A film being screened at universities and colleges across Australia looks at sexual assault on American campuses.

Called The Hunting Ground, it paints a picture of American universities as dangerous places where college sports stars rule, frat houses fuel a misogynistic culture, and one in five women are sexually assaulted.

This figure is disputed (the Department of Justice says it's far less) and the film itself has been accused of being agenda-driven propaganda, but despite this it's been shown at the White House and shaped public debate about sexism on campus.

Meanwhile, today a misogynistic Facebook page called 'Hotties of Melbourne University' made headlines.

The page, which has been active for years and has about 13,000 likes, posts pictures of (mostly female) uni students and encourages men to comment on women's appearance.

"This girl is a 0/10 I would not bang her even if they PAID me! F***in hell," read one of the comments posted on a photo.

And that's not the only story this week about sexism on campus. On Monday, boys from the Philip Baxter College at UNSW were filmed singing offensive lyrics which referred to women as "buns in the oven" they'd like to "cream by the dozen".

"I wish that all the ladies were little red foxes," the men would chant.

"And if I were a hunter I'd shoot them in their boxes."

What's gong on? Is this 'harmless fun', or something more sinister?

Will Facebook pull it down?

Two days ago University of Melbourne Law Student, Laura Blandthorn, kicked off a petition two days ago to get the Hotties of Melbourne Uni page pulled down.

It went viral and now has almost 20,000 signatures.

"I was was very concerned with the predatory nature of the comments and the fact these photos are put up without the consent of people and they likened picking up to hunting which is reminiscent of rape culture," Laura told Hack.

University of Melbourne says the page is against its values and that it began asking Facebook to pull the page down 12 months ago.

Hack asked Facebook if it would be taking the Hotties of Melbourne University page down.

It didn't answer that question; instead a spokesperson said Facebook's Community Standards outline the type of content that should be reported, and they will take the appropriate action for each report.

That means we still don't know if the page will be taken down.

Of course, Facebook itself began on campus - at Harvard University, which also features in The Hunting Ground.

And before Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg wrote the software for a "hot or not" website that allowed visitors to compare two student pictures side-by-side and let them decide who was hot or not.

A scene from The Hunting Ground.

It's bigger than one Facebook page

Whether Facebook pulls the page or not, the bigger question is about the culture on campuses.

Hack found other Facebook pages like 'Hotties' all around the country, including ones informally associated with Swinburne, Deakin, University of Tasmania and RMIT.

Sexual assaults on campus have been well documented.

A survey last year of 1,500 students from 34 unis found most students had experienced sexual harassment or unwelcome sexual behaviour, and this happened mostly on campus.

Conducted by the National Union of Students, it included anonymous personal accounts of women telling staff they had been raped, and being told to "get over it".

A19-year-old woman told the survey "reporting my rape to the university was worse than actually being raped."

There's no national standard for reporting rape on Australian university campuses.

Experiences like this has made the Hotties of Melbourne Uni Facebook page a totemic issue, National Union of Students Women's Officer Heidi La Paglia told Hack.

It's all about general misogyny on campus.

"Some might consider the site harmless, but it shows how the culture is so entrenched," she said.

Laura Blandthorn, the student who started the petition, says the page is an expression of "rape culture", including using hunting metaphors to talk about picking up women.

"The photos of the men are very jovial in nature and while they can be disrespectful as well, the ones that feature women are much more explicit, much more violent, and there just seem to be way more of them."

"If these aren't rape culture I don't know what is, some people might be shocked by that, but that's the bottom line."

"It's the role of students, the role of the community to call that out when we see it, we can't just click like and scroll past."

Tonight The Hunting Ground is to be screened at University of Melbourne - since February it's been screened at 31 campuses around the country, with 19 to go.

"It's opened up great discussions with university admin to educate and take more of a preventative approach," says Anna, who's organising the screenings.

"They can go to the dark places and deal with some of these cultural problems."