The tone of the coverage of the Reynhard Sinaga case. *Title edited by MNHQ*

[Dogsaresomucheasier]

Just watching tonight’s news. I do not wish to minimise the trauma suffered by the victims of Reynhard Sinaga, but I’m really struggling with the reporting of the case; even from female journalists. It seems so full of empathy and gravitas, when so many female victims go unheard.

slippery We had a stranger rape fairly recently. Victims phone wasn’t seized as it wasn’t relevant.

And we are not allowed to randomly browse a phone, we have to specify exactly what we are looking for and with the timescales for that. I.e all text communications between two numbers in a 24 hour period. I can’t just look at their internet history. It is all sent to a specific investigative department who are the experts. It isn’t us sitting scrolling through their Facebook.

Can people stop posting as if they know how a rape investigation is progressed?!

GlummyMcGlummerson

Lets not forget that he was
heading away from the hotel when he got the call and turned the taxi around
had to deceive the duty clerk to get in to the room.
his friends went around the building to try and film the encounter through the window
left through the fire exit (not to mentioned cheated on his girlfriend now wife).

YY Boney all very normal and consensual sounding.

The Rapist Ched Evans (not sorry and I WILL keep calling him that) appeal was a joke and exactly how rape trials shouldn't be done. It doesn't matter what her sexual history was - and I can't think of a single reason why sexual history from a different partner would EVER be relevant in any rape case

@Walkaround what reports have you been reading?

www.itv.com/news/granada/2020-01-07/police-confirm-that-potential-victims-of-sinaga-have-come-forward-since-sentencing/

Extract from the article: Sinaga preyed on drunken, mainly heterosexual men who had become separated from their friends after a night out

BBC report extract: His targets were mostly men ... who had been out drinking

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-50688975

Daily Mail headline: Rapist preyed on drunk men

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7857743/How-rapist-preyed-drunk-men-outside-clubs-pretending-Good-Samaritan.html

But it's fine to draw parallels about the way Male and female victims are reported and spoken about and the importance it still holds in our society.
Yes, it is, but to do so with this particular case is ridiculous and automatically undermines virtually every point people are trying to make. As I said before, it’s like comparing a police officer on trial for murder due to suspicion of unwarranted use of lethal force vs a police officer who flips and goes on a shopping mall shooting with a machine gun killing 100 people. Just leave it.

@TimeAfterTimeAfter
Now hopefully this ridiculous thread is at an end!

So yes, the fact that the victims were mostly drunk is a specific point of note in coverage of the case. It's a point of note to show the predatory nature of his crimes. The men are described as "vulnerable" - not, as far as I can make out, because they have cognitive or processing or social or other difficulties but because they were drunk and he "preyed" on them. Which is true, being drunk does put you in a vulnerable position but the language used, specifically "vulnerable" and "preyed", is quite different to how drunk female rape victims and their rapists are described.

It is utterly ridiculous to compare this case to others and complain that if these men were women, they would be called drunken sluts. It’s just plain nasty and frankly more likely to make some people say that actually they were male sluts than it is to make them say, “gosh yes, don’t women get treated unfairly.” And I don’t remember the BBC reporting of it mentioning all the men being drunk, or even The Daily Mail - in fact, I specifically remember the Mail focusing on a victim who said he was sober, as it clearly feels his sobriety was relevant to his credibility.

This rapist was only caught and convicted because of damning evidence on his phone and in his messages to friends. Otherwise he would still be out there raping men, because men are even less likely to report rape than women are.

Yes, women are treated appallingly in the media with respect to rape claims. This does not in any way excuse complaints about the reporting of this case. It’s so counterproductive as to be quite harmful to women, not helpful. Just stop the ghoulish and unhelpful trolling through articles to prove that the victims of one monster are treated more kindly than the victims of other monsters. The fact any reports felt the need to mention the men were actually heterosexual demonstrates the first thought in the reporter’s head was that maybe they had been asking for it. And we know that both men and women are judged for going to nightclubs, getting drunk and going home with strange men - particularly in gay districts. And we know men are less likely to report rape because whilst women these days are not condemned for failing to fight back, a man would still no doubt encounter the prejudice that if he didn’t fight back it's because he wanted it to happen, because men are not supposed to be passive or vulnerable. Men are every bit as much victim of nasty prejudices as women when they are raped. Just like men who dare come forward and claim that they are the victims of domestic violence.

Just stop comparing male and female victims and their treatment. Both are victims of male violence.

I have lots of questions about the reporting. Eg I believe that in fact no drugs were found in the perpetrators possession despite searches. There was no way of proving that previous victims (before the man who fled) were drugged either, as it was too late to test them and they were not able to recall actually being given GHB or evidence ingesting it. Yet all the reports also state unequivocally that the men must have been drugged, and therefore wholly incapacitated.

Women are often assumed to have been consenting, if not actually fighting for their lives. Women have been beaten to death but their rapist able to claim sex game gone wrong.
By contrast re the men in the current case, the fact they appeared to be snoring is taken as sufficient proof they were not consenting.

