This post is on the BDSM Activism web board.
| 4 Apr 07, 1:51 PM mini_velvet UK(EH), 6 yrs  |
lies, lies and damn statistics- Mark Twain There are worse things to eat on a train than a British Rail sandwich. | |||||
| 4 Apr 07, 1:57 PM x_Red_x 6 yrs |
In other words an entirely independent, pseudo-intellectual breeding ground for biased opinions. This is the entire piece, the opinion of 1 woman: "False Rape Accusations May Be More Common Than Thought May 2, 2006 Wendy McElroy Foxnews.com Is it the new 1-in-4 statistic? I don't mean the widely-circulated '1-in-4 women will be raped in their lifetime' but a statistic that suggests '1-in-4 accusations of rape are false.' For a long time, I have been bothered by the elusiveness of figures on the prevalence of false accusations of sexual assault. The crime of 'bearing false witness' is rarely tracked or punished, and the context in which it is usually raised is highly politicized. Politically correct feminists claim false rape accusations are rare and account for only 2 percent of all reports. Men's rights sites point to research that places the rate as high as 41 percent. These are wildly disparate figures that cannot be reconciled. This week I stumbled over a passage in a 1996 study published by the U.S. Department of Justice: Convicted by Juries, Exonerated by Science: Case Studies in the Use of DNA Evidence to Establish Innocence After Trial. The study documents 28 cases which, "with the exception of one young man of limited mental capacity who pleaded guilty," consist of individuals who were convicted by juries and, then, later exonerated by DNA tests. At the time of release, they had each served an average of 7 years in prison. The passage that riveted my attention was a quote from Peter Neufeld and Barry C. Scheck, prominent criminal attorneys and co-founders of the Innocence Project that seeks to release those falsely imprisoned. They stated, "Every year since 1989, in about 25 percent of the sexual assault cases referred to the FBI where results could be obtained, the primary suspect has been excluded by forensic DNA testing. Specifically, FBI officials report that out of roughly 10,000 sexual assault cases since 1989, about 2,000 tests have been inconclusive, about 2,000 tests have excluded the primary suspect, and about 6,000 have "matched" or included the primary suspect." The authors continued, "these percentages have remained constant for 7 years, and the National Institute of Justice's informal survey of private laboratories reveals a strikingly similar 26 percent exclusion rate." If the foregoing results can be extrapolated, then the rate of false reports is roughly between 20 (if DNA excludes an accused) to 40 percent (if inconclusive DNA is added). The relatively low estimate of 25 to 26 percent is probably accurate, especially since it is supported by other sources. Before analyzing the competing figures, however, caveats about the one just mentioned are necessary. First, the category of 'false accusations' does not distinguish between accusers who lie and those who are honestly mistaken. Nor does it indicate that a rape did not occur, merely that the specific accused is innocent. Thus, there is a drive by voices for reform, like the Innocence Institute, to improve eyewitness identification techniques within police departments. For example, the Innocence Institute suggests "Police should use a 'double-blind' photo identification procedure where someone other than the investigator -- who does not know who the suspect is -- constructs photo arrays with non-suspects as fillers to reduce suggestiveness." Second, even if false accusations are as common as 1-in-4, that means 75 percent of reports are probably accurate and, so, all accusations deserve a thorough and professional investigation. Third, the 1-in-4 figure has 'fuzzy' aspects that could influence the results. For example, Neufeld and Scheck mention only sexual assault cases that were "referred to the FBI where results could be obtained." It is not clear what percentage of all reported assaults are represented by those cases. As well, the terms 'rape' and 'sexual assault' are often used interchangeably, especially when comparing studies, and it is not clear that they are always synonyms for each other. Nevertheless, the FBI data on excluded DNA is as close to hard statistics that I've found on the rate of false accusations of sexual assault. Where do the other figures come from and why is there reason to doubt them? Let me consider the two statistics that I have encountered most often. "Two percent of all reports are false." Several years ago, I tried to track down the origin of this much-cited stat. The first instance I found of the figure was in Susan Brownmiller's book on sexual assault entitled "Against Our Will" (1975). Brownmiller claimed that false accusations in New York City had dropped to 2 percent after police departments began using policewomen to interview alleged victims. Elsewhere, the two percent figure appears without citation or with only a vague attribution to "FBI" sources. Although the figure shows up in legislation such as the Violence Against Women Act, legal scholar Michelle Anderson of Villanova University Law School reported in 2004, "no study has ever been published which sets forth an evidentiary basis for the two percent false rape complaint thesis." In short, there is no reason to credit that figure. "Forty-one percent of all reports are false." This claim comes from a study conducted by Eugene J. Kanin of Purdue University. Kanin examined 109 rape complaints registered in a Midwestern city from 1978 to 1987. Of these, 45 were ultimately classified by the police as "false." Also based on police records, Kanin determined that 50 percent of the rapes reported at two major universities were "false." Although Kanin offers solid research, I would need to see more studies with different populations before accepting the figure of 50 percent as prevalent; to me, the figure seems high. But even a skeptic like me must credit a DNA exclusion rate of 20 percent that remained constant over several years when conducted by FBI labs. This is especially true when 20 percent more were found to be questionable. False accusations are not rare. They are common. Wendy McElroy Send email Wendy McElroy is a Research Fellow at The Independent Institute, columnist for FOXNews.com, and editor of iFeminists.com. Her books include Liberty for Women: Freedom and Feminism in the 21st Century, and Freedom, Feminism, and the State." Red | |||||
| 4 Apr 07, 1:58 PM Backdooruk UK(BA), 12 yrs |
It's quite odd though that I've never seen a woman posting on the net demonstrating a lack of understanding of the law that could lead to them making a false accusation of rape. Do you have any examples? On the other hand I've seen many men posting who seem to think that (e.g.) it's not rape if a woman is drunk or doesn't say no and many other basically chauvinistic attitudes. Don't you think that it's just as likely that their ignorance my have more of an impact on the relative fall in rape convictions? - Chris "I have made this letter longer, because I have not had the time to make it shorter." - Blaise Pascal | |||||
| 4 Apr 07, 2:01 PM MKane 9 yrs |
I've never said if a girl is drunk it shouldn't be rape, I've said it may not necessarily be rape. I've never said the MAJORITY of rape cases are unsubstantiated, I've given statistics proving the majority don't result in conviction. It seems your rage and desperation is blinding you to the facts, and you are, as you often do, deliberately distorting the issue for your own agenda.
