So in the wake of a massive public spotlight on rape, the priority apparently is to protect the reputations of the tiny % of men falsely accused of rape

@Fastidia
'If I didn't know that we lived in a male supremacist society, where men's lives are valued so much higher than those of women'

pretty strong stuff !
what do you base this on ?

how do you decide that anonymity might lead to further victims?

@Trekkie
Appreciate your knowledgable and balanced views,...can I ask, what is your view on anonymity for the accused (apologies if you have made this clear in previous posts, I have slow internet so only skimmed !)

My view is that it is reasonable, given the social stigma etc of false accusation and the symmetrical argument about accuser anonymity (with the exception of where lack of public awareness might lead to further victims).

it is not astonishing though,just really depressing. pretty clear where society's priorities lie

So yes the first step is to make victims feel confident to come forward, and for police to actually investigate and investigate properly, and not lose the evidence or turn the victim away.

I also think it would be useful if they matched up accusations - many rapists are repeat offenders but lack of evidence means that any reports that do happen go nowhere. If they were linked up then police would have a list of people to keep an eye on, or would be able to combine the different testimonies. IMO if a bunch of totally unrelated people all separately accuse the same person of rape then that person is worth taking a look at. It was that lack of a joined up approach that left Ian Huntley a free man despite a string of separate reports about him for rape and sexual assault of young women and girls. I don't think that "there's no smoke without fire" but by the time you've got 6 reports from totally unrelated victims about the same person and the same crime surely it's worth a look.

holy crap some posts are contradiction junction

rape is one of the worst crimes there is/it is hard to know when a rape has occurred

rape comes down to grey area he said she said/the police will take a statement of rape from someone and this statement alone is enough to arrest a suspect

these things cannot be simultaneously true, they contradict themselves and the other assertions

There are various reports that have been commissioned by the government which look into all of this so my opinion is informed by those. There was one called the stern report (IIRC) which looked into it all very thoroughly. Also relevant are things like the inquiries into the Warboys and Reid cases, the recent conviction of a met police officer in sapphire shocking and other things that come to light. Brian Paddick's evidence in the Leveson Enquiry about the met vastly altering and then burying a report about their poor handling of rape cases was also interesting.

There is lots of info out there much of it from official sources which can help inform about all of this, google is your friend

I don't mean by my post that you are condemning them by the way, just that putting their identities in the media opens them to condemnation, hate and attacks from others.

@Trekkie
I am really interested in your comments..

May i ask, is your view that the low rape conviction is primarily due to low rate of victims reporting (because the penal system is so unpleasant) or due to the police/etc doing not handling the process well, rather than my original contention that it is just a very difficult crime per se to prove/disprove because of the lack of witnesses/physical evidence ?

Fastidia, being accused of rape can lead to very serious consequences, death by vigilantism is far worse than rape for example, so is being beaten to the point of brain damage or permanent disability, even if you escape that, many men can lose their families (ss can take the children if his wife refuses to leave him) which again is worse than rape, rape is a horribly violent, humiliating, degrading, invasive crime but that does not justify injustice toward those falsely accused and permanently tarred as rapists, nor does it mean their pain or the pain of their families is undeserving of sympathy. Even if their only 'punishment' is lifelong unemployment and being a social pariah, well that's their life ruined, it's horrible to pretend that it's no big deal.

Harsh prison sentences for convicts and cultural indoctrination in the schools to civilised behaviour for boys would be a genuine deterrent. Reserve the condemnation for those proven guilty.

I think that considering all the so called "grey areas" (like his word vs her word when they were both drunk) will be useful when we are at a point where all the not "grey area" cases are being competently and vigorously prosecuted.

apple as per my post earlier, it is highly unlikely that a case where there was no evidence other than the verbal evidence of two people who were both drunk, would ever get near a court.

I realise that my post is a bit incoherent but I was just a bit shocked at apples post and her two options!

@ FastidiaBlueberry

I believe that the drunken hazy memory of a woman and a man are equivalent - surely we all believe that ?!

But jurys only convict if the evidence is clear and alcohol clearly reduces that clarity (regardless of whether there is culpability).

Therefore, yes, I think alcoholic haze does reduce chances of successful conviction... I hope not a controversial point ?

I have had three partners, including my current one. All three are well acquainted with alcohol, as am I. In each relationship, at several points, one or both I us have been stinking drunk. Never have these men raped me, because tey are not rapists. Yes, they may have wanted sex with me when I was drunk, but they didn't have it because it would have been rape and they aren't rapists. Yes, they may have wanted to have sex with me when they were drunk, but free they were told no, they did not force me as they are not rapists.

If they had had sex with me, they would have been rapists. It would just be my word against theirs.

Many crimes are one persons word against another - would you suggest we discredited them too?

Thankyou, I have looked, but they seem like rather extreme misconceptions that very few reasonable people would believe (at least one would hope not !)

The We Believe You pages on MN that pubes had linked to have a lot of information about common misconceptions so I would second her suggestion that you have a look at those if you are interested.

Trekkie - thanks for you post, makes huge sense and points out a lot of complexity i have ignored.

Re the drunken haze...

my point was not that alcohol leads to false allegations etc but that it makes it harder for a jury to get accurate picture of events so harder to successfully convict.

Yes, the better way to do it is

Increase society understanding of what rape is
Work towards making rape utterly unacceptable in all circs (rather than just violent stranger, child victim, elderly victim etc as we have at the moment)
Train police forces to do their jobs wrt rape
Train the CPS to do their job wrt rape
Talk to juries about rape myths
Disallow talk of women's sexual history etc

All of these things are talked about in reports by schools, police forces, government reports, rape charities, and so on and so on.
Unfortunately attitudes are extremely ingrained, with society opinions shaped by the media in its various forms, and centuries of mysoginist thinking.
Still, that's the way forward.
Personally I think a non adversarial court system would be a step forward for all sorts of crimes against the person.
And sentencing reflecting risk of harm to the public rather than people getting out after a fixed time.

There is quite a lot to think about rather than your idea as to what the only 2 options are.