A plea for sanity regarding recent rape cases.

[ITR_champion]

Rolling Stone magazine published a stunning story of a brutal gang rape at UVA, for which virtually every detail that can be checked has turned out to be false. Lena Dunham accused a man named Barry at Oberlin College of raping her; that also appears to be a false accusation. That’s two major, highly-publicized accusations of rape that fell apart on the same day. This comes not long after a supposed rape threat against a University of Chicago student turned out to be a hoax. As many have noted, cases like these tend to be bad for everyone including those who actually are rape victims.

Here’s a quote from the article in The New Republic:

The dismantling of Erdely’s story–both by anti-feminist agonistes and by those genuinely dismayed by the prospect of journalistic error–will mean that Jackie’s story of being beaten and raped by seven fraternity brothers will be dismissed and that the reading public will be permitted to slip back into the comforting conviction that stories like Jackie’s aren’t real, that rapes like that don’t happen, that the system works, and that, of course, bitches lie.

What we will be allowed to happily forget is that there are plenty of real stories of rape: of violent rape, frat house rape, gang rape, date rape;

Rebbeca Traister, the author of this, makes a big assumption here. She seems to assume that “the reading public”, i.e. almost everyone, believes that there are few or no real stories of rape. But what’s her basis for this belief? I know of no one anywhere who thinks that rape doesn’t happen, or that violent rape or date rape or any other category doesn’t happen, or that it doesn’t happen in the great majority of cases where an accusation is made, or that we don’t need harsh punishments for those convicted of rape. And yet feminists like Traister appear to take it for granted that “the reading public” does generally think these sorts of things.

In fact, every member of the reading public that I know takes a much more intelligent approach than Traister gives them credit for. Some rape accusations are true, some are false. We have courts, judges, trials, lawyers, and public defenders who go through a process of weighing accusations, examining evidence, and questioning witnesses in order to separate true and false accusations, in cases of both rape and other crimes.

What many members of the reading public to have is a legitimate concerns about false accusations and their results. After the UVA case was exposed, many commented about the effect this might have on future rape victims. I’ve read a few complaints about the university’s hasty decision to ban all frat parties for the rest of the semester. (and no complaints at all about the disruption to anyone’s education) Few seem at all concerned about the traumatic effects on the falsely accused men. In the case of Lena Dunham, I’ve yet to see anyone in her media fan club express unhappiness with her making a false accusation, or sympathy with the victim of that false accusation. And this seems to be the pattern. Remember Dominique Strauss-Kahn? It is difficult to feel sympathetic for one of the world’s most powerful men when he couldn’t keep his pants on. But as a plain matter of fact, he was the victim of a false accusation, and it ruined his life and career.

Cathy Young at Slate did us a good service by investigating the facts about false rape accusations. Unfortunately everyone I’ve seen who cites her article seems to misrepresent it. Ezra Klein links to Young’s article for proof that false accusations “happen very, very rarely”. Others say that Young has shown that the figure is 8% of accusations are false. In fact, Young argues that the real figure is almost certainly higher than 8%, probably much higher.

[BigT]

It’s not that they won’t believe any stories. It’s that, pretty much any time there is an accusation, at least half of the people involve presume it is false. Yet, even if higher than 8%, false accusations aren’t 50%. Plus, these are usually the same people, so, for them, they presume 100% of rapes are false.

Sure, they’ll change their mind when they are forced to. But they start with the idea that it’s false. Which I guess would be fine if it were presumption of innocence, but it’s not, since they accuse the alleged victim.

[Grumman]

@BigT

It’s not that they won’t believe any stories. It’s that, pretty much any time there is an accusation, at least half of the people involve presume it is false. Yet, even if higher than 8%, false accusations aren’t 50%. Plus, these are usually the same people, so, for them, they presume 100% of rapes are false.

That is a stupid argument. It assumes that all rape accusations appear equal, and that it is impossible for a person to look at the presented evidence and decide whether it is more or less likely. If half of all people recognised a bullshit accusation like the UVA case as being bullshit that is a good thing, not grounds to pretend that they were just doing it as a kneejerk reaction.

