Prison Rape and the Problem With Statistics
In a recent Sexist thread, a couple of commenters got to arguing a grim set of statistics. The question at hand: Which group experiences more rapes, men in prison or women outside of prison?
In order to resolve this question, one commenter referred to the "Prison Rape" Wikipedia page, which reads: "Stop Prisoner Rape, Inc. statistics indicate that there are more men raped in U.S. prisons than non-incarcerated women similarly assaulted."
I've seen this comparison quoted on other threads, but I've never seen any specific stats to back it up—and the Wiki page doesn't refer to any, either. I'm a big fan of the work of the organization to which the stats are attributed—Just Detention International, formerly Stop Prisoner Rape, Inc.—so I reached out to JDI for some insight. JDI program director Cynthia Totten had this to say:
JDI does not compare numbers of people raped in society vs. prison as a way to show how frequent rape in detention is—doing so would be problematic and troubling on many levels. Rape is devastatingly common both inside and outside prison walls. The best academic research finds that 20 percent of inmates in men’s prisons are assaulted while rates in women’s institutions vary, with one in four inmates raped in the worst facilities. According to recent government studies by the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics, approximately 60,500 inmates reported being sexually abused at their current federal and state prison in the preceding year alone, while 25,000 jail detainees were victimized in just the prior six months; we can realistically say that at least 100,000 inmates are raped in prisons and jails each year, without considering juvenile detention or immigration detention. Add to this the fact that annual jail intakes are 17 times the population in a jail on any given day, and this number likely represents only the tip of the iceberg. Regardless of custody status, rape and sexual assault traumatizes millions of people in the United States every year, and we are committed to putting an end to this violence, no matter where it occurs.
I wholeheartedly agree with Totten: These sorts of comparisons are profoundly unhelpful.
First of all, until a reliable study is undertaken to directly answer this question, it is scientifically unsound to compare studies that employ different methods, definitions, and standards in determining the prevalence of rape in different communities. Second, these comparisons are often employed solely to derail conversations about addressing the problem of rape. Comparing statistics about the prevalence of rape in different communities ignores the fact that rapes are happening, even one is too many, and all rapists need to be stopped. When you say, "You shouldn't be addressing rape against women in society, you should be addressing rape against male prisoners," you stop a productive conversation about ending rape. When you say, "You shouldn't be addressing rape against male prisoners, you should be addressing rape against women in society," you stop a productive conversation about ending rape.
What Totten—a person who has dedicated her career to ending prison rape—is saying is that we should be encouraging conversations about sexual violence against anyone, and supporting all organizations committed to ending this violence everywhere. It's important to note, however, that these conversations won't all be happening at the same time, and addressing one form of rape in no way detracts from the task of ending rape in all its other forms. The work of ending prison rape is going to take a vastly different approach than the work of ending acquaintance rapes, or child molestation, or elder abuse, or the rape of LGBTQ victims, or male victims, or female victims. That's OK—as long as we also understand that the work of encouraging all of these conversations about all different forms of rape will not be accomplished by jostling for position. As one commenter wrote on another rape stats argument: "I can’t believe you all are arguing over this. Some of you are essentially angry for not including everyone, while missing the point: RAPE = BAD. Do we all agree on that point? Okay! Good."
UPDATE: I forgot to mention that Just Detention International has attempted to edit the Prison Rape Wikipedia page with updated information—for one thing, the organization hasn't been called "Stop Prisoner Rape, Inc." for a few years now—but the erroneous and unsourced statement has since been restored to the page.
Photo via amandabhslater, Creative Commons Attribution License 2.0
12:31 pm
"Second, these comparisons are often employed solely to derail conversations about addressing the problem of rape."
AMEN!!!
1:00 pm
Yeah, I think the original question reinforces some bad stereotypes about rape. Rapists use sex to dominate. Prison concentrates rapists in a small area with access to a small population to predate on. The fact that the population is the same sex as the rapist is irrelevant to the rapist.
1:15 pm
I actually tried commenting on the person who brought up the prison rape thing, and tried explaining that 1 the numbers were irrelevant 2 we as feminists want to end rape against all people and 3 that one type of rape was not worse than any other, and therefore one couldn't try and create a hierarchy which this person was trying to do. (s)he didn't want to listen to that though
1:24 pm
For some reason, prison rape is found downright humorous in our society. From stand up comics to tv cartoons to movies and all areas of our media it is pretty obvious that references to Bubba and Dropping the Soap are treated as hilarious. Why the double standard?
1:31 pm
Demonstrating the numbers of prison, female on female and female on male rape is a useful way of getting the message accros that the feminist stereotyping of the crime is not only inaccurate, its damaging it male, prisoner and lgbt victims.
I think that the threads would have been much more pleasant and productive if the information - that rape is not gendered had not been shouted down by an angry mob.
Rape is no more gendered than IPV.
Groups that use rape to generate hate and political currency need to marginalised and replaced by inclusive advocates, IMO.
1:37 pm
@Eo, did you even read the article above? Or are you just generating your comments based on some boiler plate of reactions to anything that you deem feminist?
1:51 pm
TJ
Im in compleate agreement with the article, ive been talking about how unhelpful a polemic approach is and quite frankly, if feminism is stereotyping and promoting the crime as being gendered which it is, and shouting down people like myself that object, which it does, feminism is part of the problem.
1:56 pm
Eo: Why do I feel like if we made a flowchart of your rhetorical processes, it would turn into a joke because no matter what direction you took it would lead to "feminism is the problem"? Could you please try to be a little more clever and covert about your personal agenda? It's getting a tad predictable.
2:07 pm
Ok em
I remember you were one of the people here who was working hard to keep prison rape information down, what use are you to someone whos had all their teeth knocked out and is gang raped every day when you are busy trying to push the idea that rape is getting drunk, deciding to fuck and the next day thinking whoops I regret doing that.
2:43 pm
Eo, I've tried to keep my mouth shut because talking to you is clearly a lost cause, but goddammit you are making it hard.
So, last year I was raped, and after spending a year in denial because I didn't want anyone to tell me that I just, "got drunk and regretted it," or that even though I told my rapist explicitly that I did not want to have sex that I still wanted it, I have finally come to terms (kind of). It only took months of feeling depressed and suicidal and not knowing why and then running into my rapist again to make it happen!
But you know what? I would never, ever compare my experience to that of prison rape or try to deem one worse than the other. Because that would be completely pointless. Because rape is always bad. There is no rape that is only kind of bad. They are all awful.
And it isn't even like anyone is disagreeing with you that prison rape is bad. This post, the one you are commenting on right now, is a direct result of you turning every conversation about rape on this blog into one about prison rape. Here you go! It is a present for you!
I just don't even know what to say anymore. I have liked reading the comments here because there are a lot of smart people writing, but you make it impossible.
