# \#MeToo backlash is hurting women (Bloomberg article) **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 5, 2018, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626 "2018-12-05T19:09:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/21 "2018-12-05T22:17:50Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Do you not believe that false accusations occur? They’re so rare as to be virtually nonexistent. > **[FactCheck: Men are more likely to be raped than be falsely accused of rape](https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-men-are-more-likely-to-be-raped-than-be-falsely-accused-of-rape)** > > According to the best data available, a man is 230 times more likely to be raped than to be falsely accused of rape. The best data we have — the number of people prosecuted for making false allegations — suggests that the average adult man in England and Wales has a 0.00021281 per cent chance of being falsely accused of rape in a year. (That’s based on 35 prosecutions for false rape allegations in 2011 compared to 16.5 million men aged 16 to 59 living in England and Wales at the time). By this measure, a man is 230 times more likely to be raped than to be falsely accused of rape. And let’s put the stats through an even stronger test. Imagine for a second that you believe that **every single one of the men prosecuted for rape in England and Wales in 2016-17 was falsely accused**. Even if that unlikely scenario were true, there would still have been more adult male victims of rape (8,000) than men prosecuted for those rapes they “didn’t commit” (5,190). And keep in mind, they’re talking about _men_ getting raped. Men get raped at an incidence rate far lower than women. If you’re more worried about false accusations than being raped, your priorities are backwards. If the main contribution you have to society’s conversation about the non-stop pandemic of sexual assault and rape is “but what about the tiny percentage of men who get falsely accused of abuse?!”, then there’s something _really_ wrong. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/22 "2018-12-05T22:23:01Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > They’re so rare as to be virtually nonexistent. > > [FactCheck: Men are more likely to be raped than be falsely accused of rape – Channel 4 News](https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-men-are-more-likely-to-be-raped-than-be-falsely-accused-of-rape) > > The best data we have — the number of people prosecuted for making false allegations — suggests that the average adult man in England and Wales has a 0.00021281 per cent chance of being falsely accused of rape in a year. (That’s based on 35 prosecutions for false rape allegations in 2011 compared to 16.5 million men aged 16 to 59 living in England and Wales at the time). > > By this measure, a man is 230 times more likely to be raped than to be falsely accused of rape. > > And let’s put the stats through an even stronger test. Imagine for a second that you believe that **every single one of the men prosecuted for rape in England and Wales in 2016-17 was falsely accused**. Even if that unlikely scenario were true, there would still have been more adult male victims of rape (8,000) than men prosecuted for those rapes they “didn’t commit” (5,190). > > And keep in mind, they’re talking about _men_ getting raped. Men get raped at an incidence rate far lower than women. If you’re more worried about false accusations than being raped, your priorities are backwards. If the main contribution you have to society’s conversation about the non-stop pandemic of sexual assault and rape is “but what about the tiny percentage of men who get falsely accused of abuse?!”, then there’s something _really_ wrong. I don’t think that “the number of people **prosecuted** for making false allegations” is a good measure of the rate of false allegations. Do you? Can you imagine any situations where an accusation might be false and yet not be prosecuted as such? Like, say, accusations made to a corporate HR department? Have you ever heard a news story where an accuser of sexual harassment recants his/her story and is then let off without prosecution? ---
**Author:** ![EscAlaMike](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/escalamike/32/4177_2.png) [@EscAlaMike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EscAlaMike)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/23 "2018-12-05T22:25:49Z")
I’ve seen a disturbing amount of sexual harassment in my workplace. Sometimes it’s been so overt I am left in a bit of shock “did he really just say/do that?”. I don’t know why these women put up with it. Ever since I was 17 and started dating the woman who would become my wife, I’ve lived by something like the “Pence Rule”. Because of that, I’ve never been in a situation where I could even be credibly accused or suspected of anything untoward. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/24 "2018-12-05T22:28:01Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I don’t think that “the number of people **prosecuted** for making false allegations” is a good measure of the rate of false allegations. Do you? If you started from the assumption that every single rape case prosecuted was based on a false allegation, the number of men raped is still higher than the number of false rape allegations. This is the same crap I went through in the Voter ID threads. You can quibble a bit about the numbers, but how many orders of magnitude off do you think they are? One? Two? If they’re off by less than a factor of 100, you’re _still_ bad at statistics. By all means, if you have better numbers, offer them, but if all you have on offer is “that might be skewed slightly”, please, save us both the annoyance and don’t bother. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/25 "2018-12-05T22:30:48Z")
> [@EscAlaMike](#): > > I’ve seen a disturbing amount of sexual harassment in my workplace. Sometimes it’s been so overt I am left in a bit of shock “did he really just say/do that?”. > > I don’t know why these women put up with it. Glad that you recognize this. > [@](#): > > Ever since I was 17 and started dating the woman who would become my wife, I’ve lived by something like the “Pence Rule”. Because of that, I’ve never been in a situation where I could even be credibly accused or suspected of anything untoward. Are you in a position with any power (i.e. a supervisor)? If so, how many women have missed out on instances of experience that could be useful to their career and potential advancement because of your fear of being alone with a woman? Perhaps you should change this policy (you can still have a “no closed doors” policy applied to everyone that doesn’t discriminate at all). ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/26 "2018-12-05T22:35:09Z")
