The Myths About Women Who "Cry Rape"

[DontCallMePeanut]

From The Telegraph

Sorry, my head's not in the right place to provide any critique of this at the moment, but thought this would interest the members of the feminist section. Will attempt to comment when I have a clearer head.

She has? She was around yesterday.

(I'm a leeeeeeetle bit offended that nobody thinks anyone else can refute such a ridiculous poster as moonferret, actually)

I think the reasons why women do not report rapes and sexual assault are because of the attitudes held by many that have been expressed here. I hope Moonferret never gets called up for Jury service. You have to go in to that situation without any prejudice one way or the other. Each case has to be looked at individually.

I know someone who was burgled and gang raped (not in the UK). She was so traumatized by what happened that she didn't prosecute, she left her home and moved back to the UK. In those circumstances you would think it would be much easier to get a prosecution but she couldn't face going through it. Most rapes are much less easy to prove. They are done to women who are debilitated in some way eg drink spiked (but they'll blame her for being drunk), they are done to women who have gone home with a man but changed her mind (but theyll blame her for going home with him and say she regretted it), they happen to women walking home alone in the early hours (but they'll blame her for putting herself in that situation), they happend to prositutes (but theyll blame her because shes a prostitute), they happen to women in abusive relationships (but they'll blame her for staying with him).

Its easy when it hasn't happened to you to say 'if it happened to me I would take him to court'. When it happens it's not that easy. You are embarrassed, ashamed, violated, scared. You want it to be over. You don't want your life scrutinized by strangers. You don't want to sit in a room and look at the man who raped you whilst you are accused of making it up. Don't forget the police constantly telling you how difficult a conviction is which puts you off. Quite often the woman knows the man who did it, a friend or colleague. Someone no one believes could possibly do such a thing. So if you accuse him you risk your friends or colleagues turning against you. It's hard enough for victims to get the support and convictions they need without these stupid attitudes from other women.

Ok. Here's some rape statistics. Taken from crime statistics in England and Wales and academic research.

A rape is reported to the police in the UK every 34 minutes. At least 47,000 women are raped every year in the UK. But rape is very underreported. Rape Crisis believes 1 in 4 women have experienced rape or attempted rape, with the vast majority of perpetrators already known to their victims and most being partners or ex-partners (2/3rds in recorded crime cases).

Only 14% of cases which are reported to the police ever reach a courtroom and only 6.1% lead to a conviction in England and Wales, compared to 33% in 1977. In Scotland the figure is just 3.9%. There is supporting evidence in 86.7% of charged cases of rape.

Three out of every four local authority areas have no services for victims of rape, and up to half of the remaining rape crisis centres face closure because of severe funding problems. This means that the vast majority of women who are raped do not have a rape crisis centre in their area.

The rate of false allegations for rape is no higher than for other crimes. Only 3% of rape accusations are ?probably or possibly false? according to police categorisation - no more than for any other crime.

I said on another thread that there is no conflict between the legal framework of innocent until proven guilty and believing the victim (who is telling the truth in the overwhelming majority of cases). That's because there isn't.

'Innocent until proven guilty' simply means that the accused is given no legal consequences to his behaviour until it is proven that he committed the crime.

That in no way means you cannot believe the victim and treat her as a victim while gathering evidence. To do anything else is abhorrent. You wouldn't do that to a victim of burglary or common assault, yet the false allegation rate is no different.

If false allegations of rape by women is a hot topic for you moonferret, and you can post links about it 32 minutes after the OP went up on a feminist board then unless you are an MRA there is something awry with your politics.

With these threads I now wonder if people like moonferret post controversial statements about an issue such as rape on a feminist board simply to get attention and cause a fight. Rape isn't really a subject for entertainment.

You can scroll through the discussion topics and find lots of debate about rape that includes plenty of distortion about false allegations of rape meaning that we should take allegations of rape less seriously. I guarantee that this thread will run to hundreds of posts and will include the following sentences:

• You're saying that all men are potential rapists?
• I would hate for my sons to grow up in a society where they are seen as potential rapists.
• You're saying that women never lie?
• Feminism is about equality. That means men deserve to be treated equally. We can't always take the woman's word ahead of the man's. To do so would be sexist.

or my personal favourite- Do you have any sons? etc. etc. etc.

Interesting sunshine, thanks for that. I was called a misandrist recently because somebody interpreted 'innocent until proven guilty' as meaning that it was 50% likely that the rape victim was lying.

@floyjoy, yeah yeah, that's the argument I got "do you have any sons?". eh yeah. but that doesn't mean I think rape is ok

Rape is the crime that can be got away with (sorry for bad english there). Only about a sixth are ever even reported. a fraction of those will have a strong enough case to go to court. and most of the time they get off anyway.

yep, absolutely bandwithering. It's about looking at the big picture, not looking at the men you love and then feeling they need to be protected from false allegations of rape.
And moonferret there was a recent thread asking whether if raped you would report it. You might get some sense of perspective by reading that if you haven't already.

www.fawcettsociety.org.uk/documents/Rape%20-%20The%20Facts.doc

I posted this link on another thread yesturday, but it is highly relevent to this discussion. Officially, the rate of allegations that have been rated as "no crime", ie, the investigating officer deems that there was no crime committed (UK version of false allegation) is 8%, which is extremely high. However, when each report was analysed, it was found that only 3% fitted the official guidelines for a "no crime", which is no higher than any other crime. It is therefore not beyond the realms of reason to say that the officers are not taking the allegations as seriously as they should.

