“It is encouraging to see a strong majority of Australians support criminalising stealthing, a legal reform led by the ACT and adopted in several other states,” Director of the Australia Institute’s Centre for Sex & Gender Equality Chanel Contos said.
“Uniform legislation around the country to raise awareness of the act could prevent mass amounts of sexual violence in our society.
“Stealthing is a particularly intricate type of sexual violence because the definition, by default, means that you have consented to having protected sex with the perpetrator, meaning that you probably had positive feelings towards that person.
“We don’t have a nationally representative study of the prevalence of stealthing, in part because stealthing is often committed without the victim’s knowledge.”
Stealthing is already explicitly criminalised in the ACT, NSW, Tasmania and Victoria, while in SA and WA, sexual assault legislation reviews are in progress and a private members’ bill criminalising stealthing has been introduced in SA.
For Australians looking for intelligent and unbiased news coverage, join renowned journalist Natarsha Belling on Your Morning Agenda for breaking national and international stories as well as the top business and finance stories - every weekday from 6:30am on Listnr: