Women who falsely accuse, of RAPE etc. Feminists ?

[Oblomov]

FACT
There have been lots of discussions on here of RAPE recently.
But what about all these woman who falsley accused. what damage they do. then it is even harder for women who have really been raped to be believed.

Do feminists believe that women do falsely accuse.
That poor head of Dept, was accused by a troubled girl and has now lost his chance of being a Headmaster.
What about that girl, who i remember from the papaers, scuffed her own arms when a boy she knew refused to give her the taxi money. she accused him of rape.

At uni, I knew someone who we all thought was falsely accused of rape. He never recovered. his perssonality changed forever.

I am not a rape supporter. I don't support men who rape. But neither do I hate men and automatically assume that all men are cappable of rape. Men are falsely accused sometimes you know. not every woman tells the truth.

I'm sure there are some women who make false accusations of rape. But my thoughts are:

a) those women must have some serious mental health problems to do that. They should be pitied and supported rather than accused of being evil. There probably are cases where the motivation is nothing but malice, but I'd like to think that's a small minority - in most cases I'd assume that the woman had issues.

b) the number of women crying wolf is tiny compared to the number of women who are genuine, and who either never see the case come to court, or who see the accused be acquitted. And I see the insanely low rape conviction rate in the UK as more of an issue than the wolf-cryers.

I don't see this as a feminist issue, tbh. Being a feminist doesn't mean you think every man is a potential rapist.

I don't really understand your point OP .

I don't think anyone on this thread would condone falsely accusing anyone of anything.

As you rightly say, false accusations of rape make it harder for women who really have been raped to be believed.

I don't see how this adds to or detracts from recent discussions on here about rape though.

You are dwelling on the low number of false allegations rather than the actual issue of Rape, OP.

This has been done to death.

I think TheButterflyEffect has prety much covered it.

I think it is a bad thing that people make up false accusations of criminal activity. Of course there are women who make up rape accusations, just like there are people who make up arson, child abduction, GBH and theft accusations.

I am not sure what more you think can be said on the subject.

I find it hard to believe that anybody would claim there are no false accusations of rape. Why would people make false accusations about other crimes but not rape? Where have you heard someone say that there are never false accusations made?

Becasue if you question rape then you are automatcially accused of being a rape anologist. but all acqusations must be examined and questioned. All, not just rape ones.
And it has to be questioned and examined becasue you need to get to the facts and as hassled says, some people acuse out of malice/mental health, all sorts of issues.

We are all judgemental and have pre-concieved ideas. also depends on our personal morals, our parenting style and how we were bought up, in a loving home or abused.
But I always 'try' very hard not to judge, but 'try' and go purely on the facts.

But you need to question everything. not just in refernce to a rape allegation. but regards anything. try to be open minded. and go on the facts.

But here on Mn, if you question whether its rape. you are automatically accused of being an apologist.
But it is right to question everything. Plus some lie. we know this.

OP,
If your mother came home from work one day battered and bruised saying she had been robbed of her purse on the way home, would your first reaction be of disbelief and that she must be making it up?

Would you question what she was doing immediately to get into that situation?

There should not be the automatic assumption that a rape victim is lying.

Still not sure what you want people to say.
The wanting-to-get-to-the-truth argument is so laughable, no one is given the third degree when their car gets nicked, or theit home is burgled.
"But you need to question everything"...really? "Here on MN"? I'll remember that next time someone posts about having their purse nicked.
It's funny though, cos I always thought it was the job of the police to get to the facts of the matter.

I don't think anyone on here has suggested that there shouldn't be a due process in trying those accused of rape.

The whole legal system is skewed in favour of the accused rather than the rape victim though so the issue of the tiny minority of women who falsely accuse men of rape seems like a bit of a red herring really.

