 4 (Secondary 3): Youth Empowerment Against Sexual Assault
Workshop 5 (Secondary 3): The Culture of Hypersexualization and Gender Stereotypes
Workshop 6 (Secondary 4): Sexual exploitation

More info

02The #GCPT Program

#GardeÇaPourToi is a prevention program on sexting and child pornography that was developed in partnership with the Service de Police de la Ville de Gatineau and the Procureur aux poursuites criminelles et pénales du Bureau des affaires de la jeunesse.

Through our participation in this project, we hope to open a dialogue with teenagers, to allow them to develop their critical thinking skills and to question, and to understand their motivations, what influences them and the issues behind sending intimate images. Our workshop also allows them to explore positive and healthy alternatives and to learn about the resources available to them when the consequences of sexting appear, and to become engaged citizens and active witnesses to react to sexual violence. We have also developed an animation and intervention guide for school personnel. Contact us to obtain a copy.

CALAS, the definition of sexting, the culture of hypersexualization, seduction, sexual consent, the consequences of non-consensual sharing of intimate images, the role and responsibility of everyone, what to do if it happens to me, available resources.

More info

03Sexual Assault Awareness Workshops

A workshop that increases understanding about sexual assault, using interactive tools to engage and develop critical analysis. Can be offered to mixed or single gender groups, all high school levels as well as adults.

CALAS, the definition and forms of sexual assault, the notion of sexual consent, myths and prejudices, helpful and harmful attitudes.

04Workshops for people living with an intellectual disability

In an effort to reach out to diverse women who are vulnerable to sexual assault, we developed a sexual assault prevention-awareness workshop for people living with intellectual disabilities from an intersectional feminist perspective. Interactive visual tools and audiovisual content were developed to improve the accessibility of the information shared.

Definition and forms of sexual assault, my rights, recognizing and responding to sexual assault, finding help, sexual consent, online sexual assault.

05CALAS Services Workshops

A workshop to increase understanding about sexual assault, using interactive tools to engage and develop critical analysis. Can be offered to mixed or single gender groups, all levels of high school as well as adults.

CALAS, the definition and forms of sexual assault, the notion of sexual consent, myths and prejudices, helpful and harmful attitudes.

06Customized workshops

CALAS is open to offering customized workshops after assessing the needs of the community and depending on the availability of the team.

The workshop application process

Requests are evaluated by the team based on the following criteria: the availability of facilitators, the facilitation schedule, its annual targets and the diversity of requests and settings.

CALAS, the definition and forms of sexual assault, the notion of sexual consent, myths and prejudices, helping and harmful attitudes.

Facilitation request form

Fighting against prejudice

to demystify beliefs and fight against the banalization of aggression

As in all fields, it is important to be informed to better understand the implications and repercussions of sexual assault. To this end, we invite you to respond by true or false to the following statements concerning sexual assault.

Quiz on myths and prejudices

We suggest that you answer a few questions that come up regularly when discussing the subject of sexual assault.

– – –

A survivor of sexual assault must hate her abuser.

All people who sexually abuse children are pedophiles.

Biological predispositions put men at greater risk for sexual assault because they have a greater need to satisfy their sexual urges.

Only a minority of sexual offenders are predators, mentally disturbed and not easily rehabilitated.

It is possible for someone to have sexually assaulted me even if I have had consensual sex with them in the past.

After experiencing sexual abuse, it is possible to recover, live a satisfying life and feel good again.

Sexual assaults are mostly committed at night, on dark streets or in parks.

Lesbian and bisexual women are at greater risk of experiencing sexual violence.

Women lie when they say they have been sexually assaulted and often make false accusations of sexual assault.

People living with developmental disabilities are at greater risk for SCAs.

A girl who dresses in sexy or revealing clothes provokes sexual assault.

Abusers are lonely men who are sexually frustrated because they don’t have a partner.

Women provoke sexual assault

If parents have had a normal sex life, a father would not commit incest with his daughter.

The consequences can be as severe for sexual harassment as it is for sexual assault.

It is mostly homosexuals who assault boys, teenagers and men.

People who have experienced sexual assault are more likely to become homosexual.

People who were abused as children will become abusers as adults.

Sexual assaults are most often committed by people known to the victim.

People who become sexually aroused during sexual assault are consenting because they have experienced pleasure.

Alcohol is the most common date rape drug

Only 5% of sexual assault victims report the assault to the police.

If a person is not crying or visibly upset, it was probably not a serious sexual assault.

Prostitution is the oldest profession in the world.

Women in prostitution regularly suffer multiple forms of violence and have a mortality rate 40 times higher than the Canadian average. Do you know of any other profession with such conditions?Rather, it is the oldest oppression in the world. This myth serves to imply that it has always been there, that it will always be there and that nothing can be done about it. Thousands of women in Quebec suffer the consequences of sexual exploitation.To think that prostitution is the oldest profession in the world, banalizes the fact that it is based on the exploitation of the vulnerability of these women.Would we accept rape or torture under the pretext that they are as old as the world?