[astorian]

The problem for MANY of us, on both the Left and the Right, is that we’re often predisposed to believe stories that fit into our notions of The Way Things Are.

A left-leaning feminist is predisposed to believe that elite colleges are ruled by a Good Old Boy Network of rich white males. To them, almost any charge of rape by white preppies rings true, even if the accuser doesn’t seem very trustworthy. “Jackie” struck me as an embarrassingly unreliable witness, but if you believe that schools like UVA are dominated by a “rape culture,” you may overlook holes in her story.

Similarly, many conservatives are predisposed to believe that the federal government under Barack Obama is filled with dadgum tyrannical commies who like psuhing around honest, humble, God-fearing Americans. If you’re one of those conservatives, you’ll be inclined to view rancher Cliven Bundy as a hero… even though a closer look would reveal him as a crackpot and a racist.

It’s precisely when a story seems to confirm our own deepest prejudices that we have to be ESPECIALLY skeptical.

[LionelHutz405]

I disbelieve all the ones where they complain to the media only and not the police.

[marshmallow]

Social activists have been picking the wrong hills to die on lately. Might want to think about looking before just leaping in cannonball style.

[ITR_champion]

@BigT

It’s not that they won’t believe any stories. It’s that, pretty much any time there is an accusation, at least half of the people involve presume it is false. Yet, even if higher than 8%, false accusations aren’t 50%. Plus, these are usually the same people, so, for them, they presume 100% of rapes are false.

Sure, they’ll change their mind when they are forced to. But they start with the idea that it’s false. Which I guess would be fine if it were presumption of innocence, but it’s not, since they accuse the alleged victim.

What, exactly is the evidence for this? How exactly do we know that “pretty much any time there is an accusation, at least half of the people involve presume it is false”? In many of the best known, high-profile cases pretty much every seemed to assume that the accusation was true.

[Martin_Hyde]

Yeah, I’ll echo that on high profile rape accusations. Almost everyone believe DSK was guilty, no one has seriously doubted Cosby is not only a rapist but a serial rapist, most people bought Duke LaCrosse hook, line, and sinker. I hadn’t even heard anyone suggest the Rolling Stone article was false before RS itself posted its clarification. Now, I am aware that the Washington Post and Slate had been skewering some of the details of that story, but I personally hadn’t heard any of that until the day it all blew up. That suggests at least in a small selection of high profile rape cases people are pretty quick to believe that the rapes happened.

I think it never helps to exaggerate things or to distort them in anyway. One of the big problems is the persistent myth that college campuses perpetuate a “rape culture.” In fact, women on college campuses aged 18-24 are less likely to be raped than women who are not enrolled in college in that same cohort. Additionally, rapes in general have steadily gone down since the mid-1990s, from 5 per 1,000 to a little over 2.

Is there a problem with how universities handle rapes? Absolutely, and it seems to be the problem of excluding any rational handling of them at all. Colleges either seem to ignore serious infractions, or to instantly believe them to be true and give the accused virtually no due process in the procedures designed to mimic in some way the real world legal system. Both of those practices need to be brought to an end.

A common refrain I’ve heard in reference to the Jackie story is “people remember things differently after a trauma”, and “it isn’t the job of counselors or friends to question a story but to support the victim.” Okay, I can agree with that 100%. But it is actually the job of journalists, the legal system, and the administration of a college to investigate serious accusations in a balanced way. It is not the job of any of those entities to simply believe anything a person who claims they are a victim of rape says, or to ignore difficult-to-reconcile inconsistencies.

Additionally, we should probably try substantiating what is meant by “people remember things differently.” As a lay man on that topic it would seem reasonable to me “Jackie” might forget a lot of details of her assault due to the mental state people often enter during times off extreme fear, violence or etc. Many victims of gang rape I do know, cannot correctly recall the total number of assailants, the number of times they were assaulted, or all of the different ways in which they were assaulted. However, Jackie apparently can’t recall basic biographical information about the ring leader of her assault, meaning whether or not he was in a fraternity or whether or not he actually worked at a pool where she met him. She also apparently cannot remember the calendar date of her assault. I’ve not ever heard of a rape victim actually forgetting the date of their attack. In fact most sadly usually have a rougher time on the anniversary of their attack even years after they have largely been able to emotionally and psychologically recover from it. Not knowing the correct date is hard to believe, especially since you would think even if somehow Jackie didn’t know the exact date, wouldn’t she at least have some memory of the week in question, what was going on that week, thus what day of the week, and thus the actual calendar date?