Furthermore, take a look at the analysis of the jury. Bear in mind that a jury is a set of laypeople, so public opinion would be equal. Now realise that pretty much all of the convicted crimes either had overwhelming evidence or a confession. Word against word is never convicted because there is insufficient evidence.

How does one rectify this? I really don't have a good answer.

As for under reported, it is estimated that 55-75% of male>female rape is reported, whereas only 10% of male>male rape is supposedley reported. And no one has done any research on female>male or female>female rape, so it's not even known how common either is (See over and under reporting

I don't know how you resolve it.
But people (juries) do not want to believe that the bloke who looks like their postman or neighbour or brother is capable of rape. It is the same as child abuse -people do not -will not connect - 'pedophile' with average bloke who would be funny and charming in a social situation.
A jury is hugely motivated to want him to be innocent. It keeps their own perception of how safe their world is intact.

I believe all women who tell me they've been raped, abused or assaulted, the same way I was relieved that people believed me when I admitted to being abused for four years. No one saw the abuse, it was his word against mine, he was friends with many of my friends. But they believed me.

Likewise. If my son comes to me and tells me he's been abused or assaulted in any way, or any other child for that matter, I bloody well believe them. If we don't believe victims, then the criminals get away with it.

Thanks, Lenin.

I was about to say I regretted posting it as I seem to have provided a sounding board for rape apologists. :( Like I said earlier, heads not in the right place at the moment, and was starting to think people would think that was my intention.

I agree with you, Lenin.

I've been told by a few women, and I took what they said at face value. The problem is not believing her, it is whether or not there is sufficient evidence for a conviction. As with all crimes.

Someone once stole £200 from my house. I knew exactly who it was. The police were called, but they did not act because they said there was insuficient evidence. Whether they believed me or not, there was no proof. That's how our law system works.

Another issue is (as we've probably all seen from threads on the subject) the publics view on what constitutes a rape. People need to start realising that if you don't want to and do so under any coercion or when you are not able to say no, it constitutes a crime. And "taking advantage" is more often than not an actual crime.

Think of the arguements on here about "implied consent". Which is, IMO, something you would only argue for if you think for some reason you would not have been able to obtain proper consent and is therefore a rediculous thing for anyone to argue.

I don't think you've started something about rape apologists. And I really hope my posts don't come across as such. I happen to have serious loathing for people who can do it, since I've seen what it can do to people. There are no excuses for it. The only question is how you can reasonably up to conviction rate without compromising human rights, which we just can't do whether we want to or not for any crime from shop lifting to pedophilia.

"Another issue is (as we've probably all seen from threads on the subject) the publics view on what constitutes a rape. People need to start realising that if you don't want to and do so under any coercion or when you are not able to say no, it constitutes a crime. And "taking advantage" is more often than not an actual crime."

Shit. That's just put something into perspective for me.

DS was conceived after the ex used to systematically pressurise me into sex. I knew it was wrong, but I used to say yes. It'd stop him throwing tantrums, throwing me out, threatening to hurt me. There were incidents of rape, but I consented the time DS was conceived, as he'd literally trashed the place. "Make up" sex, he called it...

The stupid thing is, if anyone else posted it on here, I'd be urging them to get away from their DP. I may not use the word rape, but I'd let them know it's not right. Yet, I've spent four years normalising it when it happened to myself. :(

Moonferret, you need to look to your logic and your conscience. You claim to care about evidence: "If I was ever on a jury for sexual assault trial, the evidence would need to be absolutely overwhelming for me to be convinced."

Yet you freely admit that despite not knowing "what the precise percentage [of false allegations of rape] is you would be "confident of two things. Firstly, a good number of claims will be false (of course the majority never even reach court), and secondly, more than for virtually any other offence as a percentage of the total."

If you really cared about evidence, you would not hold to the position you have taken without some facts to back it up. Instead, you have shown all the hallmarks of someone who is driven by their sexist prejudice to seek confirmatory anecdotes* from women-hating newspapers in support of a morally reprehensible position: attacking rape victims by casting blanket doubt on their credibility as a group. Splutter denial all you want, but as far as I'm concerned if it walks like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck. As I said, you need to look to your conscience. This is vile behaviour and you ought to stop.

*Repeat after me: the plural of anecdotes is not data.

I think there is something to be said for a law banning the naming of accused criminals until after conviction. Though it is worth bearing in mind that the harm done to both Colin Stagg and Christopher Jefferies, who were wrongly accused of terrible crimes, was mostly done by men(ie newspaper reporters and editors) not women lying about being assaulted. There are always going to be cases of rape where the woman is not lying but the man on trial is innocent because it's the wrong man (ie stranger rape when a man matching the physical decription of the rapist is arrested).

TAB, nope you haven't sounded rape apologist in the slightest. Just the way things started last night. Stupid ol me had been hoping that we'd be united in how positive it was that the article had been covered in such a popular newspaper. And the first post after the OP was trying to prove why we shouldn't believe women who report rape.

Maybe it's me being oversensitive, in the midst of PTSD and the way I got shaken up yesterday on another thread, but it kinda shook me up.

Maybe I'm just not in the right frame of mind for feminism atm. :(

I'm sorry to hear about you're history, Peanut. And I hope that realising helps you in some way. It is terrible that this behaviour goes on, but unfortunately it is not the first time I've seen it.

I'm just glad to here that at least you're away from that now.