I don't believe in We Believe You

So is your default position 'I don't believe you'?

No of course not. My default position is that with regard to strangers, I don't know. The weight of history is suggests that lying is incredibly rare and I would assume they were telling me straight. And for all the reasons others have said below, in all probability they have been the victim of a crime and they may not get the justice they deserve. But my approach to that is to challenge this wherever I see it - not to start proclaiming my belief in people I don't know.

Tbh I don't care about twitter.

My own mother didn't believe me until I linked a newspaper article which referenced the two rapes.

'I agree with everything you have said Sparrowhawk. But I still don't like "We believe you". Actually especially on the internet. There are so many nutcases and trolls on here sometimes. There are people lying about their children's cancer just to get a thread going. I've believed most of them until the thread suddenly disappears. So it feels like the wrong place to be issuing blanket statements. But this particular campaign feels a little twitterstormy and I'd rather contribute to a more respectful culture by calling out the bad.'

So is your default position 'I don't believe you'?

I think this perception that men have about the number of false allegations is a result of the term rape not only being used in the traditional 'down a dark alley' way or within an abusive relationship, but to apply to drunk women who are fairly incapable.

I think men are scared that after a consensual sexual encounter when any amount of alcohol is consumed they could be accused of rape the following day and they would be believed to be a rapist. It is their responsibility entirely to ensure that the women they are with wants to have sex, not hers to communicate that she does even if she does she can say otherwise in the morning and he wont be believed. I don't know why the fear of this is so great but I think it comes down to this. Fear of an accusation drives it because whether or not he is found guilty, mud sticks.

I find it hard mentioning it on here even because I just know that some people are nodding at their screens going 'She is SO lying'

But that's life unfortunately.

I agree with everything you have said Sparrowhawk. But I still don't like "We believe you". Actually especially on the internet. There are so many nutcases and trolls on here sometimes. There are people lying about their children's cancer just to get a thread going. I've believed most of them until the thread suddenly disappears. So it feels like the wrong place to be issuing blanket statements. But this particular campaign feels a little twitterstormy and I'd rather contribute to a more respectful culture by calling out the bad.

FWIW every woman I know has been the victim of sexual assault at the very least. So I am only too aware of the prevailing culture.

So sorry myoriginal :( Not being believed is really horrible. I found people's reactions to the abuse I suffered worse, in a way, than the abuse itself. My abuser was a monster, I didn't expect him to be good to me (of course). But I expected my family and friends to care about me and they didn't, they doubted me, made excuses, told me I was making them feel guilty. It was a total kick in the teeth.

To the op. I think it's largely because people don't talk about it. It's almost a myth.

To be brutally honest, I don't think anyone believed me until he raped again on the 9th October. Then they 'suddenly' believed me. Stupid people .

'I think this perception that men have about the number of false allegations is a result of the term rape not only being used in the traditional 'down a dark alley' way or within an abusive relationship, but to apply to drunk women who are fairly incapable. It's only recently in our culture that has seen a shift from actively trying to get a woman drunk in order to 'seduce' her, to that now being called rape. It's a whole layer of access to women that has been redefined and the man is expected to respect women's boundaries over his own desires.

It's that conflict that has them worried they will fail to do so and then be accused of something they don't really feel they have deserved. Cos you know, they're not 'real' rapists. The premise is based on entitlement to sex. Pure and simple.'

HEAR HEAR. With fucking bells on.

I've been raped, my sister's been raped and many of my friends have been raped. None of us reported it. I have never once known a single man who's been accused of rape, falsely or otherwise.

The idea that false accusations are this big problem we must protect men from is so utterly fucked up I struggle to even address it tbh. In the UK a minimum of 85,000 women a year are raped. Rape is a massive problem. False accusations are just not. They're not. So why do people focus on them so much???

Really sorry to hear that happened to you myoriginal. Have you had people around you who have believed you and supported you? How are you doing?

M0stlyHet

You nailed it there.

I think this perception that men have about the number of false allegations is a result of the term rape not only being used in the traditional 'down a dark alley' way or within an abusive relationship, but to apply to drunk women who are fairly incapable. It's only recently in our culture that has seen a shift from actively trying to get a woman drunk in order to 'seduce' her, to that now being called rape. It's a whole layer of access to women that has been redefined and the man is expected to respect women's boundaries over his own desires.

It's that conflict that has them worried they will fail to do so and then be accused of something they don't really feel they have deserved. Cos you know, they're not 'real' rapists. The premise is based on entitlement to sex. Pure and simple.

'This is a very good childhood friend, by the way. Occasionally a bit of a misogynist. But then a lot of my friends hold some views that I disagree with - I'm not sure it's possible to only ever have friends who completely agree with you?! But yes, this is a biggie to disagree on, I see that. And I was pretty upset about it.'

This isn't the same as disagreeing about, say, whether to stay in the EU. Your friend was basically saying that if someone date raped you he wouldn't consider that particularly bad, that he values men over women and would have very little sympathy for you. It's along the same lines as a white person saying to a black friend 'it's only racism if someone shouts at you in the street, it doesn't matter if someone you love and respect calls you the N word.' Would your friend dare to say such a thing? I doubt it.

I was on MN when WBY was started. It came about as a result of a number of threads about rape, such as "If you were raped, would you report it?"

The overriding response to these threads was that a huge factor in not reporting was the fear of not being believed.

It "helped" that at the time MN was overrun with MRA trolls who would join these threads to belittle rape victims, cast doubt on real rape statistics, and just basically be heinous. This served to prove the point of many MNetters that rape was not taken as seriously as it should be, along with the news that the Met Police had No-Crimed a large number of rape victim's reports (including victims of the Black Cab rapist).

WBY was born of a need for rape victims to feel that they would be believed if they come forward to report rape.

Having been raped on the 15th September this year, the single most important thing to me has been being believed. It's difficult to describe how utterly isolating it is when you know someone doesn't believe you.

But some of it is that women who've been raped pick up nuances...

Maybe, having been raped myself, I too am picking up nuances, but ones which could cause doubt. I don't know.

SpeakNoWords - tbh I don't know. I offer "tea & sympathy" and I'll listen to them. I'd give them the phone to call the police if they wished to do so. But I wouldn't automatically believe them.

I saw this article linked on twitter, which seems relevant to this discussion. Worth a read as it's about 'why rape cases should not be subject to reasonable doubt'. I doubt we'd ever move from that point in law but it's an interesting perspective & one I think is relevant to this discussion.

Devi that's a great post, and I think also explains why some women know lots of victims of rape and others say that no-one in their circle of friends has ever said to them that they've been raped. Now some of this is statistical variation - rapes aren't distributed entirely evenly through the population. But some of it is that women who've been raped pick up nuances in people's attitudes and know which friends it's safe to open up to, and which would act like the person in your little script - "I support you, but of course I can't believe you till it's been proven."

Do they know you wouldn't believe them about things like this, Milk?