I'm still not sure I get your point OP

scurry, no, of course not. becasue i am presented with bruises etc. then you need to ask what happened in order to ascertain more info, surely.
who said anythign about assuming that the rape victim is lying ? i don't assume the rape victim is lying. if anything i prob assume thay are tellign the truth. surely that is reasonable.

falling, i didn't realise thta it was laughable to want to get to the truth.

many threads, many cases in life, you never get to the real truth till you find out all the deeper issues.
threads, where Op posts somethign and then later on it turns out her dh does all sorts of things that are odd, or himself has been abused and is quite controlling.

I think there is something really important here. For most crimes, juries have to decide whether the accused was the person to do it. In most rape crisis juries have to decide about intent. Thus there is no way that personal prejudices cannot come into it. The judge can try to rule certain defenses as inadmissable but as it is the duty of the barrister to defend the accused, he will always try to get as close to the line as possible. Until society as a whole has a reasonable view of female sexuality and what constitutes consent, courts will never convict fairly. This results in both unfair convictions (v. rare) and rapists not being convicted. It is society and not the law that is wrong
I also would rather some rapists got off than prejudice the central idea of our justice system that people should be presumed innocent until proved guitly

There are basic points to prove in any offence.

The person making the allegation will be asked questions by Police to establish whether a crime has been committed, the same as any other offence.

I am not sure what point you are trying to make now, OP.

I must have missed that new legislation which obviously got passed which says being a feminist means you have to men believe all are rapists .

I don't understand the point of your OP either oblomov.

Can you explain what you mean?

'But what about all these woman who falsley accused. what damage they do. then it is even harder for women who have really been raped to be believed.'

I don't understand this really.

If some people falsely accuse others of stealing, does it make it harder for people who have actually been stolen from to be believed?? No.

In fact I can't see why you started this thread at all.

When I was younger I was out with some friends from my workplace. I was very drunk and one of them offered to walk me to the taxi rank. On our way he pushed me against a wall. I was extremely disorientated. He then turned me around and tried to penetrate me anally.

When I told people that I had been the victim of sexual assault they said I hadn't, because we had been kissing earlier and I was drunk, and I allowed him to walk me to a taxi.

So I felt for years that I had lied about him assaulting me, and I felt really guilty. People knew me as the girl who lied.

But actually, he did sexually assault me.
So maybe a 'lying' rape victim isn't actually lying, iyswim.

:( OneNameChange. That is awful - I'm really sorry that happened to you.

I still don't get the point of the op.

Is it that false accusations of rape are endemic and it's a huge problem that people pretend doesn't exist? That we all know it goes on but don't care?

It's not clear.

I think the OP thinks feminists think it doesn't happen.
What most feminists I know actually think is that it probably does happen but the number of instances is so small compared with the number of instances of men raping and getting away with it, that it's a bit strange to focus on it.

Also for any given case that is reported as a false accusation, many of us are sceptical because all that has really happened is that there hasn't been enough evidence to prove the guy did do it.

The thing that bothers me massively about the false accusation issue is that in effect this means that a woman is found guilty (not legally but in people's minds) of making a false accusation every time a man gets off.

OK, some stats and info to put this issue into context:

?In no other crime is the victim subject to so much scrutiny during an investigation or at trial; nor is the potential for victims to be re-traumatised during these processes as high in any other crime.? (HMCPS & HMIC, 2007)

"Passing this law [giving anonymity to men accused of rape] would boost the widely held belief that most women who report rape are lying. The latest research on false allegations found that the figures are around the same as with other crimes. If a woman is found to have made a malicious accusation of rape she loses the right to anonymity. Media coverage of false allegations far outweighs reports of men arrested for rape.Julie Bindel, Guardian, May 21st