2:44 pm
And AGAIN it's abundantly clear that Eo doesn't actually give a shit about prisoners, he just hates women and will say whatever he can think of to discount issues that we face.
2:45 pm
Sorry about the double post.
There is some good information on prison rapes here
Amanda http://feck-blog.blogspot.com/search/label/Raped%20males. The section on prison rape is near the bottom of the page.
2:51 pm
EO, feminists accept all types of rape, and accept that they are all bad. Why can't you accept that? Why do you have to blame the ONLY group of people who try and stop a culture that says that men CANNOT be raped. That isn't an idea that feminists push, it's an idea that the culture surrounding rape pushes
3:05 pm
Eo, no one is trying to push the idea that rape = drunken consensual sex later regretted. Seriously, no one. I have read many posters arguing that rape = sex with someone too drunk to consent, which as far as I know is an accurate statement of the law and of basic human decency. Everyone is in agreement that men are also raped, and that men being raped is bad. The feminists you argue against are straw men (straw women?) who exist only in your head. Even when Amanda, a self-identified feminist, explicitly addresses your professed concern by running a post on the topic, and stating that prison rape is a bad thing, you still spout the same crap you've been spouting all along about how awful feminists are and how they don't care at all about men and prison rape. Seriously, do you even read the posts before you copy-and-paste?
That said, given that Amanda apparently does not want to ban Eo from posting, I really wish that people would stop responding to Eo. I like reading this blog, but I'm tired of it being hijacked by the same "discussion" every single time. It gets really old, really fast.
3:17 pm
@KitKat, I couldn't agree with you more. Trying to talk to folks like him is like talking to a spoiled three year old... who speaks a completely different language.
3:19 pm
Rape is rape and it's wrong.
3:50 pm
Gita
Im sorry to hear that, it should be obvious that when I talk about the push to include any drunken sex as rape, which is IMO a fraud to keep the figures, hysteria, hate, political currency and funding artifically inflated and a genuine rape, such as yours.
4:07 pm
Kit-Kat: I agree. I engaged in a discussion with Eo a few weeks ago and when it was recently suggested we ignore him, I took up on that. The arguments are ALWAYS the same, circular tripe that there is literally no way of engaging with on a meaningful level. It's not a productive use of my time to continuously read about his imagined rape-hysterical society or his exchanges with his supposed sexual partners.
I skip over his comments now and usually just read what everyone else is actually contributing. It's working out quite well for me. He just reminds me of Sady Doyle's [boners] situation where it always came back to the dude's penis. http://tigerbeatdown.com/2010/04/09/why-tiger-beatdown-has-jokes-on-it-turns-out-some-motherfucker-had-to-ask-me/
4:13 pm
Eo - it isn't obvious. the language you use is the same language I am afraid I will hear from my peers if I tell them what happened to me.
4:15 pm
honestly, i don't know why i replied, ignoring you is basically the best course of action for everyone on this blog if there is any hope of having an actual conversation ever again.
4:38 pm
Gita
No I differentiate between rape and drunken sex that is later regretted... other here seem to have difficulty seperating the two concepts.
4:47 pm
No, YOU have trouble understanding that all "drunken sex" is NOT consensual. You seem to want to say that any time alcohol is present, that constitutes consent, and that is just blatantly NOT TRUE.
People have repeatedly told you that there is such as thing as "too drunk to consent" and you just keep saying "just because she regrets it later doesn't mean she doesn't consent" when that doesn't actually address the points made at all.
Have fun with your feminist conspiracy theories.
4:47 pm
I guess there's a lot of animosity against EO, but I think on a general level the point is well taken. Even Amanda's analysis seems to say so too.
"First of all, until a reliable study is undertaken to directly answer this question, it is scientifically unsound to compare studies that employ different methods, definitions, and standards in determining the prevalence of rape in different communities"
Well yeah of course, but that does not mean that currently the unreliable data does not indicate the possibility of prison rape being on par with rape in society at large.
Also, its also important to note that statistics about rape in society generally are unfortunately and remarkably unreliable as well. The problem, among several other issues, is that the number varies depending on the assumption of a specific non-report rate.
In the case of college rape (where I know the stats pretty well), major show that rape or attempted rape occurs at rates of .4%, 3%, 12%, and 25%. That's a pretty wide window for a really reliable statistic.
"Second, these comparisons are often employed solely to derail conversations about addressing the problem of rape. "
I guess it really depends on the circumstance with this one. In some cases (which might be the case for EO which is causing so much animosity) these sorts of remarks come off as distracting from the point that we need to combat rape.
On the other hand though, it might also bring attention that no matter how you cut the statistics, prison rape if not half of what constitutes rape in American as EO asserts, it certainly is an enormous part of the problem and gets dramatically less attention than other forms of rape.
The criticism in this case is one of attention and focus, not of claiming that rape in society generally is not bad. The valid criticism in my mind is that if we see efforts against rape as finite, then the disproportional lack of efforts against prison rape represents a failure of anti-rape groups such as feminists.
It's at best difficult and possibly impossible to try to rate different forms of injustice against one another, but on some level we should use the best statistics we have to do so. If for example, prison rape constituted .1% of all rape and college campus's experienced 99.99% of all rape, then this would indicate where anti-rape resource should be prioritized. Unfortunately, its not as clear as that.
6:29 pm
Comparing statistics about the prevalence of rape in different communities ignores the fact that rapes are happening, even one is too many, and all rapists need to be stopped.
I agree. Unfortunately, your post is the pot calling the kettle black.
In an ideal world we should be able to acknowledge, discuss, and address all forms of sexual violence without any essentialism, politics, or personal attacks. We should be able introduce similar experiences or issues without any name-calling or jostling for position. Unfortunately, I doubt that will ever happen considering no one even manage to do that on this thread.
7:20 pm
Toysoldier, I suppose "disingenuous feminist pity" isn't a personal attack? I suppose "It just seems more prudent and important to focus on diseases that impact men more" isn't jostling for position? I suppose "Plenty of people engage in sexual activities while intoxicated and later regret doing so or were too drunk to remember what occurred and therefore assume the sex was not consensual" isn't hindering acknowledging, discussing, and addressing all forms of sexual violence?
And now you're sooo surprised that people don't take you seriously on this blog?
You are a fucking hypocrite. Stuff it.
11:26 pm
[...]"a genuine rape, such as yours."
I can't speak for gita, but as for me, nothing gets under my skin more than when someone, for whatever reason, deems my rape "real," and then says that this should make me even MORE incensed by those silly feminists, trying to call everything rape just because of the PALTRY matter of non-consent.
The logic is as follows: I am a rape victim, therefore I feel a certain kinship with other rape victims, and hate seeing others' trauma belittled. NOT I am a rape victim, therefore other rape victims should just stop stealing my thunder already!
6:22 am
Melissa
You dont suffer at all if there is a clear difference between rape victims and people who decide to have sex and then for some reason say its was rape because under the new fraudulant definitions.