> [@EscAlaMike](#): > > I’ve seen a disturbing amount of sexual harassment in my workplace. Sometimes it’s been so overt I am left in a bit of shock “did he really just say/do that?”. > > I don’t know why these women put up with it. Good on you for being so woke and in tune with the realities of daily work life for wom- > [@](#): > > Ever since I was 17 and started dating the woman who would become my wife, I’ve lived by something like the “Pence Rule”. Because of that, I’ve never been in a situation where I could even be credibly accused or suspected of anything untoward. _God dammit_. :mad: ---
**Author:** ![EscAlaMike](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/escalamike/32/4177_2.png) [@EscAlaMike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EscAlaMike)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/27 "2018-12-05T22:36:04Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Are you in a position with any power (i.e. a supervisor)? If so, how many women have missed out on instances of experience that could be useful to their career and potential advancement because of your fear of being alone with a woman? Yes, I supervise 7 women, 6 directly, and no men. None have missed out on anything. There is nothing in this job that would require me to be alone with any of them. BTW, it’s not fear, it’s prudence. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/28 "2018-12-05T22:41:14Z")
> [@EscAlaMike](#): > > I’ve seen a disturbing amount of sexual harassment in my workplace. Sometimes it’s been so overt I am left in a bit of shock “did he really just say/do that?”. > > I don’t know why these women put up with it. > > Ever since I was 17 and started dating the woman who would become my wife, I’ve lived by something like the “Pence Rule”. Because of that, I’ve never been in a situation where I could even be credibly accused or suspected of anything untoward. Why aren’t you afraid that a man that you’ve been alone with will falsely accuse you of sexual harassment? ---
**Author:** ![AlsoNamedBort](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alsonamedbort/32/3213_2.png) [@AlsoNamedBort](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlsoNamedBort)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/29 "2018-12-05T22:43:23Z")
> [@EscAlaMike](#): > > Yes, I supervise 7 women, 6 directly, and no men. > > None have missed out on anything. There is nothing in this job that would require me to be alone with any of them. > > BTW, it’s not fear, it’s prudence. What if one of your subordinates needs to discuss something with you privately? ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/30 "2018-12-05T22:44:31Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Why aren’t you afraid that a man that you’ve been alone with will falsely accuse you of sexual harassment? Just curious, in the universe of sexual harassment complaints in the workplace, what % of them come from women vs men? ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/31 "2018-12-05T22:45:35Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > They’re so rare as to be virtually nonexistent. > > [FactCheck: Men are more likely to be raped than be falsely accused of rape – Channel 4 News](https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-men-are-more-likely-to-be-raped-than-be-falsely-accused-of-rape) > > The best data we have — the number of people prosecuted for making false allegations — suggests that the average adult man in England and Wales has a 0.00021281 per cent chance of being falsely accused of rape in a year. (That’s based on 35 prosecutions for false rape allegations in 2011 compared to 16.5 million men aged 16 to 59 living in England and Wales at the time). > > By this measure, a man is 230 times more likely to be raped than to be falsely accused of rape. > > And let’s put the stats through an even stronger test. Imagine for a second that you believe that **every single one of the men prosecuted for rape in England and Wales in 2016-17 was falsely accused**. Even if that unlikely scenario were true, there would still have been more adult male victims of rape (8,000) than men prosecuted for those rapes they “didn’t commit” (5,190). > > And keep in mind, they’re talking about _men_ getting raped. Men get raped at an incidence rate far lower than women. If you’re more worried about false accusations than being raped, your priorities are backwards. If the main contribution you have to society’s conversation about the non-stop pandemic of sexual assault and rape is “but what about the tiny percentage of men who get falsely accused of abuse?!”, then there’s something _really_ wrong. This whole thing is weird… More men are raped than men are prosecuted for rape but men rape women at a much higher incidence than men being raped? And remember an accusation is not a prosecution and a rape accusation can be devastating (true or not). Careers can be ruined on an accusation alone and we have plenty of high profile examples to point at. Further, I would submit a false accusation is a lot more likely against men of wealth and/or power motivated either by hopes of financial gain or political vendetta. I would submit that it is still a pretty rare thing for a false accusation to happen, even to the rich guys, but then humans are really bad at assessing risk and if you have more to lose you are more fearful of losing it. Also, there is a follow-up (of sorts) to the article in the OP: [NYC Officials Blast Wall Street’s Ice-Out of Women in Wake of #MeToo](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-12-05/nyc-mayor-s-ex-goldmanites-blast-ice-out-of-wall-street-women?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_content=business&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter) ---