That’s just how human memory works, and I don’t think calendar dates are good candidates for things to just float away due to an assault. Victims of prolonged assaults may “lose days”, but to actually forget the calendar date and pick one weeks and weeks away from any that could have actually happened is very suspect to me.

[robert_columbia]

@ITR_champion

…Ezra Klein links to Young’s article for proof that false accusations “happen very, very rarely”. Others say that Young has shown that the figure is 8% of accusations are false. In fact, Young argues that the real figure is almost certainly higher than 8%, probably much higher.

There’s a major problem with trying to calculate these numbers - how do you know whether or not an accusation is really (really and truly-o) true, and how many incidents really never get reported? As I understand it, these stats are based primarily by comparing how many incidents are formally reported to police versus how many incidents are reported on confidential surveys. But that doesn’t solve the problem because people can lie or be mistaken on a confidential survey too.

[robert_columbia]

@astorian

The problem for MANY of us, on both the Left and the Right, is that we’re often predisposed to believe stories that fit into our notions of The Way Things Are.

A left-leaning feminist is predisposed to believe that elite colleges are ruled by a Good Old Boy Network of rich white males. To them, almost any charge of rape by white preppies rings true, even if the accuser doesn’t seem very trustworthy. “Jackie” struck me as an embarrassingly unreliable witness, but if you believe that schools like UVA are dominated by a “rape culture,” you may overlook holes in her story.

Similarly, many conservatives are predisposed to believe that the federal government under Barack Obama is filled with dadgum tyrannical commies who like psuhing around honest, humble, God-fearing Americans. If you’re one of those conservatives, you’ll be inclined to view rancher Cliven Bundy as a hero… even though a closer look would reveal him as a crackpot and a racist.

It’s precisely when a story seems to confirm our own deepest prejudices that we have to be ESPECIALLY skeptical.

And there’s a fear among many men that the pendulum is swinging the other way, and that they will be bitten by new “tough on rapists” rules that make them guilty until proven innocent. So be careful before you sleep with her - even though it was really consensual, maybe she’ll regret it in the morning and “cry rape” to gain some sympathy. You’re now a hunted man with a bad reputation. Now your hopes for the future aren’t whether you’ll get that good job or that advancement to PhD candidacy - it’s whether or not you’ll spend the rest of your life as a registered sex offender on the edge of society, with no job, begging for money from people who think you’re an unredeemable dirtball.

[shiftless]

Well, it’s pretty damned sad that what looked like a chance to shine some light on a huge, hidden problem has turned into another example of the mass media gone wild. The fact is, rapes happen. There should be a way a person (I purposely do not limit this to woman) can report a crime without being drawn into a public ‘he said - she said’ debate. Every case of alleged rape can’t be solved, of course, no more than every theft case can be solved, but I would think a little change in the way information is gathered could give us a better view of what or where the problem is.

Rolling Stone chose to focus on one sensational (they thought) instance of rape, because it was so outrageously over the top that nobody could possibly find it acceptable. Makes a great story, gets a lot of attention but it is not a good example of the real problem.

A common theme I hear in the news stories is that the victim was ‘lured to the frat house.’ Lured. As if someone left a tail of beers from the girls dorm to the frat house and she couldn’t help following that trail until it was too late. If they have to use that kind of deceptive language to excite their public, maybe they shouldn’t be talking about the subject at all.

[Orwell]

@robert_columbia

And there’s a fear among many men that the pendulum is swinging the other way, and that they will be bitten by new “tough on rapists” rules that make them guilty until proven innocent. So be careful before you sleep with her - even though it was really consensual, maybe she’ll regret it in the morning and “cry rape” to gain some sympathy. You’re now a hunted man with a bad reputation. Now your hopes for the future aren’t whether you’ll get that good job or that advancement to PhD candidacy - it’s whether or not you’ll spend the rest of your life as a registered sex offender on the edge of society, with no job, begging for money from people who think you’re an unredeemable dirtball.

