Zonta Club of Hervey Bay co-organises youth forum for Sexual Violence Awareness Month

Zonta Club of Hervey Bay was honoured to help organise “It’s a Man’s Issue: Voices of Change,” a youth breakfast and panel discussion that tackled the complex realities surrounding consent, rape culture, and toxic masculinity.
Held on Thursday, 9 October 2025 in observance of Sexual Violence Awareness Month in QLD, the event featured speaker Jacob Levin, a registered nurse, DFV advocate and facilitator of the It’s a Man’s Issue program. Joining him in the panel discussion were Fraser Coast Anglican College student Jasper Robinson and Ashleigh Kinsela, Chair of the Fraser Coast Domestic & Family Violence Alliance.
150 guests including students from schools in Hervey Bay and Maryborough, community organisations representatives, government leaders and other domestic and family violence advocates were in attendance. It was a great opportunity to engage our youth and the community to help reshape the cultural narratives around gender, respect, and responsibility.
The event was hosted by the Fraser Coast DFV Alliance of which the Zonta Club of Hervey Bay is a member. It was proudly funded through grants and generous donations from:
✅Social Shift Institute
✅Fraser Coast Regional Council
✅Llew O’Brien, Federal MP for Wide Bay
✅David Batt, Federal MP for Hinkler
✅John Barounis, State Member for Maryborough
✅David Lee, State Member for Hervey Bay
✅Maryborough City Rotary Club
✅Maryborough Sunrise Rotary Club
✅Hervey Bay City Rotary Club
✅Hervey Bay Sunrise Rotary Club
✅Hervey Bay RSL
✅Wide Bay Transit