--------------------------------------------------- - Edited 4 Apr 07, 2:05 PM by MKane | |||||
| 4 Apr 07, 2:08 PM x_Red_x 6 yrs |
Really? And of course you *never* do that, do you? You never edit quotes to your own ends, do you? You never make it appear that a direct quote from someone is other than it is, do you? You've never said that it's a good idea for lads to go out, get drunk and sew their wild oats without a care, have you? You've certainly never alluded that it would be an ok think to do, have you? Errrr.... Hmm. Suddenly the echoes of your past posts come back to haunt me, something about *encouraging* young people to do exactly those things, something about inserting your own opinion into a quote to make it appear as though your opinion was words from anothers mouth. And so recently, too! Red | |||||
| 4 Apr 07, 2:10 PM mini_velvet UK(EH), 6 yrs |
I value your legal experience and knowledge. There is a place for it. But you cannot look at the issue of rape and discount the emotions. This isn't court. This is a discussion forum and thus emotional responses will always take place. A clever man has a wealth of knowledge. An intelligent one knows when to use it. You come at this purely from a legal stand. That's fine, but you fail to recognise that for many this is about their own experiences. You also miss the agenda of some posters. There are worse things to eat on a train than a British Rail sandwich. | |||||
| 4 Apr 07, 2:12 PM MKane 9 yrs |
Have you taken your medication today? Take a chill pill. I can almost picture you sitting there, veins pulsing in your head, eyes bulging with fury, gnashing your teeth and foaming at the mouth as you type. LMAO --------------------------------------------------- - Edited 4 Apr 07, 2:14 PM by MKane | |||||
| 4 Apr 07, 2:17 PM x_Red_x 6 yrs |
Unfortunately leeway and relevance are in the eyes of a judge, not you. And not all judges carry the clarity of mind that would be desired in these cases. I point you to the case of a girl who had to endure her rapist acting as his own counsel and therefore cross examining the girl in *great* detail over several hours before the judge finally intervened. Some leeway, some relevance, some total bloody farce. And then you expect someone with their self respect in tatters, who believes in their heart that they somehow deserved what happened to them, who is only a short step away from a psychiatric ward or suicide to think clearly and say "I must tell the police, preserve the evidence and approach this rationally and logically"? I'm sorry John, but your approach forgets the state of the victims in all this. It's why we have victim support and rape support, it's why there are even religeous laws addressing rape that go back centuries. If we forget the victim in all this and the damage done it just becomes a farce. Anyone after being raped is in a damaged state. They're not thinking clearly. And if they then turn on the news and see something like that it will stick in their mind forever. There's no way you'll ever get that person into a witness box, and the purpetrator of the act is free to do it again. And again. And again. Red | |||||
| 4 Apr 07, 2:21 PM x_Red_x 6 yrs |
Yeah, right. How well you know me. Not. Actually I'm sitting here with a cup of tea, a smile on my face and one of my cats beside me. Far from the angry little missy that doesn't understand the world that you would love to paint me as, or the PMT ridden hag that would destroy all men, I am actually nothing like either of those. But then this is your classic answer to anyone female that dares to call you on your claims. Your answer to men is generally to shut up and crawl back into your hole if you cannot throw your weight around sufficiently to get the response you want. Your posts are there for all to see, lots of us have read them. And not just women. Your quote on this thread used to back up your argument comes from the US - therefore hardly relevant to this website or the law in this country. It comes from a so called independent site which is actually a breeding ground for the neo-Con thought control. To use it here only shows your bias more, not less. And in your desperation to paint yourself as the righteous one and me as the idiot, be careful that you do not expose yourself to others that already have an insight on you. Be careful that you don't protest so much that those watching may question your own motives here. Red | |||||
| 4 Apr 07, 2:23 PM Backdooruk UK(BA), 12 yrs |
So your only justification is that correlation? Really I'm surprised that you would attempt to impute causality on so flimsy a basis.
I think you are being slightly ridiculous now if you are truly suggesting that most rapes that fail to get a conviction are based on this technical point. Men don't say 'it seemed reasonable she was agreeing', they say 'she did agree'. It isn't a break down of communication as you imply, one of them is lying after the fact!
According to your unsubstantiated theory you might say that. I prefer to listen to women who claim they said no rather than that they were misunderstood. - Chris "I have made this letter longer, because I have not had the time to make it shorter." - Blaise Pascal Edited 4 Apr 07, 2:24 PM by Backdooruk |
