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The Wurm Rants #4
11 years ago
This is a very blunt rant about rape. Read at your own risk.
...
Let me start out by saying this. Ignoring the tons and tons of people I know online, I've had over 200+ friends in real life (as in in person). Yeah, I'm a social butterfly. All of them have confided in me about their past.
My friends are approximately 55% male, 35% female, and 10% other.
They are white, black, and asian. They're American, Irish, African, Russian, Australian, Japanese and Canadian, just to name a few.
They come from the North End, the South End, the East End, the West End and the Ass End.
Of those 200+ friends, four have been sexually molested. Including myself. (I'm defining this as unwanted/aggressive/rough intimate touching.)
Of those 200+ friends, one has been raped. One.
But what do I constantly fucking hear about on the internet? "Oh, there's like thousands of rapes a day in the US that go unpunished." Where? Where do these people live? What evidence is this based on? Now, don't get me wrong...if someone brings up rape charges with physical evidence (bruises on the wrists, face, back; sexual fluid; etc), and the jury dismisses the case? Yeah, that's gonna make me look real hard at that. I would say someone's getting away with shit in that case.
A lot of the time, however, there is no physical evidence. Fuck bruises, I'd consider an odd rug burn or a violently torn article of clothing sufficient evidence to at least warrant an investigation. But a lot of the time, it's just testimony. Some completely untouched person with no discernable evidence sits in a room and cries or gets angry while saying they were raped. This then becomes a "statistic".
Here are some true figures: In the US, there was a recent study of 556 individual rape cases. 46% of the cases were based on testimony alone, 35% involved circumstantial evidence, and 19% presented hard evidence. Another article points out that false testimony in general (including rape cases, which it specifically mentions) accounts for 72% of overturned cases.
What really amazes me is that so many people don't see the danger of someone just being able to say "a crime happened", and that's it, with no evidence, and then that becomes an "unconvincted crime statistic" for everyone to froth over and obsess on.
That's no different than me going around my neighborhood, accusing all of my neighbors of stealing from me, presenting no evidence of anything stolen, and just saying "I saw them do it". Noone gets convicted of course, but then a year later, someone writes an article saying "We all know neighbors can't be trusted. I'd say about 70% of those people stole from Flynn".
Now, I want to observe for a moment how many TV shows and movies and such play this up. You see the rape depicted onscreen, but there's no evidence, and so the rapist gets away with it, and that makes people angry. This is how they get you. There's no such "witness" in real life, but obviously this must happen a lot, right?
Because noone ever has second thoughts or regrets their choices and wants to blame someone for it, right?
...
Now I don't wanna see a bunch of reactionist responses from SJWs about how "rape is srs business how dare you blahblahblah". Of course real rape is serious business! It's fucking horrible! That's not the issue here. The issue here is treating virtually every person who just says they were raped as actually having been raped. That's not "unserved justice", that's Communists in the soup.
...
Let me start out by saying this. Ignoring the tons and tons of people I know online, I've had over 200+ friends in real life (as in in person). Yeah, I'm a social butterfly. All of them have confided in me about their past.
My friends are approximately 55% male, 35% female, and 10% other.
They are white, black, and asian. They're American, Irish, African, Russian, Australian, Japanese and Canadian, just to name a few.
They come from the North End, the South End, the East End, the West End and the Ass End.
Of those 200+ friends, four have been sexually molested. Including myself. (I'm defining this as unwanted/aggressive/rough intimate touching.)
Of those 200+ friends, one has been raped. One.
But what do I constantly fucking hear about on the internet? "Oh, there's like thousands of rapes a day in the US that go unpunished." Where? Where do these people live? What evidence is this based on? Now, don't get me wrong...if someone brings up rape charges with physical evidence (bruises on the wrists, face, back; sexual fluid; etc), and the jury dismisses the case? Yeah, that's gonna make me look real hard at that. I would say someone's getting away with shit in that case.
A lot of the time, however, there is no physical evidence. Fuck bruises, I'd consider an odd rug burn or a violently torn article of clothing sufficient evidence to at least warrant an investigation. But a lot of the time, it's just testimony. Some completely untouched person with no discernable evidence sits in a room and cries or gets angry while saying they were raped. This then becomes a "statistic".
Here are some true figures: In the US, there was a recent study of 556 individual rape cases. 46% of the cases were based on testimony alone, 35% involved circumstantial evidence, and 19% presented hard evidence. Another article points out that false testimony in general (including rape cases, which it specifically mentions) accounts for 72% of overturned cases.
What really amazes me is that so many people don't see the danger of someone just being able to say "a crime happened", and that's it, with no evidence, and then that becomes an "unconvincted crime statistic" for everyone to froth over and obsess on.
That's no different than me going around my neighborhood, accusing all of my neighbors of stealing from me, presenting no evidence of anything stolen, and just saying "I saw them do it". Noone gets convicted of course, but then a year later, someone writes an article saying "We all know neighbors can't be trusted. I'd say about 70% of those people stole from Flynn".
