I’m Not Sure This Is Rape, But: An Exposition of the Stealthing Trend

Abstract

Upholding the sexual and reproductive rights of all women and girls has been flagged as a global priority. However, the hetero-patriarchal actions and systems within which female sexuality and reproduction is situated not only disenfranchises women of these rights, but it sometimes usurps these rights from them, without them knowing. One such act, is the practice of stealthing. This conceptual article argues that the stealthing trend is a relevant construct in the human and social sciences because it has a detrimental impact on female sexuality and gender-based sexual violence. Through both a conceptual scrutiny of the construct and through online narratives of stealthing, this article not only establishes stealthing as a distinctive form of gender-based sexual violence, it also establishes it as a practice that deviously subjugates female sexuality and reproduction under the guise of sexual autonomy and sexual consent.