This fear is not unwarranted, and not new, as a matter of fact. The simple fact is that, with the exception of very violent stranger attack rapes, there are always elements of he-said, she-said. And there are usually elements of honesty, dishonesty, motivation, uncertainty, fear, miscommunication and other factors on both sides that need sorted out. It is a dangerous mindset to instantly believe either the accuser or accused before sorting out the facts.

As far as the Rolling Stone article, it was clearly a case of a dishonest reporter finding exactly what she was looking for without any level of detached suspicion or journalistic ethics. Of course, it is Rolling Stone, so what do you expect?

[Jackmannii]

@ITR_champion

In fact, Young argues that the real figure is almost certainly higher than 8%, probably much higher.

It’s a good article.

But I’m not seeing where she argues that the true false accusation rate is “probably much higher” than 8%.

[ITR_champion]

@Jackmannii

It’s a good article.

But I’m not seeing where she argues that the true false accusation rate is “probably much higher” than 8%.

She says that “official data on what law enforcement terms ‘unfounded’ rape reports … yield conflicting numbers depending on local policies and procedures, average 8 to 10 percent of all reported rapes.” Later: “This does not include cases in which chrges are filed but rejected for prosecution (between a quarter and nearly half of all cases), or the relatively small number of cases that end in dismissal or acquittal. Of course not all such cases involve innocent defendants–probably not even most, but surely some do.” After that she summarizes a particular paper examining sexual assault reports at a university, which had similar results. Only 6.8% were shown to be definitely false, but a majority did not lead to charges. So she acknowledges there’s no way to know the exact figure of cases that are false, but clearly it consists of all those that are proven false plus some of the portion of those which were never proven false or true.

[ITR_champion]

@robert_columbia

And there’s a fear among many men that the pendulum is swinging the other way, and that they will be bitten by new “tough on rapists” rules that make them guilty until proven innocent. So be careful before you sleep with her - even though it was really consensual, maybe she’ll regret it in the morning and “cry rape” to gain some sympathy. You’re now a hunted man with a bad reputation. Now your hopes for the future aren’t whether you’ll get that good job or that advancement to PhD candidacy - it’s whether or not you’ll spend the rest of your life as a registered sex offender on the edge of society, with no job, begging for money from people who think you’re an unredeemable dirtball.

Speaking of good articles in Slate, they just published an excellent examination of university policies that are taking away men’s rights. It also debunks the ubiquitous statistic that one fourth of women in college are raped.

[Hamlet]

@ITR_champion

She says that “official data on what law enforcement terms ‘unfounded’ rape reports … yield conflicting numbers depending on local policies and procedures, average 8 to 10 percent of all reported rapes.” Later: “This does not include cases in which chrges are filed but rejected for prosecution (between a quarter and nearly half of all cases), or the relatively small number of cases that end in dismissal or acquittal. Of course not all such cases involve innocent defendants–probably not even most, but surely some do.” After that she summarizes a particular paper examining sexual assault reports at a university, which had similar results.

You and I have extremely different definitions of “much higher”.

[ITR_champion]

Evidently.

[LinusK]

@ITR_champion

Rolling Stone magazine published a stunning story of a brutal gang rape at UVA, for which virtually every detail that can be checked has turned out to be false. Lena Dunham accused a man named Barry at Oberlin College of raping her; that also appears to be a false accusation. That’s two major, highly-publicized accusations of rape that fell apart on the same day. This comes not long after a supposed rape threat against a University of Chicago student turned out to be a hoax. As many have noted, cases like these tend to be bad for everyone including those who actually are rape victims.

Here’s a quote from the article in The New Republic:

Rebbeca Traister, the author of this, makes a big assumption here. She seems to assume that “the reading public”, i.e. almost everyone, believes that there are few or no real stories of rape. But what’s her basis for this belief? I know of no one anywhere who thinks that rape doesn’t happen, or that violent rape or date rape or any other category doesn’t happen, or that it doesn’t happen in the great majority of cases where an accusation is made, or that we don’t need harsh punishments for those convicted of rape. And yet feminists like Traister appear to take it for granted that “the reading public” does generally think these sorts of things.