To most people quite simple, rape is rape, chosing to have sex and later crying wolf is not rape.
To feminists on campus its all rape and id people disagree they are "rape apologists".
The sane majority disagree with deliberatly criminalising normal sexual behaviour, ie. people partying together and deciding together that they are going to have sex.
7:46 am
For the THOUSANDTH time, of course choosing to have sex and regretting it later is not rape. Good luck finding a single feminist who thinks it is. You've been frequenting this feminist website for weeks now, maybe you should actually...I don't know...read it. Read what Hess has to say. Read our comments. There is not one single reference to the concept that "choosing to have sex and later regretting it" is rape.
8:09 am
rebekah
"EO, feminists accept all types of rape, and accept that they are all bad. Why can’t you accept that? Why do you have to blame the ONLY group of people who try and stop a culture that says that men CANNOT be raped. That isn’t an idea that feminists push, it’s an idea that the culture surrounding rape pushes".
I disagree with you there, feminism did a 40 year white-wash on domestic violence/IPV, the world was lead to believe that women couldnt be abuse their partners and there was and still is a deliberate effort to do that despite the fact that all independent research shows that women are equally if not more likely to abuse their partner.
There is a similar situation with female pedophiles and their victims, same goes for female child abuse and infantacide.
And there is a similar situation with rape in that the public are lead to believe that this is something that happens to women at the hands of men.
Feminism will accept politically correct rape, that is rape carried out by a man, feminism will suppress rape carried out by women, and false accusations of rape carried out by women while at the same time exagerating the number of victimisations of women.
In order to tackle abuse society needs to see it for what it actually is, a people problem. Heres one good example of the logic behind an inclusive approach to abuse - if we recognise female child abuse there will be fewer adults with misplaced anger directed at women. ie fewer rapes of women.
When society recognises abuse as a people problem and rejects groups that use it to stereotype an enemy group in society, resources can be used to fix the problem itself. At present the resources all go to mainly white, privilaged women on campus, who are according to Hoff Sommers research, one of the safest groups.
Look to see how the idea of an inclusive approach is beat down here. The majority of the feminists here will only accept politically correct abuse and will supress information that contradicts their POV.
8:43 am
Im not supposed to double post but I did'nt see your responce Melissa
"For the THOUSANDTH time, of course choosing to have sex and regretting it later is not rape. Good luck finding a single feminist who thinks it is. You’ve been frequenting this feminist website for weeks now, maybe you should actually…I don’t know…read it. Read what Hess has to say. Read our comments. There is not one single reference to the concept that “choosing to have sex and later regretting it” is rape".
There is a recurring assertion here on this site,, a consent is viod is a woman is drunk, I was framed as being a rapists here only the other day for talking about drinking and having sex with a willing partner, thats how figures like 1 in 4 are created, by counting a drunken concent as a rape, when Hoff Sommers excluded all the drunked concents that the women interviewed did not consider to be rape themselves the number became 1 in 26.
In order for feminism to maintain the illusion of there being a rape epidemic,consent that is later regretted has to be classified as rape and if that happened the campus rape industry would collapse.
9:23 am
The following is a direct quote from the very thread you're complaining about (from LeftSidePositive):
"Eo, if your partner actually did consent beforehand, when she was sober, or was cognizant enough to make sound decisions (technically over a 0.08% BAC, but still in command of her faculties), then no one is claiming that would be rape. Your partner wouldn’t state later that she was 'made to have sexual intercourse when [she] didn’t want to because of alcohol or drugs.'"
In case you didn't know, that wording of "made to have sexual intercourse when you didn't want to because of alcohol or drugs" is the wording from Koss' study. That wording clearly describes something other than "choosing to have sex and regretting it later," or "counting drunken concent [sic] as rape."
Does someone MAKING someone else have sex the second person DOES NOT WANT sound like not-rape to you? Really, honestly?
We said repeatedly in that thread that, if your drunken partner is truly consenting--that is, she is still in control of her faculties, and she tells you she wants to have sex with you--then that's fine. No feminist is going to accuse you of rape. And more importantly, your partner is not going to accuse you of rape. What reason would she have to do so, if she consented to it? Because it sounds just SO MUCH MORE CONVENIENT to submit to an invasive physical exam, be treated like a lying slut by the police, publicly shunned, and then, if she's lucky, have the opportunity to have her entire sexual history aired out to a jury? Her diary read aloud in a courtroom? Every misstep she's ever taken be used against her? Sounds like an awful lot to go through just for regretted drunken sex, don't you think?
As for the people in Koss' study who didn't consider what happened to them "rape," that's NO INDICATION that it actually wasn't rape. Koss' study described the event, not the words the victims attached to the event at the time. A lot (and I really mean A LOT) of rape victims live in denial for a very long time. The idea of admitting that what happened to them is rape is just too terrible, too traumatic, to deal with. So they pretend it didn't happen. They make excuses. Or sometimes it isn't even fully their choice. Sometimes they're told so many times that "if you knew the guy/if you were married to him/if you were drinking/if you flirted then it wasn't really rape" that they internalize it and even begin to believe it. For example, this is a public thread with dozens (probably over a hundred by now) of rape survivors talking about how long they were in denial, how long they didn't call it rape, and what would have been different if they had.
http://pandys.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=2964&st=0
It is very real.
You're big on not applying after-the-fact standards to whether or not sex was consensual (and I agree). For example, if she regrets sex after the fact, that doesn't make it rape.
Similarly, if she decides after the fact that she simply cannot handle the fact that she has been raped and prefers to live in denial, that doesn't retroactively make it not rape. She cannot retroactively apply consent to a situation wherein there was none.
10:28 am
Melissa
Koss's research is political activism. She set out to get a certain result, when she didnt yeild the result she was looking for she reworded it and tried again, in other words, its not good research.
And the language she used, if a drink is bought or a joint shared, its described as "administering an intoxicant". She blurs the lines between partying together and spiking.
Hoff Sommers found that once the people who didnt feel that they hand been raped and continued dating and the people who regretted the sex after they chose to have it had it were filtered out the number became 1 in 26.
By bluring the edges between predatory rape, consensual sex thats regretted and consensual sex while drunk the numbers are artifically inflated.
And in the minds of most here, those lines dont exist.
Whats more if we are going to use Koss's definitions and the popular definitions here... there will be gender parity in rapes as if both parties are drunk, both parties are rapists and victims. If both parties regret the sex and only had it because they were drunk, both are rapists and victims.
Koff worked for and was commisioned by NOW, who to this day, just go to their site, tell blatent lies and propagandise about domestic violence and many other things.
This sort of convoluted political activism and fundrasing masquarading as "research" and helpful should be dismissed.