Now, I want to observe for a moment how many TV shows and movies and such play this up. You see the rape depicted onscreen, but there's no evidence, and so the rapist gets away with it, and that makes people angry. This is how they get you. There's no such "witness" in real life, but obviously this must happen a lot, right?
Because noone ever has second thoughts or regrets their choices and wants to blame someone for it, right?
...
Now I don't wanna see a bunch of reactionist responses from SJWs about how "rape is srs business how dare you blahblahblah". Of course real rape is serious business! It's fucking horrible! That's not the issue here. The issue here is treating virtually every person who just says they were raped as actually having been raped. That's not "unserved justice", that's Communists in the soup.
Well said.
I have lots of other issues with how the media and people treat rape and the facts about it ... But I'd prefer not to say anything unless I'm asked.
One of them is sample size. 200 people as a rough estimate but because of the plus and the only number we have is 200 we can then estimate that there is possibly 400 people IRL [this goes back to a german tank problem, which basically says that when trying to approximate how many Tanks an enemy has, if you have only one data point, double it, but with more points of data you can get a better approximation by applying a standard curve]
and even with 400 people coming from numerous locations, your sample size is really small if you compare it to the total US population. Which is about 3.185 million people. Now the question is, do you have a link to this precise study?
So if those are the case that have been reported and actually make up a decent sample size of all the cases, then that would be accurate assessment.
Now the next question is, of these 200+ people, how many of them did you know well? Because there are people who won't say anything, like ever, but they might confide in a friend who will then say, yes s/he knew someone that was raped. When we get down to it, we really need to put a lot of math behind this, specifically statistical analyses, which while the media doesn't necessarily do all the time, I will admit that, but any well credited researcher will sit down and run the analysis.
Also when we talk about rape, what sort of definition are we using? Must intercourse happen? That now then becomes a semantics problem, because what definition do we use when something goes beyond just sexual touching in a forceful manner, but never actually ended in intercourse?
And really we should be putting all of this under sexual assault, because as much as rape is a problem, sexual assault catches everything.
But to top this off, Almost everyone that I talk to on F-list or in IRC's made for roleplaying has dealt with unwanted sexual advances, even I have dealt with it to where I have had numerous males [surprisingly no females or herms or any other gender/sex for that matter] just suddenly start in character with something sexual. While this does not leave any physical damage, it does leave some emotional discomfort, and also demonstrates that there are enough people with this sort of entitlement mentality that it is a bit of a problem.
That is my two cents and I hope I came across as pragmatically/logically as possible
Molestation is basically any bad touching, while rape involves forced sex (including oral or non-penetrative sex). All of it is considered sexual assault, yes.
The real problem with these cases is that we're talking about trying to lump people who drug, beat on or tie up other people and fuck them in with people who basically just talk or manipulate someone into sex they might not want. There's a reason why there's a separation of crimes like armed and unarmed robbery, or murder and manslaughter. Trying to make those the same thing is a reactionist viewpoint, and incredibly self-defeating. Crime has gradients for a reason.
So, everyone screams rape, and cases that might have gotten a conviction on sexual harassment or entrapment just fail instead.
Especially is we run with these definitions: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/rape
Manipulating someone is just as bad as drugging them, because it is still non-consensual.
the thing about armed and unarmed crimes, is that it is very clear cut and dry, with rape,....well basically it should be anything that was done non-consensually, even during. My thing is, if someone asks to stop, and just say too bad, 'this is how it is suppose to feel', it is then still rape.
This is never going to work until there are two crimes: one being rape, and the other being sexual coercion.
P.S. if "sexual coercion" ever actually does get put on the books as a new category of crime, I expect royalties.
Progressive doesn't mean everything is on a spectrum/gradient, it just means there are discrete levels of crimes, much like the difference between a Class 3, a Class 2, and Class 1 offense, which we see in university and school systems.
Class 1 example would be destruction of school property
Class 2 example might be looking at porn
Class 3 example would be dress code violation
or something to that effect.
But i calm down and now i try to answer you.
So there some REALITY fact for you!
First: less than 8% of the rape report are fake. You can think this is a lot. But this is LESS than ANY other crime. So ALL the idea behind your post is a HUGE HUGE HUUUUGE bullshit. Why i know this? Well, because i am in the board concil of 2 organisations helping man and woman that suffer from domestic violence and rape. We regulary work whit cops , social worker, criminalist,
psychologist.
Second: A great majority of the rape victim will NEVER NEVER admnit they have been rape, and usualy, wen they are mentaly strong enough for suit the rappist..usualy the legal prescription protect the agressor. Most of your friend may suffer from rape, and you will never know, and they may die whit that secret.
thirdly : In a HUGE majory of trial 2 thing happen.
first: the rappist is relase. Not guilty . Because usualy , the victim cannot give proof.
Second: this is not like in the movie. The victim is often mentaly totaly destroy by the opposite lawyer, and a lot of victim suffer from severe depression after or as the the trial go.