**Author:** ![EscAlaMike](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/escalamike/32/4177_2.png) [@EscAlaMike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EscAlaMike)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/32 "2018-12-05T22:48:02Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Why aren’t you afraid that a man that you’ve been alone with will falsely accuse you of sexual harassment? Incidentally, that kind of thing does happen in my workplace. I can’t think of a time I’ve been alone with a man here either. ---
**Author:** ![EscAlaMike](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/escalamike/32/4177_2.png) [@EscAlaMike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EscAlaMike)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/33 "2018-12-05T22:49:04Z")
> [@AlsoNamedBort](#): > > What if one of your subordinates needs to discuss something with you privately? My office has a door with a big, clear window. ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/34 "2018-12-05T22:53:24Z")
Well gee, another thread about the dangers men face from false accusations of sexual misconduct. Ho and Hum. This is getting monotonous. Do any of you frat boys realize what a person has to go through and the risk they take by reporting a harasser? You can’t just walk into HR and say, “That person touched me, and I didn’t like it.” like you were a sulky kid in the back seat of a long car ride with a sibling. You have to have documentation of prior bad acts or maybe witnesses before your claim is taken farther than the boss “having a word” with the aggressor. Plus pursuing the claim farther than that leads to all sorts of job stress for the complainer, rumors and office politics being what they are. Never mind getting the law involved. There might be lawyers to consult, court dates to attend, and all the costs of that. Nobody except a raving loon is going to go through all that in a fit of pique over a misinterpreted joke or gesture. As has already been pointed out in this thread, the percentage of false accusation of harassment and/or rape is vanishingly small. Yet on this board, all the time, there are these threads about FALSE ACCUSATIONS!!! WHAT DOES #METOO INTEND TO DO ABOUT ALL THE FALSE ACCUSATIONS??? Lemme tell ya, if you are really petrified about the #MeToo Movement causing an avalanche of false accusations, I believe you are feeling your guilty conscience speaking to you. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/35 "2018-12-05T22:55:24Z")
> [@EscAlaMike](#): > > I can’t think of a time I’ve been alone with a man here either. If you have a workplace policy of never being alone with any employee regardless of gender, then I don’t see anything discriminatory about that. The problem is not men “protecting themselves” by maintaining gender-neutral high standards of dignified professionalism in their workplace behavior: the problem is men “protecting themselves” by discriminating against women. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/36 "2018-12-05T22:57:39Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Just curious, in the universe of sexual harassment complaints in the workplace, what % of them come from women vs men? Just curious, in the universe of sexual harassment complaints in the workplace, what % of them are just completely made up out of whole cloth? See, I understand where you’re going with this. Your theory is that sexual harassment complaints by men against other men are pretty rare, so it’s an acceptable risk to be alone with a man. If you won’t be alone with a woman because she might be a psychopath who will falsely accuse of of sexual harassment, do you think men are less likely to be psychopaths than women? After all, we’re not talking here about legit sexual harassment complaints, we’re talking about malicious false complaints, right? I get it, you’re not gonna proposition some dude for sex, that would be disgusting, right? But we’re not talking about what you would do, we’re talking about what some other person might falsely accuse you of. So why is it that you might think a false accusation by a woman is much more likely than a false accusation by a man? Thing is, we can pretty safely say that genuine sexual harassment by men against women is more common than by men against men, right? Or if we can’t say that, then what you’re arguing is that men are less likely to snitch after getting harassed, and so it’s safer to harass them? ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/37 "2018-12-05T23:00:42Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Do you not believe that false accusations occur? I believe cannibalism occurs with about the same frequency, yes. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/38 "2018-12-05T23:07:26Z")
> [@Two\_Many\_Cats](#): > > I believe cannibalism occurs with about the same frequency, yes. According to [the BBC](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-45565684), in the case of rape: > [@](#): > > Over the past 20 years, only 2-10% of rape accusations (Prof Ford’s lawyer says she believes this was attempted rape) are proven to be fake, argue the authors of a 2010 US study. > > That figure does not include any unsubstantiated accusations where an investigation was unable to prove a sexual assault occurred, so an accurate figure for the total remains unknown. > > Other studies have figures in the same range. The FBI has put the number of “unfounded” rapes - those determined to be false after investigation - at 8%. 8% would be a shitload of cannibalism. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/39 "2018-12-05T23:08:46Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Also, there is a follow-up (of sorts) to the article in the OP: [NYC Officials Blast Wall Street’s Ice-Out of Women in Wake of #MeToo](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-12-05/nyc-mayor-s-ex-goldmanites-blast-ice-out-of-wall-street-women?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_content=business&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter) Which, I’ll note, also is light on numbers. This could all just be some people ruminating on fears, not realities. Neither the original article nor this one has shown that Wall Street is _actually_ doing anything different than before (e.g., hiring fewer women, etc.) ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2018, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626/40 "2018-12-05T23:16:42Z")
Ultimately, the problem underlying this concern is that overall, accusations of sexual harassment of women by men are by default extremely **credible** , because so many men **do** harass women. The people who’ve done by far the most to put men as a group at risk for false harassment accusations (still an extremely small risk, as previously noted) are not the women of #MeToo, but rather the men who have normalized sexual harassment as a routine feature of the workplace. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/metoo-backlash-is-hurting-women-bloomberg-article/825626.md?page=3)