10:39 am
You can't filter out the people who continued dating their rapists after the event as if that automatically means it wasn't rape. A lot of very real victims of very real rapes continue dating (or stay married to) their rapists.
10:47 am
As for your description of "the language she used," perhaps you should read the study for yourself. Every type of encounter she described on the survey she handed out very clearly describes rape. Not regret, not drunken consent, but rape. And we've already said that there is a big difference between drunken consent and rape. We've said it a lot of times.
"She blurs the lines between partying together and spiking."
She wasn't studying the prevalence of spiking. She was studying the prevalence of rape. Which can happen in both "partying together" and spiking situations.
And again, with the "filtering out" thing. You can "filter out" rape accusers based on one thing only: consent. NOT whether or not they call it rape, NOT whether or not they were drunk, NOT whether or not they slept with their attacker again...consent.
"By bluring the edges between predatory rape, consensual sex thats regretted and consensual sex while drunk the numbers are artifically inflated."
Ah, but if you actually read the Koss study, you will find that it doesn't blur any of those lines. It describes situations where people are forced to have sex they don't want. In other words, rape. Not regret.
"And in the minds of most here, those lines dont exist."
Those lines absolutely do exist, as we've said about a billion times already. The knowledge that those lines exist is, in fact, what informs our determination to stand up for those victims who were not taken seriously because they were drunk, or a sex worker, or [insert-excuse-here]. The thing that differentiates regretted sex and drunk consensual sex from rape is...AGAIN...consent.
"Whats more if we are going to use Koss’s definitions and the popular definitions here… there will be gender parity in rapes as if both parties are drunk, both parties are rapists and victims. If both parties regret the sex and only had it because they were drunk, both are rapists and victims."
But it isn't the drunkenness itself that defines the rape. It is the non-consent. So it's pretty simple. The non-consenting party, male or female, is the victim. The party who forces the non-consenting party into intercourse is the rapist. Amazing how that works, huh?
11:56 am
Ok well Melissa, the one in four figure cant survive without the inclusion of people that didnt consider themselves to have been raped but were considered raped by Koss's definitions.
So you are occelating between the reasonable POV - That drunk doesnt automatically mean rape and sex thats regretted doesnt atomatically mean rape and backing a politically motivated and skewed study that presumes that drunk does mean rape and that drunk sex thats regretted also means rape.
Ive read Hoff Sommes debunking of the study.
2:14 pm
"Ok well Melissa, the one in four figure cant survive without the inclusion of people that didnt consider themselves to have been raped but were considered raped by Koss’s definitions."
That's true. But why on earth would you want to not include rape victims who do not (yet) consider themselves rape victims? The study doesn't purport to identify what percent of women identify as rape victims, but rather what percent of women ARE rape victims.
Again, a LOT of rape victims (I would venture to guess the majority) can't bring themselves to use the "R" word for a period of time. For some, it's only a few weeks or months, but for others it takes years, or even decades. Self-identification as rape victims isn't an accurate measure.
"backing a politically motivated and skewed study that presumes that drunk does mean rape and that drunk sex thats regretted also means rape."
I like that you're still claiming Koss' study "presumes that drunk does mean rape and that drunk sex thats [sic] regretted also means rape" even while admitting that you haven't even read it. I'm kinda LOLing about that. According to the survey administered in Koss' study, neither drunk consensual sex nor regretted sex counted as rape. Only non-consensual sex did. But why would you listen to me this time? I've told you that several times already.
2:44 pm
Putting aside the contraversial definitions of the Koss study, it only considers hetereosexual women. Where the same questions asked to members of other groups the story would show symmetry.
Heres a little bit on how feminist studies hide gender symmetry in personal violence studies. Because of this dishonesty you have a 1.25 billion dollar domestic violence idustry that discriminates against everyone except hetereosexual women.
http://pubpages.unh.edu/~mas2/V74-gender-symmetry-with-gramham-Kevan-Method%208-.pdf
And we have the same situation happening with rape.
2:55 pm
Wow. Your point about heteronormativity is actually quite valid and good. I'm impressed.
However, it does nothing to help your argument that statistics about the rape of women are trumped up. Yes, Koss' study only acknowledged rapes in which the rapist was a man. Once you include rapes perpetrated by women against other women, then the number gets higher, not lower. AND the study didn't include transwomen, who are among the most at-risk of ALL women for rape. So then the numbers go up even more.
As for comparative statistics about the gender of rape victims, that's not what we're talking about here. In fact, that's what the article explicitly said is NOT important, so long as we continue fighting against rape in ALL situations. I'm not interested in some sort of "competition" about whether men or women get raped more. That's pointless, and frankly horrifying.
4:20 pm
Brava, Melissa!!
p.s. the "competition" about who gets raped more can easily be summed up as follows: "but men get raped in prison so why should I have to make child support payments?"
4:33 pm
Melisa
Id rather you didnt try to patronise me.
I dont have to make much of an arguement about campus rapes being trumped up. In the studies that show it as being an epidemic most of the women didnt consider themselves to have been victimised. Reliable studies dont count non rape victims as rape victims. The help lines rarely ring, all international studies on drink spiking have shown up little or nothing bar what the person admitted to talking.
Campus rape hysteria and rape culture seems to be more paranoic religion based on Koss et als work, a self help group for genuine victims, among other things.
Your point about the competition is a good one. What people like me are beginning to say to feminists is this..
stop lying about rape and domestic violence, it affects all groups not just women and not disproportionatly women.
I like the way female victimhood is waved around and used to profit and stereotype other groups as abusers and as soon as other groups are advocated for all of a sudden its "not a comptetion"
Setting up domestic violence and rape industries that discriminate against all other groups bar hetereosexual women, pretending that abuse is gendered, artifically inflating figures and using sex crimes to spread hate and fear is what makes it a competition, unfortunatly.
4:55 pm
Eo, we've already trashed the "but they didn't SAAAAAAAYYYYYY they were raped!!!!" argument on this blog numerous times, so trust me, no one is going to be convinced by that tired-out, easily disprovable nonsense. Melissa has already done an admirable job disproving it to you, and your repeating the same dreck over and over again (interspersed with bizarre claims about history, politics, race, justice, and everything in between) just shows that you are a batshit crazy asshole who hates women and hates any attention paid to our grievances.
5:03 pm
the only group that I accuse of rapists, are rapists. I've been reading this blog for over a month, and more and more what the majority of comments state make sense to me. I am a woman. I am a survivor. I do not believe that all men are rapists, but I do believe that all rapists are rapists. I believe that rapists commit the act of rape. I do not believe that women are the only victims. I do believe that victims of rape do not get enough help before, during, and after the rape, and that the majority of them (man or woman) are blamed for the crime committed against them.
I wanted to come here and state my point of view, because I feel that certain people on here are accusing me of things that I don't believe.
Thanks for the space to speak for myself.
