April 27, 2017.
An American lawyer wished to shed light on a new practice comparable to sexual assault: stealthing is the act of removing one’s condom during intercourse without warning one’s partner.
A prejudice that victims must denounce
You may have been a victim of stealthing yourself. This practice involves removing the condom during intercourse without the consent of your partner. According to investigation conducted by Alexandra Brodsky, lawyer at the National Women’s Law Center, and published in the Columbia Journal of Gender and Law, many victims, mostly women, would have suffered such harm.
Experienced as an intimate betrayal, this practice leaves the victims in deep disarray. ” Victims fear unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases », Explains Alexandra Brodsky, in remarks reported by our colleagues from Release. They “ have experienceda clear violation of their bodily autonomy and the trust placed, wrongly, in their partner “.
Stealthing is akin to sexual assault
According to Alexandra Brodsky, the practice of stealthing should be recognized as a form of sexual violence. In this way, victims would have more courage to denounce the harm they have suffered. While some defenders of this practice defend “ a natural male right », The lawyer recalls that the two partners must be consenting before removing the condom. Otherwise, it is indeed an assault.
In France, this practice could be assimilated to rape and judged as such. As our colleagues from Release, article 222-23 of the Penal Code defines rape as “ any act of sexual penetration, of any kind, committed on the person of another, by violence, coercion, threat or surprise “. If you’ve been a victim of stealthing, now is the time to report it.
Marine Rondot
Read also: 10 reasons to never forget the condom
