Met Police change rape guidelines - shocker of a quote from cressida dick

[TheDukesOfHazzard]

A few articles today - this evening standard one is not paywalled.

It's interesting. Partly because the lack of disclosure was across all crimes, but the press focus in on rape (most of us will know why).

Secondly because the "We believe you" thing was - on MN at least - never about unquestioningly believing a report at all times no matter what. It was a reaction to two things:

• Cases where women (and chidlren, probabyl men too) had reported and the police said I don't believe you go away - Saville etc Warboys had this too
• Cases where a woman had reported a rape and immediately the police had started investigating her, and not investigating the actual crime she had reported at all

So the idea that they treat victims with dignity and respect and go and investigate is fine - I mean who wanted anything else

The part that concerns me A LOT is this at the end:

"She reportedly added: "And what might be a misunderstanding between two people, clumsy behaviour between somebody who fancies somebody else, is not a matter for the police.""

This (to me) is a clear reference to "date rape" / sexual assault when the victim knows the assailant, and it happens behind closed doors, isn't it? I can't see another reading of it.

WTF?

Here's the article

www.theguardian.com/society/2007/feb/01/penal.genderissues

I think the key word there is contempt which has been highlighted out of the whole dictionary defn.

I don't think unfriendliness is a crime -

However, it is not a crime to treat women with contempt, as we are not a group who is included in hate crime legislation, despite being included in other areas where discriminated against / protected characteristics are listed.

Sex was deliberately left off hate crimes, my guess is because if it was included they'd never deal with anything else + the things that happen to women because they are women at th "lower" end of the scale- being shouted at on the street, followed, insulted, groped ie sexually assaulted and yes treated with contempt as seen as utterly normal and unremarkable. They aren't seen as crimes. Just life. So not included.

If a random man shouts at a girl on the street "Fucking slag come and suck my dick" -

That is not a hate crime. It shoud be, right?

Is it even a crime at all? I am never sure.

That's why the Notts thing was good when they included misogyny as it encouraged women and girls to report stuff that actually was illegal but previously they'd have felt like they were "making a fuss" - and not known if it was illegal or not.

How can "groping" be decriminliased unilaterally by the met?

How far does groping go - sticking their hand up your skirt / down your trousers / in your pants?

I also question how much "groping" is reported to police. Very little I imagine. I've never reported any - has anyone else?

Like I said earlier, this is a tactic which diverts attention from police failings by pointing the finger at imaginary rafts of trivial reports from women, which has the effect of reinforcing myths in society about women complaining over nothing and having "victim mindsets", t the same time she uses coded language to announce that assaults by men known to the victim will no longer be invetigated by the Met.

This is properly appalling. Do you think the Met decide this themselves or do they get direction from govt?

No I've been groped many times during my life and never reported. Not to say that's right or wrong, I just didn't see any point.

I didn't report

I was speaking to a young gay man the other day who seemed convinced that if a women is groped she reports it immediately and something is done about it

As opposed to if someone gropes a gay man in a club...

I felt it was the culture around both women and gay men that caused the problem

I think it would be great if women did report and even greater if police did something -

Women don't tend to though do they, due to a belief (now confirmed) that the police aren't interested.

Yep dukes

It was just weird that even with all the 'me too' business that he thought that women complain and are listened to all the time

And i think he expected me to say that it was different if a gay man is groped and assaulted

When A) its not and B) anyone does that to my precious children and i will be equally as furious...no matter the sex of my child

Where had he got that idea from Rufus?

Reports to who?

What is done?

This is not so much a gay man idea as a man idea - plenty of straight men complain that men get groped sometimes and it's not "taken seriosuly" and they don't feel they can report while for women they just walk into a police station and all men are arrested because someone breathed on her or something.

WHERE do men get this idea? How are they so clueless as to female experience? We've had #metoo, few years back we had everyday sexism, this topic re-emerges every 3 years or so and there is an "outpouring" - why don't men listen? Why do they persist in this belief that women get special treatment with kid gloves?

Is it a "stories" thing? Like the stories that men tell - which are all around us but not based in reality and are often reversal. The "story" here is that women are weak, vulnerable, and therefore are heavily protected by society, and by the vast majority of men who are good and strong and brave, and by the police and courts etc...

dukes

No idea i am afraid

Although i did find it funny when he mentioned cis gender and one of my children said 'oh god...dont say that!!! '

I wonder what effect this new policy will have on what they euphemistically call "domestic" violence?

Today's Times: "Police are 'trained to hide vital evidence'"
www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/police-are-trained-to-hide-vital-evidence-cnfdbm6jz

From the look of it, we've gone way beyond simple police incompetence and into actual corruption and attempts to pervert the course of justice. It seems to me that this victim blaming is a deliberate attempt to get the Daily Mail frothers going to distract from serious wrongdoing on the part of the police. Shift the headlines from "police lose/hide evidence in attempt to boost conviction figures by fitting up innocent people" to "police make bold move to throw away political correctness: evil women can no longer accuse poor innocent men..."

hairy

I read recently (its probably on this bloody thread and ive forgotten) that lawyers are saying that this evidence business is across all crimes

But the media are jumping on the lying women bandwagon

(Apologies if it was you who said it originally)

"If it's a long time ago, or it's very trivial, or I'm not likely to get a criminal justice outcome, I'm not going to spend a lot of resources on it."

Rape Crisis quote the figure a conviction rate of 5.7% for reported rapes.

So...if 96% of reported rapes don't end in a criminal justice outcome then isn't Cressida Dick saying that she won't spend a lot of resources on the 96% of rapes that are reported to her?

(bearing in mind that 85% of rapes already don't come her way...)

Sorry if 93.3 % of reported rapes don't end in a criminal justice outcome, that should say....

"I read recently (its probably on this bloody thread and ive forgotten) that lawyers are saying that this evidence business is across all crimes"

• this was in the mainstream reports about the lack of disclosure, often tacked on at the end, the reports tended to focus on sex crimes for the usual reasons (lying women lie / poor men / ooh sex).

I wonder if anyone has seen anything about this in the press / online since? I have googled etc and seen nothing subsquent.

I am really worried about this statement about sexual assaults (? up to rape) where the assailant knows the victim.

No I didn't see anything further. It was closely followed about discussion/statements about violence in London -stabbings/shootings - and got no more discussion that I could see.