5:05 pm
What a good argument LSD, I realise my mistake - just because 79% of the 1 in 4 when apporached a decade or so later said that they werent raped doesnt mean that they werent raped.
5:27 pm
Are you honestly trying to claim that people who are raped always use that word? Do you honestly believe that all rape victims identify as such?
6:06 pm
"Are you honestly trying to claim that people who are raped always use that word? Do you honestly believe that all rape victims identify as such?"
Nope of course not, thats just a strawman you have set up in the absence of logical arguement. Thats what LSD does, leave her to it and keep your head on your shoulders.
How about I reverse your question so it makes sense?
Are you honestly trying to claim that 79% if the people that made up the 1 in 4 stat. dont believe that they have been victimised when they really had?
The only way 1 in 4 can exist is by making not rapes out to be rapes. You saw LSD using the Koss method on me on another thread when she framed myself and tasha to be a rapist and rape victim when no victimisation whatsoever had gone on.
The studies that dont include people that dont feel that they were victimised as rape victims are more reliable than the ones that do. That shouldnt be difficult to get across.
The fact that the phones rarely ring in the campus rape help lines should be another indicator that the Koss story fiction. 1 in 4 is a factoid, not a fact.
oops I got that 70% stat wrong.
"Koss’s study had serious flaws. Her survey instrument was highly ambiguous, as University of California at Berkeley social-welfare professor Neil Gilbert has pointed out. But the most powerful refutation of Koss’s research came from her own subjects: 73 percent of the women whom she characterized as rape victims said that they hadn’t been raped. Further—though it is inconceivable that a raped woman would voluntarily have sex again with the fiend who attacked her—42 percent of Koss’s supposed victims had intercourse again with their alleged assailants."
http://www.city-journal.org/2008/18_1_campus_rape.html
8:17 pm
"Are you honestly trying to claim that 79% if the people that made up the 1 in 4 stat. dont believe that they have been victimised when they really had?"
Absolutely.
It's not so much that they "don't believe they've been victimized" as that they're in (possibly temporary) denial. People will go to extreme lengths to attempt to prove to themselves that it wasn't really rape. I know someone who was so desperate to prove to herself that she had "wanted it" that she just started sleeping with every man that asked. Eventually, she ended up in five (yes, five) simultaneous sexual relationships. A year or so later, when she finally admitted that the first encounter had been rape, she felt a lot more at peace.
This is not a rare story. It's just the story of the particular person I know best.
"You saw LSD using the Koss method on me on another thread when she framed myself and tasha to be a rapist and rape victim when no victimisation whatsoever had gone on."
She did no such thing. Quit making shit up. She was talking about the often coercive nature of rapes involving alcohol, and you and "Tash" came back talking about all the awesome consensual sex you have while you also just HAPPEN to be drunk. Which is, of course, not AT ALL what LeftSidePositive was talking about. If you and Tash both consent to the sex, actively, in (somewhat) sound mind, and continuously, then OF COURSE it's not rape. She never once claimed it was.
"The studies that dont include people that dont feel that they were victimised as rape victims are more reliable than the ones that do. That shouldnt be difficult to get across."
But it just isn't true.
Say 100 people take a survey. While they're out, taking the survey, 10 of their houses get robbed. They've been robbed, but they won't know about it until they get home. Which study would give a better estimate of how many of them were victims of burglary--the one that asks them if they have? (All 100 say no.) Or the one that GOES to the houses, and sees whether or not a burglary has occurred? (Yielding an accurate 10%) It's not a perfect analogy of course; rape really can't be compared to any other crime. But it gets the idea across. Just because someone doesn't KNOW they've been the victim of a crime yet doesn't mean they HAVEN'T been the victim of a crime. The crime itself exists with or without their knowledge.
"Further—though it is inconceivable that a raped woman would voluntarily have sex again with the fiend who attacked her—42 percent of Koss’s supposed victims had intercourse again with their alleged assailants."
It is anything but "inconceivable" that a raped woman would voluntarily have sex with her attacker again. It happens ALL THE TIME. Again, the fact that she has sex with him after the fact does not retroactively change the fact that she didn't consent to the rape. (Although, in many cases, including my friend's, that was the exact reason WHY she had sex with her attacker again. In the first day or so after it happened, she was so panicked at the idea of having been raped that she thought "well, if I just have sex with him again then it won't have been rape!") Also, many rape victims are married to their attackers. Many are in relationships with their attackers. Some are so in shock that their attacker comes back and assaults them a second or third time. Some are either children or in abusive relationships, and their rapists continue abusing them in the long term--they are unable to leave and unable to tell. There are a myriad of reasons why rape victims could (and do) have intercourse with their rapists again.
8:25 pm
Joliska, thanks for sharing and welcome to the blog! You'll find that most of us here are quite informative and thoughtful, but then there's always one or two misogynists, but we try to keep them at bay!
Eo, rape apologists just love to trot out that tired argument about the Koss study. All you're doing is refusing to believe any interpersonal victimization that doesn't fit in your myths about what "real rape" looks like. Since the argument is so far from new, I'll just copy & paste what we all said to the last numbskull who thought that critique passed for intelligent:
LeftSidePositive
February 28th 2010
9:11pm
We have heard OVER and OVER again on these boards about how difficult it is for rape victims to come to terms with the word “rape.” Posters here have been brave enough to share their very personal stories about what happened to them and why it’s so hard to admit to oneself that one has been raped. NONE of these people deny that they were forced to have sex against their will, they had just been brainwashed and pressured by society (e.g. Whoopi Goldberg’s “not rape-rape”) that they don’t deserve to call what happened to them rape. It DOES NOT MEAN that they are okay with what happened, and often these incidents lead to some very, very broken lives.
Here are some examples:
petpluto
January 14th, 2010
7:29am
I think the Amy Dickinson issue a month or so ago really highlights the guilt-response quotient of girls and women reacting to their rape.
And then it isn’t one lone persona on the internet, who may or may not be connected to one person elsewhere in the Real World that makes the difference. It is the popular conception that you “have to” (or should) fight back, that if you don’t look like a rape victim, then maybe you just had sex you didn’t consent to. It is the Whoopi Goldberg’s difference between rape-rape, and just rape.
It is the friends who say things like, “I don’t think of that as _____”, whether it be sexual assault or rape. It is things like this jungle analogy, it is things like writing in to an advice columnist and having her tell you right off the bat that you are a victim of your own poor judgement. It is a culture that looks at you like you’re now somehow dirtied, or a lying liar who lies.
And all that culminates in women perhaps not being able to label what happened to them as rape.
Toysoldier
January 14th, 2010
11:34 am
Sexual violence does not necessarily work in black and white terms. A person (female or male) can experience what qualifies legally as rape and yet attempt to write it off. The person could go for years thinking nothing of it, believing that the act had no real impact. However, if one were to look at that person’s life, one would likely find a host of failed relationships, difficulty with trusting people, various social interaction issues, drug abuse, sex addiction, co-dependency, etc. A person does not have to call the act “rape” in order for the act to have an impact. A person does not even have to acknowledge the act had an impact for it to actually harm the person’s life.