In addition the video evidence is there yes, but there can be no actual evidence that the videos were not being made of consensual sex (portraying role play for example). There are lots of examples of videos of women being assaulted having been dismissed in court as consensual rough sex or role play being recorded. (Porn culture underpinning the assumptions that women like/want this).

The men were drinking, went to the perpetrators flat of their own free will and continued to party and drink there. They agreed to sleep there and in some cases even struck up friendships online with the perpetrator AFTER the rape. Some became Facebook friends with him afterwards. This alone would have women ripped to shreds in the press (and probably by the public) and their claims thrown to the wall.

It's awful what's happened, and I have no wish to see it minimized- but you rarely see such sympathy for women victims.

Completely agree sadly, @NewYearsHumberElla

NewYearsHumberElla - do you really think in the trial that the defence would not have mentioned porn culture, drunkenness, consent, sexuality, enjoyment of rough sex/drugged sex/role playing being asleep sex? Do you really think the fact there were so many victims involved had nothing to do with the successful convictions? And do you really think that if the men had actually been homosexual that there would not have been an extreme prejudice against them when they claimed they did not give consent?

Walkaround

I haven’t said I think any of those things or questioned the trial. My comment was with regard to the reporting of the case and which details are presented and how it is framed.

But I do think that we (generalised we) still judge women first and believe them second. I also think there is sex bias in press reporting of rape and sexual assault for that reason.

I’m glad there is outrage at this terrible crime and that it looks likely the sentence will be proportionate.

I think there have actually been 4 trials, NewYeasHumberElla and I think the restriction in media reporting until now has a large part to play in the way it is being reported - it’s too late to insinuate the men were anything more than innocent victims of awful crimes, because it's all a fait accompli. The media would look crass in the extreme to attempt to report it any other way.

Yes there may well be truth in that Walkaround

@Walkaround I've literally just posted reports from the BBC and others that state the men were mostly drunk. How can you not remember something that's posted right above yours? The difference is that the reports stress that the fact the men were drunk made them "vulnerable". There is no question anywhere as to whether or not they were wise to get dressed up for a night out, get drunk and go to a stranger's house. Not that there should be, but there is in reports about female rape victims. It is treated differently.

And yes I wonder about the GHB as well. No trace ever found, not even on the guy they arrested for defending himself. Sinaga never said in any communication that he'd drugged anyone - the accounts used in trial were from when he'd told friends about sexual conquests, with no mention of coercion or sedation.

@1forsorrow. - yes, that was exactly the reason

And gone have you read the comments? So many readers scolding her "hope she's learned her lesson" "no smoke without fire"

Oh for goodness sake. Those DM readers who have posted comments like that have massive downward red arrows disapproving of the comments

The Mail has appalling coverage generally of so many things - but let’s or confuse that with selective misrepresentation on this occasion

TimeAfterTimeAfter, most men being drunk is not the same thing as all. This is a case of multiple victims, not individual ones. Do you really think, after the conviction, that the media would say the crimes are shocking, but only really with respect to the sober ones? You do know that extreme drunkenness is evidence that someone was incapable of giving consent, anyway, don’t you? Besides, it is stressed constantly to women that getting drunk makes them vulnerable. It’s a statement of fact used about all drunk people, that they make themselves vulnerable. This is used against them if someone is found not guilty, but can work in their favour, because they were “vulnerable” and incapable of giving consent if they were drunk. Nobody is going around clapping these men on the back for having got drunk and then followed a diminutive gay man back to his home. Most people would probably, however, consider they were at less risk from someone smaller and weaker than they are than from someone bigger and stronger. That’s the main difference - the need to prove that something stopped them from preventing a small, weak individual from overpowering them and raping them.

Yes drunkenness negates consent. Not that one would think so to read transcripts of rape trials involving women victims but hey ho. According to you no one has even said they were drunk. Not even in the three reports helpfully provided for you ten posts back, all of which failed to register in your pointy little head. 🤷

TimeAfterTimeAfter - don’t be so incredibly childish. I did not say nobody was drunk, I just pulled you up on your claim that they were all drunk and noted that the Daily Mail article that I read felt the need to mention one of the sober ones, clearly because it felt this added something to the story in terms of credibility with respect to the claims made.

This is what you said in your post at 9pm, TimeAfterTimeAfter: “Walkaround all of the male victims here had been clubbing, presumably not in monks' robes, were drunk and went to a stranger's house.” Note your use of all.

I fail to see why it's appalling or outrageous to perceive and say that the press and media portray male victims of rape differently - more sympathetically - from female ones and that the justice system routinely appears to sentence rapists more leniently if their victims are female.

And to assume that anyone who notices this and comments on it is lacking empathy or wants male victims portrayed more harshly or just plain hates all men so must be a "frothing" feminist (whatever that means) is plainly an inaccurate and absurd corollary to draw.

Of course we all want fair, sympathetic and unbiased treatment and coverage for all rape victims and stiff sentences for all convicted rapists. What's wrong with that?

This case is an opportunity to bring some good out of evil and make us look hard at the rape culture that still prevails. More needs to be done to end victim-blaming and protect defendants from defamation of character in the press and media, including social media.