The responses I have heard in person, seen on the broadcast media, and read in news articles when speaking about Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s claim of sexual assault by Brett Kavanaugh is that we need to realize that not every claim of rape or sexual assault is real, as if that is sufficient grounds to automatically assume hers must not be as the implication is that false reports outnumber real ones, and by a huge amount.
We are very familiar with the false reports because we were hoping they were, but we seem to just skate over the true ones, and the too often slap on the wrist sentences especially if the perpetrator is a rich privileged White person from high society, or the son of a politician. We all recall the high profile cases like the Duke Lacrosse team case in 2006 and the alleged University of Virginia gang rape in 2014, and many, if not all, legitimate victims most likely groaned knowing these cases would become the poster-child of future doubt of reported rapes.
But as high profile as these cases are, studies have shown that in the last 20 years, only 2-10% of rape accusations are false. Looked at another way, in the last 20 years, 98-90% are real.
According to a study by the Journal of Forensic Psychology,
“In the years 2006-2010 all law enforcement agencies combined reported to the UCR of the FBI that yearly between 4,400 and 5,100 allegations of rape were false and baseless allegations, while 82,000 to 85,000 that are considered to be true allegations. False and baseless allegations of rape constitute about 5% of all rape allegations.”
Other studies arrived at that same conclusion.
Claire E. Ferguson and John M. Malouff reporting rates in the Archives of Sexual Behavior in 2016 found that 5.2% of cases were false rape reports.
Researchers Cassia Spohn, Clair White, and Katharine Tellis examined figures from the Los Angeles Police Department founfd the rate there was 4.5%.
In 2010 David Lisak published a study in Violence Against Women that found of rapes reported on American college campuses only 5.9% were false.
The FBI put the number of “unfounded” forcible rape accusations around 8%.
A 2006 paper by Philip N.S. Rumney in the Cambridge Law Journal covered false reporting in the US, New Zealand and the United Kingdom and found that some members of law enforcement seem to “have fixed views and expectations about how genuine rape victims should react to their victimization” and “that some officers continue to exhibit an unjustified skepticism of rape complainants”. This attitude seems to be shared by the general population especially when people are talking about the Ford allegation and ask why she or her “loving parents” did not file charges or claim she should have said something sooner than 6 years ago.
There are other studies as well that hold to the 2-10% figure, so while people grasp at the possibility that Dr. Ford is not being truthful, again, there’s a 90% she is.
The idea that the incident happened 36 years ago, was brought up in therapy 30 years after, and that it was just a one off case of a randy drunk teen, seems to be sufficient grounds, to some, to brush it aside.
My fellow high school teachers and anyone who taught high school anywhere should be familiar with the sexually active boy being a stud while the girls who have sex once or multiple times were easy, sluts, and ho’s. Going commando in loose basketball shorts showed how studly a boy was, while spaghetti straps on a dress was an invitation for boys to do what they will because it was seductive.
A crime is a crime upon commission. A crime does not become one only if it is multiple. This idea that the 17 year old who can be prosecuted as an adult was merely being a typical boy, and drunk which at his age was also illegal, should be let off because it was a onetime event ignores that although he moves on, the victim is a victim after that one time.
The most disturbing aspect of all this is that after the moral gymnastics employed to get around Roy Moore in an attempt to get him elected and a man being elected to president who had bragged repeatedly about his boys will be boys activity from the tape on the bus to his claiming his Viet Nam was avoiding STDs because of his sexual activity, Dr. Ford is being judged by the man who is speaking against her to his base, while she has to face a bunch of old white guys who want to confirm Kavanaugh as quickly as possible and who belong to a party whose major players consider rape God’s way of impregnating some women,
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There are court cases where male judges deemed the rape victim as having been responsible for her rape because of where she was or what she was wearing.
Brock Allen Turner, a champion swimmer at Stanford University, got six months in jail instead of the possible maximum 14 years for three felony counts of sexual assault, and his father complained that his son’s life had been ruined for “20 minutes of action” fueled by alcohol and promiscuity. According to the judge, “A prison sentence would have a severe impact on him.”
A Montana judge sentenced a man who pleaded guilty to raping his 12-year-old daughter to 60 days in jail, gave the father credit for 17 days already served in jail while awaiting trial, and reduced the sentence to 43 days.
A Texas judge gave a rapist 45 days in jail, 5 years probation, and 250 hours of community service, a lighter than usual sentence, because the 14-year-old victim had had three previous sexual partners and had given birth before the sexual assault. Upon completion of probation, the rapist will have a chance to wipe the conviction off his record.
Austin James Wilkerson was convicted of sexual assault on a helpless victim after assuring his friends he would take care of the drunk girl. Instead of four to 12 years in prison, he got two years in jail with the privilege of leaving lock-up during the day to work or attend school.
In Brooklyn, a judge handed down a three year slap on the wrist to an ex-police officer who showed no remorse for having repeatedly raped a young girl, and then freed him on bail pending his appeal.
A judge in California sentenced a man who raped his teenage sister to just four months in jail because the “stigma” of being a sex offender was punishment enough.
A Minnesota judge sentenced a confessed rapist to 361 days in jail. Michael Stucky was 18 when he raped a 15-year-old girl in her bedroom, and had sexually assaulted a 13-year-old girl a few months earlier, and had pleaded guilty to two counts of criminal sexual conduct. He was immediately released from jail for time served. The County Attorney and the girls’ parents agreed with this because it would prevent having the two girls traumatized by taking the witness stand. The girls had no say in this agreement.
David Wise, 52, of Indianapolis, was convicted on six felony charges of rape and deviate conduct for repeatedly drugging and sexually assaulting his wife for which prison terms of six to 20 years apiece are standard, but the judge ordered no prison time. Instead he got eight years of GPS-monitored home confinement, with the ability to leave for work, and no required therapy. The judge told the victim at the sentencing that she “needed to forgive her attacker.”
In seven states, including Wyoming, New Mexico, Minnesota, Mississippi, Alabama, and Maryland, Rape victims have no laws protecting them from a custody fight with the rapist if a pregnancy resulted and the victim kept the child.
In total 31 states have no laws that bar rapists from seeking custody or visitation rights.
There have even been laws proposed in states where the rapist can have the victim prosecuted if she aborts the fetus without his permission.
When young girls hear that it is okay for boys to get drunk, lose self-control, and sexually assault them and instead of punishment they are excused because boys will be boys, and excused by people in authority, the world becomes more unsafe.
We claim the victims are not credible because they wait to come forward, yet if they come forward their character and morality are questioned to favor the alleged perpetrator.
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