Melissa
January 14th, 2010
10:49 am
John, yes of course I know that a lot of the women in the study (and a lot of women in the world) don’t necessarily call their experiences rape, even if they were. This is not me underestimating women or taking away their ability to define their own experiences–indeed, for a lot of people, not using the word “rape” can be a coping skill. Sometimes the thought of having been raped is simply too horrible to deal with, and some recovery (this period can take days, months, years, or forever) is necessary before a person can even handle using that word. The fact is, there are a lot of people (really, A LOT of people) who take many years to actually be able to use the “R” word to describe their experiences, even when it is the only valid and accurate descriptor.
For example, I know a man who was raped by a woman. He was extremely drunk and only half conscious, and she had sex with him anyway. Having sex with someone who isn’t fully conscious is rape, full stop. There can be no arguing that point. However, when he told me about it, his exact words, after describing the incident were “I don’t know if it was rape, but…yeah.” To any outside observer…of course it’s rape. But you can’t begin to understand the emotions that go into defining an experience as such.
As for me, during my rape I certainly knew what it was. I was in shock…all I could think was that I couldn’t believe that this person who I’d trusted was raping me. By later that night, I’d convinced myself not to say anything, for fear of making him mad. By the next day, I’d convinced myself it wasn’t THAT big of a deal…(after all, it’s not like he was a stranger jumping out of the bushes with a knife, he was someone whose apartment I’d entered on my own free will.) By a week later, I’d convinced myself it wasn’t rape. And by a week after that, I’d blocked out the memory that I had ever considered it rape. It wasn’t until over a year later that it all came rushing back one day. I think I subconsciously knew when I was ready to handle the events of that day in full force. But I was a rape victim for a year and a half without calling myself one. Those are just two stories. There are millions. There are millions of situations, and millions of reasons why a rape victim might not use that word. That doesn’t, however, change the reality of what happened.
Wren
January 14th, 2010
2:27 pm
I was raped and no it was not a “traditional” rape. A trusted friend raped me while I was passed out in my own bedroom. We lived in the same house, but were never intimately involved, we were just friends. I played the self blame game for a long time – I was drunk, I should have locked my bedroom door, I should have fought or screamed, etc. I also didn’t know what to call it for a long time – after all he was my friend, it occurred in the safety of my own room, he didn’t have a knife, and I didn’t fight. But in spite of that, it was RAPE. He entered my room without my consent, he used my body without my consent, and just because I was so drunk and terrified that I was unable to fight or scream, doesn’t mean that I consented to it or wanted it.
[…]
It is exactly because of people like you that women often do not know what to call what happened to them. They can’t match their experience up to your definiton of “traditional” rape. There is also the issue that for many women, saying it was makes it all real, it makes it a lot harder to run away and hide from the horrible truth. Healing from rape is a long hard process, and for many people the first step on the path to healing is in fact denial and minimization. If you tell yourself it didn’t happen or it wasn’t that bad or it wasn’t really rape, then you think you don’t have to deal with the after effects. After all, if nothing happened, then there is nothing to heal from, right? It’s when the aftermath of rape becomes so bad – the inexplainable depression, or the fear of sexual touch, or the nightmares and flashbacks- that many women have to be truthful with themselves and acknowledge it for what it is.
I have talked to many other survivors who describe horrible rapes, even what you label “traditional” rape, who refuse to use the word “rape”. They cannot bring themselves to say it. Are you telling me that they are stupid or not socially aware or that it didn’t happen? Just because a survivor doesn’t know how to name their experience, or can’t emotionally bring themselves to the point where they can acknowledge it was rape, doesn’t change the fact that they were indeed raped. The facts are simple: PENTRATION WITHOUT CONSENT IS RAPE.
Chris
February 25th, 2010
2:39 am
If an experience is traumatic enough, someone may not realize it immediately. I have not been raped, but I am dealing with PTSD following my service in Iraq. When I returned home, I felt fine, and I seemed like a normal 22 year old guy. A year later, I began having nightmares and recalling repressed memories. I began abusing drugs and alcohol, and watched my life fall apart around me for the next four years, the entire time denying that I was affected by my experiences.
It wasn’t until someone very close to me, herself a victim of “traditional rape,” sat me down, and shared with me the exact same feelings that I was having that I realized that I had PTSD. The thing is, her experiences seem so much more traumatizing than mine.
My point is that you cannot begin to imagine how something that might not appear traumatizing to you can be traumatizing. I hope that you never have to experience something that is so horrible, but don’t minimize something that happens based on how someone perceives it or appears to perceive it in the immediate aftermath.
And, as for again sleeping with the person who raped them:
LeftSidePositive
January 14th, 2010
1:05pm
as to why women may have had sex with these men later, there are all sorts of reasons–feeling worthless, social pressure, denial, trying to convince oneself that it’s “ok,” a history of past abuse and lack of a model for healthy relationships. None of these in any way mitigate the fact that if a person has sex where coercion is present or implied, or does not consent, then the act is RAPE.
Melissa
January 14th, 2010
1:25pm
Having sex with the perpetrator again has nothing to do with whether or not rape occurred, and whether or not trauma resulted from that rape.
1. Many rape victims are raped repeatedly by the same man. They’re afraid to come forward, and they’re told by people like you that their experiences weren’t rape. They’re scared, beaten down, and easy victims–especially since the man who raped them already has such power over them.
2. Many rape victims are in a relationship with or married to their rapist. Even if one partner rapes the other one sometimes, there are bound to also be some (relatively) consensual acts in there too. (I say “relatively consensual” because once someone has established that degree of power over you, it’s extremely difficult to even know which way is up. There are times with rape victims when the line between consent and submission becomes so blurred as to become indistinguishable, at least in the mind of that victim.)
3. Heck, even without a relationship, that same “relatively consensual” sex happens. Once you’ve been raped, you’ve been shown your place in the hierarchy of the world. You do what you have to do.
4. Denial. Some rape victims choose to have sex with their attacker after the fact in order to prove to themselves that the initial encounter WASN’T actually rape…not because they actually believe it, but because they want to believe it.
11:22 am
I would just add that victims of crimes other than rape sometimes also refuse to label what happened to them a crime. It's quite common in the white-collar fraud arena, actually--someone who has had money stolen by a fraudster will insist that he or she is not a victim--sometimes because they are embarrassed to admit that they were taken in by a con man, sometimes because they believe that the con man is really their friend and would never cheat them. The law doesn't care how those people feel about what happened to them--if someone obtains money using fraud, it's a crime, whether or not the victim calls it fraud.