In fact, every member of the reading public that I know takes a much more intelligent approach than Traister gives them credit for. Some rape accusations are true, some are false. We have courts, judges, trials, lawyers, and public defenders who go through a process of weighing accusations, examining evidence, and questioning witnesses in order to separate true and false accusations, in cases of both rape and other crimes.

What many members of the reading public to have is a legitimate concerns about false accusations and their results. After the UVA case was exposed, many commented about the effect this might have on future rape victims. I’ve read a few complaints about the university’s hasty decision to ban all frat parties for the rest of the semester. (and no complaints at all about the disruption to anyone’s education) Few seem at all concerned about the traumatic effects on the falsely accused men. In the case of Lena Dunham, I’ve yet to see anyone in her media fan club express unhappiness with her making a false accusation, or sympathy with the victim of that false accusation. And this seems to be the pattern. Remember Dominique Strauss-Kahn? It is difficult to feel sympathetic for one of the world’s most powerful men when he couldn’t keep his pants on. But as a plain matter of fact, he was the victim of a false accusation, and it ruined his life and career.

Cathy Young at Slate did us a good service by investigating the facts about false rape accusations. Unfortunately everyone I’ve seen who cites her article seems to misrepresent it. Ezra Klein links to Young’s article for proof that false accusations “happen very, very rarely”. Others say that Young has shown that the figure is 8% of accusations are false. In fact, Young argues that the real figure is almost certainly higher than 8%, probably much higher.

Well, first of all, nice post.

Second, I don’t know how you could possibly know what percentage of allegations are false.

Do you go by convictions? Not everyone who is innocent is acquitted, and not everyone who is guilty is convicted.

If we don’t even know the rate that courts get it right, how can you possibly guess at the allegations that don’t make it to court?

But I agree that the reactions you quoted are strange. It seems to me that the natural reaction would be to remember that an allegation isn’t a fact.

[Rune]

@BigT

It’s not that they won’t believe any stories. It’s that, pretty much any time there is an accusation, at least half of the people involve presume it is false. Yet, even if higher than 8%, false accusations aren’t 50%.

I used to believe all rape allegations since I couldn’t imagine any reason anyone would want to make false accusations, but there have been so many false or spurious ones that I find that very hard anymore. Also I’ve read that various US prosecutors estimate the percentage of false rapes allegations are in the range of 40%-50%, and that it certainly overwhelmingly is the violent crime for which the percentage of false allegations is the highest.

What I want to know is why the hell anyone would want to make a false allegation. Let alone that you might ruin somebody’s life, what is in it for you? It used to carry considerable stigma, has it now so completely flipped that having being raped is now considered a badge of honour to be sought for and desired?

[Chief_Pedant]

@Rune

What I want to know is why the hell anyone would want to make a false allegation. Let alone that you might ruin somebody’s life, what is in it for you?

For many personalities, there is a very large secondary gain to achieving victimhood status. You have suffered. Greatly. Your inadequacies are no longer your fault. You are a Victim. Something uttterly understandable is responsible for whatever it is going wrong in your life.

Beyond that, tales grow in the telling, and particularly so as those anxious to be associated with a Tragedy parse out your details. You do not want to disappoint them; they are anxious to have someone confirm a Narrative they know to be true.

What begins as as something ambiguous can easily grow to a Jackie. And as it grows, the vestedness of both Victim Supporters and Victim snowball until an entire story is mostly bullshit, with whatever germ of original fact–if there was any at all–long buried.

Not only is the Narrative now bullshit; giving it up would take you back to a place of personal inadequacy. Not to mention let down the millions who have not only given you a public status you never had; they have trusted you. And so, what began as an offhand remark about sex that you weren’t sure you should have had, becomes a gang rape by the archetypical perp.

Sure; the real tragedy are the rapes that were rapes. But that tragedy has nothing to do with the fact that your story is nonsense, and those other rapes out there don’t mean the real lesson is rape.

The real lesson is that it is very easy for some personalities to get sucked into making false allegations under the proper conditions and with the right coaching from those prosecuting their narrative.