fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2686 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2686 ⌋

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I shit you not, I have been in an internet argument with someone about socialized medicine who cited statistics posted on a website with eagles clutching assault rifles in each talon from studies backed by the American Freedom Foundation, and insisted when I protested that they were just as valid and non-biased as data gathered by the CDC and WHO.

See also: MRAs who post statistics from studies that purport to show that "30-40% of rape claims are false" when in order to get this percentage they included all cases dismissed or dropped from lack of evidence as "false".

Yes, but just as bad as this are the people who INSIST that statistics "prove" only like, 0.004% of all rape allegations are false because # of acquittals/every allegation ever including those that were never actually reported so therefore can't even be accurately counted and therefore MATH FAIL.

People seriously do not understand statistics OR how the criminal justice system (in the U.S., at least) functions.

Just as bad statistically, yes, but morally...? That's questionable.

"LIKE HALF OF RAPE ALLEGATIONS ARE FALSE SO WOMEN ARE LYING BITCHES AND WE SHOULDN'T TAKE ANY RAPE ALLEGATIONS SERIOUSLY" has a slightly different motive from "ALMOST NO RAPE ALLEGATIONS ARE FALSE SO WE SHOULD TAKE EVERY SINGLE RAPE ALLEGATION SERIOUSLY".

Plus, when legitimate sources give false allegation rates of 2-8%, a distortion of 32-38% is a great deal larger than a distortion of 1.996-7.996%. Someone intentionally being off by 1.9% to come down more harshly on criminals is making a very different error than someone who is intentionally off by 38% to excuse criminals, by an order of magnitude.

Legitimate sources meaning... I'm not asking to be an ass, honest, I'm genuinely curious. You don't strike me as "this is what some infographic on tumblr told me and that's legitimate" so the benefit of my doubt is actually on your side here. I just tend to...always want to check before even getting into any specific response because even from some of the fairly reputable sources, there are major problems in which cases are being included in the "proven false" set vs. "proven true" vs. ....everything else. Personally I have yet to see a breakdown that convinces me it's even POSSIBLE to come up with a vaguely trustworthy percentage due to the nature of the crime and the nature of the justice system, but I'm always willing to look because hell, it would actually be a relief to be able to refer to something specific in trying to get people to use as a reference instead of...well, infographics on tumblr or NCVS data they don't actually know how to read and interpret.

Hahah thanks for the vote of confidence.

On the flip side, you don't seem like someone with a vested interest in the worldview that women are lying bitches/etc., so let me ask you: do you question the rates of false allegations for other crimes? To be sure, "the nature of the crime" as you say, makes it particularly difficult to prosecute (e.g. if there's a murder there's ostensibly a body, if there was arson something burned down) but it is far from the only crime for which this is the case. Mugging, for example, frequently has less evidence than rape, as victims are often verbally threatened and not physically assaulted, and there's no way of proving that they didn't just dump their wallet/belongings somewhere. People can, and do, trump up false mugging allegations for attention, pity, to get out of something, as an excuse for having lost said belongings, etc. As most mugging victims don't know their attackers and most rape victims do, "revenge" can't be a motive, but on the flip side, there's a great deal less to lose to file a report for mugging, whereas rape victims who chose to prosecute are branded sluts, liars, "asking for it", etc. - often by the police themselves. They become targets for vicious harassment; mugging victims do not.

As for "legitimate sources" - the majority of police and criminal justice departments in OECD nations give rates of 2-8%, including the FBI, the RCMP, Interpol, CPS, the AFP, and others. This is in line with false allegation rates for other crimes. The data were also collected in the same manner as other crimes; there is no reason to doubt the statistic for rape and not for other crimes for which the evidence is often circumstantial. These are not feminist organizations; they have no vested interest in social commentary, either, unlike many academics who've pursued this kind of research (some openly "to debunk feminist claims".) But again, these are not "feminist" claims. To be sure, retracted claims may have been false even if the justice department or the accused chooses not to purse charges, but this is true for retracted claims of all crimes - i.e. if rape dropped charges are suspect, all dropped assault charges (which are also frequently dropped) are also suspect.

Yet, rape is the only crime onto which this degree of aspersions are cast. If false allegation reporting by various justice organizations are bunk, to you, then rationally they're all bunk - not just rape. That the focus, then, is on rape to exclusion of all other crimes with circumstantial evidence is extremely telling.

Yay votes of confidence. FWIW, I'm really REALLY not vested in any view of women or anyone as lying bitches, honestly. What I am is (scum alert) a lawyer and yeah, actually do very much question the rates of false allegations (with a particular concern for wrongful convictions, which I have had some professional background in) for other crimes as well. The only sense in which I feel rape is actually different is not so much from a moral perspective such as "oh, falsely accusing someone of rape is WORSE than falsely accusing them of mugging," but more an issue that I don't actually know a good solution for, in that we as society (and/or we as an increasingly social justice oriented online generation) treat it differently in so many ways, not just those that you totally rightfully point out re what often happens to victims who do come forward, but (more and more as we make important progress in destigmatizing and caring for victims better) in how we sometimes view and treat anyone against whom even so much as a whiff of an accusation is made.

I think overall we need to be very careful about crime statistics in general, because they're really complicated but REALLY easy to manipulate with devastating effects on people. While it wasn't particularly relevant to the topic of this conversation, I am actually JUST as bothered by, say, mugging or murder or drug crime rates being distorted to make some supposed point about "those" people, whoever they might be. And I'm bothered by not actually having a comfortable sense of the right direction to go in since there's something of a rock and a hard place involved -- we absolutely need to ensure that victims of any crime can be safe and secure in their ability to come forward and seek both help and justice, but at the same time I feel we need to at least be realistic and honest about the fact that people DO lie about rape just like any other crime, and the consequences can be terrible for real people (not just faceless numbers), and I'm very, very bothered by what feels to me to be a growing radical myth of "believe every accuser no matter what" that is making it completely taboo in many circles to even suggest otherwise. Case in point: I'm a highly educated woman with a fairly broad range of professional legal experience dealing with things directly impacted by and involving these issues, and I do dare consider myself a pretty decent person and a feminist to the extent that radicals these days are not making me sort of uncomfortable with openly aligning myself with the actual "movement" -- but most of the time I point these things out I get accused of being an "MRA" right off the bat. I'm genuinely not, I just think that justice starts with honesty, and it's unfortunately the crime of rape that's particularly prone to having gussied up infographics with laughable claims bandied around the internet for political and/or ideological (which is not necessarily to say invalid -- my beef is with the means, not really the ends as long as we're not talking about the very small genuine radfem whacko minority) purposes.

I'll go check out those various organizations, thanks btw. It's been awhile since I updated myself on what reputable sources are reporting, anyway. Like I said, it's the manipulation of perfectly good, if complicated, data that gets to me and THAT seems to happen more frequently with rape in social justice culture these days than other crimes. So I do admittedly have some bone to pick with it.

(Also, thanks for a pleasant and calm talk about this. NOT usually how this conversation goes for me online.)

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