The analogy is particularly apt, since many rapes are committed by serial rapists, who choose victims based on perceived vulnerabilities and use various techniques to lull their victims into a false sense of security or cloud their judgment, so that they can be isolated and taken advantage of. Alcohol is one of these tools, but it's not the only one--they also use charm and flirtation, so that their actions can look a lot like a guy and a girl flirting at a party, but the motivation is different.
For many of these guys, they set out at the beginning of the night planning to have sex. If it's consensual, fine, but lack of consent isn't going to stop them. For them, sex is about status and power, and the woman's consent is irrelevant.
The victim may be understandably confused--the guy was so nice and charming and popular, I thought he really liked me, I did agree to go to his room, I was attracted to him--and have a hard time calling what happened to her rape.
8:56 am
Ok Melissa.
You belong to whats basically a religion thats based around a politically motivated and skewed study that makes false reports of rape. The fact that the "victims" didnt feel victimised or the fact the campus emergency rape telephone line rarely rings is not enough for you to question your belief system. This is called putting ideology before evidence.
There is little point in us having a debate if I'm expecting rational debate and all Im getting back is blind faith. I might as well go preach evolution to creationists.
10:08 am
Eo, please, read the last three posts.
When you do, you won't be able to make ridiculous claims about us having a lack of evidence anymore.
10:12 am
And speaking of putting ideology over evidence, what does it say about you that you continue to argue without even bothering to read our counterarguments?
1:39 pm
Melissa
Im well aware that according to the Koss definitions of rape that those people were raped.
LSD framed myself and tasha as rapist and victim and according to the Koss definition she is correct, we are both, according to the Koff definitions our own serial rapists and victims even though neither of us feel that we were victimised or damaged and we are in a healthy fun relationship... which is great for people who want to artifically inflate male on female rape figures, but its not so great for the innocent men who are being stereotyped as rapists or the other victims that are buried beneath inflated male on female rape figures.
So, is that clear? I understand perfectly how according to Koss that these subjects, myself and tasha are rape victims..... the point is that none of us agree that we are.
The Koss study and campus rape culture is violent anti-male propaganda which seeks to stereotype all or most men men with a minority of rapists.
2:11 pm
"LSD framed myself and tasha as rapist and victim"
Stop saying things that aren't true. Any literate person can read the thread for him/herself and see that that simply isn't the case.
"we are both, according to the Koff definitions our own serial rapists and victims "
Again, absolutely not true. According to the Koss definition, in order to be rape, one of you would have to have not wanted the sex, and the other person would have had to've forced the non-consenting party. Yes, alcohol can be involved IF the element of force used by the rapist is the fact that the victim is incapacitated by alcohol and physically unable to fight back. If this is not the case with you and Tash, then you obviously would not fall under Koss' definition of rape.
AGAIN, you should probably read things before you attempt to debunk them. Otherwise, you come off looking very silly. You could keep coming back here and wasting your time arguing about this, OR you could take 2-3 minutes to actually read the questions on the Koss survey. This will be all the evidence you need to know that what you do with Tash is NOT rape, as long as you both want it and both consent to it.
2:58 pm
Look melissa.
This is the question that drew in the most rape victims.
"Have you given in to sex play (fondling, kissing, or petting, but not intercourse) when you didn't want to because you were overwhelmed by a man's continual arguments and pressure?"
To this question, 53.7 percent responded affirmatively, and they were counted as having been sexually victimized.
Most people that have been in a relationship accomadate their partner when they are not in mood, people of all genders and sexualities are sexually assertive and like the other questions, its a question that many men and lesbians would also answer in the affirmitive.
Feminist "research" loads the results by only asking women the questions and then it presents the results in a vacume.
And these factoids then become "official" and when they are nothing but inaccurate memes.
If you want to talk about rape stats. you need to be looking at non politically motivated, non polemic, independent studies on both sexes and all sexualities victimisation.. once you do that you wont have a gynocentric and prejudiced view on the subject.
3:23 pm
Sorry about the double post...
Melissa
Here are some resources on abuse factoids and myths.
Factoid - According to Government estimates, approximately
987,400 rapes occur annually in the US.
Truth - This statement was made in HR 739. The actual number of rapes reported by the FBI is 90,427, one-tenth the number claimed in the bill.54
Myth - One in four women has been a victim of rape or attempted rape.
Truth - This claim by Mary Koss has been criticized on many grounds. For example, only 27% of women classified by
the researchers as rape victims actually viewed
themselves as victims of rape, and 42% of the putative
victims later had sex with their “attackers.”
Myth - Since 2001, rapes have actually increased by 4
percent.
Truth - This claim was made in HR 739. The FBI reports that female rapes have fallen dramatically since the 1970s.From 2001 to 2005 the rate of rapes continued to decline (0.6/1,000 women in 2001 to 0.5/1,000 women in
2005).56
Factoid - 89 percent of rapes are perpetrated against female victims.
Truth - This claim from HR 739 ignores the problem of male
rape in prisons. A Human Rights Watch report cites a
study that found 140,000 male inmates are raped each
year in the United States, a number that is higher than
the FBI report of female rapes.
Factoid - Almost 50 percent of sexual assault survivors lose their jobs or are forced to quit in
the aftermath of the assaults.
Truth - This statistic from HR 739 is an incidental finding from a non-representative sample of 27 women in the Atlanta,GA area.58 This figure has never been replicated.
Factoid - One in four teenage girls has been in a relationship in which she was pressured into
performing sexual acts by her
partner.
Truth - This claim was made in HR 590. The actual percentages are 11.9% of teenage girls and 6.1% of teenage boys.
http://www.mediaradar.org/docs/RADARreport-50-DV-Myths.pdf
There is a good paper on how feminist studies skew the results further up the thread.
Look Melissa, you are going to take feminist information as the "gospel truth" and you will argue that it is in the blind faith... so there is no point in this, your mind is already closed to information that doest conform to the ideology.
11:16 pm
You say this:
“Have you given in to sex play (fondling, kissing, or petting, but not intercourse) when you didn’t want to because you were overwhelmed by a man’s continual arguments and pressure?”
And this:
"Most people that have been in a relationship accomadate their partner when they are not in mood"
...as though they refer to the same thing. They do not.
Do a lot of people in relationships pretend to be in the mood for the sake of their partner every once in a while? Sure. They do it voluntarily, out of love/respect for their partner. Because they like seeing their partner happy, and like giving their partner pleasure. This is not even CLOSE to finally giving in because your partner won't stop coercing you until you obey.
"Hm, he's in the mood but I'm not. I think I'll "take one for the team" tonight, because I'm pretty sure he did the same for me last week" =/= "God, I don't know how to get out of this. He drove me here, I don't have a car, I don't have a way to get away from him, he looks really scary AND he says he'll dump me if I don't!"
That you find it so difficult to see the HUGE difference between being "overwhelmed by a man's pressure" and "accommodating your partner in a relationship" is astounding.