Info from Fawcett Society report on rape:
? Overall, research suggests the rate of false allegations of rape are no higher than those of other crimes (Kelly, Lovett, and Regan, 2005).
? A recent study in the UK found 8% of cases reported to the police were designated ?false? reports. However, internal police rules specify that only cases where either there is a strong and credible admission by the complainants, or where there are strong evidential grounds, should be classified as ?false?. Further investigation of this figure of 8% found that only 3% of cases designated false fell within the police categories of ?probable? and ?possible? false allegations (as opposed to additionally those classed as ?uncertain?). (Kelly, Lovett, and Regan, 2005).
? There is an over-estimation of the scale of false allegations by police and prosecutors and subjective judgements are still being made about victims. This results in poor communication and loss of confidence between complainants and police (Kelly, Lovett, and Regan, 2005; HMCPS & HMIC, 2007).
? International research shows that, of the very small proportion of genuinely false allegations, in most cases there is no named offender (EVAW, 2007).

Janos, stop putting words in my mouth. i never said it was epedemic, or that you didn't care. did i say thta? where ? no, you can't say i did, becasue i didn't.

all i said was that false allegations have dramatic affetcs. the cases on the fact website. i ffel sorry for the citim that has been falsely accused. i belelive it does alot of damge to their lives.
THATS ALL. Thats ALL i was saying. people make false allegations. and it is very damging.

at 'I'm not a rape supporter' - did you want a medal or something for that?

I'm sure false accusations of rape do happen, as with pretty much every other crime. And I agree that the bigger issue is that it's very hard for a woman to be believed, especially if she wasn't raped by a complete stranger at knifepoint or something, 'rape myths' are so pervasive that often even the victim herself feels it wasn't 'proper' rape, or that it was her fault somehow.

This isn't the case with other crimes - if you're robbed, people don't start questioning you about whether you might have consented to handing over your wallet, or start talking about how they've seen you give money to charities or homeless people in the past, so how was the poor robber to know you didn't actually want him to take your money? Are you sure you remembered to shout 'No!' as he took it? And if you'd had a drink or two, well, what did you expect? I'm sure there are false accusations of theft and robbery as well, but it's not the default assumption in every case!

To be honest, in mainstream society I see more hate and vitriol directed at women for 'ruining a man's life' by making an accusation, true or otherwise, than at men for raping women.

Oblomov, several people have told you that false rape accusations are no higher than false accusations of other crimes.

Does that surprise you?

It surprised me, when I found that out. Because when I see other crimes reported, I don't see mentions of "of course we should always remember innocent till proven, she might've given that money away and forgotten about it the next day, well what if he was also drunk and therefore thought it was okay to punch someone, huh?". So it had literally never really occurred to me that people made up accusations of other personal crimes.

I would say two things are important here:

a) why are rape accusations so universally doubted compared to other crimes-to-which-the-only-witness-is-the-victim?
b) why are false accusations so disproportionate to conviction rates?

Will you be starting a thread where ALL you were saying is that being falsely accused of murder ruins people's lives? How about common assault? Arson, maybe?

Because clearly it is VERY IMPORTANT to bring that to people's attention. Since, you know, nobody at all in the media ever mentions that. As opposed to rape, where there cannot be a single media report without a thousand people reminding us of the harmful effects of a false accusation.

So I'll anticipate that thread, will I?

'all i said was that false allegations have dramatic affetcs. the cases on the fact website. i ffel sorry for the citim that has been falsely accused. i belelive it does alot of damge to their lives.
THATS ALL. Thats ALL i was saying. people make false allegations. and it is very damging.'

But......that's not ALL you are saying. There is a huge subtext to the 'point' you are making, which is that false allegations of rape are higher, or more damaging, than false allegations of any other crime. I also don't understand your point.

Logical people (feminists or otherwise) acknowledge that people lie, about all sorts of things. Rape allegations are one of those things. Logical people also agree that this must be devastating for those falsely accused. However this is a complete non-point, unless you are trying to extrapolate that false allegations of rape are more prevalent than any other type of allegation, or that there is some kind of conspiracy by bitter women to harangue and persecute men by making false allegations (an idea which is sadly in existance). So which was it, OP?