Who i know this?
i am a lawyer.
But most of all:
I get almost kill by my family, they was ALL of them, uncles, dad, mom child beater and rapist. Becuase of that, my young age history is complicate..but a lot of my friend, of people i know from close or not, suffer from rape. Yeah. We cannot all have 300 lucky friend in life :p.
I saw friends kills themself or try to after rape or as they do the trial. A lot of them become drug addict. Why? Well because if in our sociality the rape is something horrible like you say, a lot of people like you
think woman use rape as weapon against man when they brooke.
Because a lot of people like you think this is easy to confess accept the idea "hé i have been rape" . And worst, usualy, people will act like you " You don't have proof, i don't belive you". "Rape is a easy crime to report whitout proof!" ect.
Because a lot of people like you defend the people they know, refuse to admnit "yeah..he can have done this"
I understand we CANNOT put somone in jail whit no proof.
But people like you help the rapist.
People like you help victim to kill thesemf, to feel guilty and hide what happen.
Ho and for your information. 1 woman on 5 will suffer from sexual assult. And not alwais only once.
Who many trial can you find about sexual assault? for sure, not that quantity.
You're basically saying that anyone who says they were raped should be believed with no proof or evidence of any kind. Doesn't matter what the courts say, doesn't matter what reason says, the moment someone is accused of rape "we the people" should hate them and judge them because they're definitely guilty.
Also being that he is a lawyer, he might have better statistics than the media can give.
We also must consider that with rape, there is a really fine line between what is actually rape, and what isn't, but that line is really clear
You don't give a shit this is the crime where the report art almost alwais true.
Don't give a shit about the fact if we take ALL the rape victim, that number drop to easily less than 1% That what you say?
It DOESN'T matter if 90% or even 99% of the accusations are true. That wasn't the point they were trying to make here. They were talking about the fact that EVERYONE believes the person yelling rape and all these arguments pretty much just prove that to be true. I've personally seen someone's life ruined by it, even after the justice system spent a good deal of time and money investigating and didn't find ANYTHING, much less enough to even bring a case against the guy...don't just have the standard, knee jerk reaction that they must be defending rape because they aren't trying to string someone up for it. :p
Quite frankly, I think your point is moot. I think it really does matter that 90% to 99% of the accusations are true. Our justice system is BROKEN. Real rape cases are going ignored, and people, especially minorities, are being crammed in for any old infraction into a for-profit prison system as grist for the money mill.
There is NO crime that isn't viewed as "innocent till proven guilty" in this country even if that's the way it's "supposed" to be.
Your friend is not special in this just because he was accused of specifically rape. He would have lost his job as a teacher if he had been accused of theft, drugs, DUI, whatever. I've seen that happen to loads of people. I have a friend who was 2 weeks from finishing his training to become a teacher when a little troublemaker girl accused him of inappropriately putting his hands on her. No evidence, he was just gone on principle.
Our public school system is a notorious mess for that kind of crap as well. Teachers and students get severe punishments for nothing, really.
In regards to rape specifically, people react with fury because people just bring out that tired old "What about all the false accusations" trope as a way to derail the topic, so they don't have to care about the suffering of people they consider lesser to themselves. So if people are defensive, I am understanding. Innocents falsely accused of crimes is nothing new, and I don't think we can expect justice for them when we don't even get justice for actual crimes.
Please do not take this as a lack of caring in my part. I'm keeping my emotions deliberately in check for the moment.
My comments were addressed to the folks who replied earlier with statistics, so not sure what purpose is served by you telling me you can back up statistics you haven't even mentioned.
Well, my comment about the 90% to 99% does matter, but the part after that explaining why is apparently going to be dismissed out of hand so you can bring your personal opinion about the justice system in...except that was pretty much the original point that was being made here and folks keep ignoring it to make random attacks because...well, not really sure why. If I had to guess, it would say it was the black and white fixation people have that if you aren't 100% for something, you are on the other side and against it.
I didn't claim my friend was special, it was an example used to illustrate a point to one of the people I was actually addressing. Again, personal opinion being brought in despite the fact none of this was address to you.
Except none of that about people reacting with fury applies if part of the topic was about false accusations to start with. It's not derailing the topic to point out that it was brought up and was part of the focus.
I don't take this as a lack of caring on your part, more a need to insert yourself into the argument as if I was talking to you earlier and to use language like a weapon to try and make it sound like disagreeing with you means someone supports rape and "so they don't have to care about the suffering of people they consider lesser to themselves." Pretty sure no one is talking down about rape victims and in fact, a comment was made in the first post about how if someone got away with rape it was a terrible thing. It was aimed at the cases were there was no proof and it was just a case of someone making an accusation that is instantly believed. I was trying to point out that a lot of the response ignored that to act like it was a defense of rape or something, which it clearly isn't and honestly the fact several of the responses so far have totally ignored what was said seems to indicate no one cares, they are much more interested in making it clear they are anti-rape for some reason. Pretty sure it's safe to assume your average person falls down on that side of the line. :p