"If you want to talk about rape stats. you need to be looking at non politically motivated, non polemic, independent studies on both sexes and all sexualities victimisatio"
Fine. Then you'd better stop looking at MRA sites.
Myth/truth #1: the first number claims only to be an "estimate." The second number refers to the number of FBI reports. Since I'm sure even you would agree that a lot of rapes do NOT get reported to the authorities, then there is absolutely no reason why those two numbers would be the same. Anyone who sees the second stat as debunking the first needs to check his/her reading comprehension skills.
Myth/truth #2: We've already debunked this extensively.
Myth/truth #3: Who cares? Your truth may be true. If rapes have indeed declined in the last 10 years, that's great, but what are you trying to say? That that's enough? That the number of rapes has decreased a little bit, therefore feminists shouldn't worry about it anymore? I'm not really sure what you're trying to prove with this.
Myth/truth #4: OMG read the article that started this whole discussion.
Myth/truth #5: I agree that that isn't anywhere near a sufficient sample size. However, statistics aside, don't you think that people being fired from/having to quit jobs because of rape/sexual assault is something that...you know...shouldn't happen? Whether it's 50% of victims or only 5%, we should still strive to punish the rapists rather than the victims. (Anecdotally, I had to quit a job after a sexual assault. I worked at an overnight job where I had to spend the whole night alone with one other coworker. This was fine for almost a year, when one night a coworker held me down and felt my breasts, even as I tried desperately to escape. After that I was too afraid to ever work with him again, and too afraid to report what had happened to the police. My only choice was to quit.)
Myth/truth #6: Again...and you think this isn't a bad thing? Even if your statistics are true, they're still pretty damn horrifying. I mean, what do you expect people to say? "Only 12 percent of girls and 6 percent of boys, well THAT'S no big deal!"
10:19 am
Melissa.
I said
“If you want to talk about rape stats. you need to be looking at non politically motivated, non polemic, independent studies on both sexes and all sexualities victimisation”
You said
"Fine. Then you’d better stop looking at MRA sites".
MRA site DO cite non politically motivated, non polemic, independent studies on both sexes and all sexualities victimisation, there is an agenda to diseminate and protect against feminist abuse propaganda using independent, non polmic studies but no agenda to produce actual false research.
If feminist sources were quoting the non politically motivated, non polemic, independent studies on both sexes and all sexualities victimisation instead of the skewed polemic studies that they do this argument wouldnt be happening, because we'd be in agreement.
Once a group starts using alledged sex crimes to stereotype another group and impliment polemic policies accordingly, be it nazis verses jews, american racists verses black men during the lynching era, religious zelots verses gay men, islamists verses women or feminists verses white heterosexual men the line between advocacy and hate has been crossed and that is largely why the mens movement has mobilised.
Whether you back the false information and suppress the true information is up to you entirely but from here on in its not going to be as easy to use factiods and polemic studies to slander hetereosexual men while covering up for all the other groups and denying false allegations as it was.
12:12 pm
Oh yes. A movement whose landmark study claimed that FORTY FIVE PERCENT of rape reports are false by classifying all of the following as "false reports":
-cases where the police deemed the evidence insufficient to prosecute
-cases where the accuser withdrew his/her complaint, regardless of the reason
-cases the police may have (and may well have, because it's extremely common for police to do this, although we'll never know for sure, because Kanin never released which police station he used as his incredibly small sample size, so NO ONE HAS EVER BEEN ABLE TO VERIFY HIS FINDINGS) arbitrarily decided are false and either terrified the accuser into recanting, or sent him/her on his/her way without an opportunity to go to trial.
Why yes, such a movement is a beacon of objectivity, lack of political motivation, and non-skewed results.
1:00 pm
Melissa
I dont know what you're talking about "landmark study"?
I think that you are talking about the 41% that admitted that their rape accusations were false recorded by an independent researcher, thats not a "landmark study" its just one study on the methodology of one police station that put a lot of its resources into investigating rape at both ends, catching rapists and weeding out false accusers. If the results conflict with the ideology, that women dont make false claims it doesnt in reality constitute an attack on the ideology, or a skewed study undertaken by shady pro-rape characters, its just an outcome that contradicts the politically correct construct of how things are.
(btw, heres Wendy McElroy suggesting a more paletable figure http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=1719)
Rape culture is hung on one "landmark study" that was followed by others including the same 2 ambiguous questions that Koss herself has admitted is , its a mistake to suppose that the mrm is using the same methodology, the mrm use many independent studies.
For example - there are 100s of studies showing gender symmetry in IP /DV yet NOW.org still insists that IP /DV is in the main gendered and political, as per the ideology the NOW.org pov is not a reflection of reality, its just a reflection of a political construct.
1:19 pm
edit
that link is not working - http://www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2003/0805roberts.html
"The Eugene Kanin study did show up a 41% false reporting rape and an FBI report showed that 25% of suspects are excluded by DNA testing).
Neither here nor there, neither are "landmark studies", but we do know that the rate is higher than 2% and that innocent men can go to jail where they face torture and rape as punishment.
We also know that feminism works to supress the reality that false accusations happen in significant numbers and seeks to remove legal defence for men accused of rape.
5:30 pm
Eo,
You write, "The Koss study and campus rape culture is violent anti-male propaganda which seeks to stereotype all or most men men with a minority of rapists."
Violent?! Really? Violent. Hmmm...
And, "We also know that feminism works to suppres (sic) the reality that false accusations happen in significant numbers and seeks to remove legal defence (sic) for men accused of rape."
Reality check - even when you're presented with material that contradicts your delusion (e.g., Lisak's work, pretty much everybody's posts here) you STILL take issue with the mere concept of rape and immediately turn around and find some new "problem" to wave in the air as "evidence" of some evil feminist cult and plot to "get teh menfolk." WAKE UP - THE FEMINISTS ARE NOT OUT TO GET YOU!
You want to "defend" MRA sites and spend an inordinate amount of time and energy extensively regurgitating "research" from individuals who have been ostracized by their own academic communities and had their research methodology ripped apart REPEATEDLY. Yet, when people post RELEVANT criticisms or contradictory findings to the "research" you repost, you either ignore the comments altogether, call them "personal attacks", or find some new problem with feminists to make up for it.
You project your delusion onto the comments of other posters and even when people cut and paste from previous posts you STILL maintain your delusion, albeit "reframing" it a little for the current post. While pretty much everybody else here has made a good faith effort to acknowledge and respond to your points and even ceded when appropriate, you blatantly REFUSE to listen to any reasonable argument that anybody else puts forth unless it's praising YOUR position. Despite the ENTIRE blog post with the opinion of a PROFESSIONAL in this particular area, that “these comparisons are often employed solely to derail conversations about addressing the problem of rape,” you CONTINUE with the barrage of statistics to both make these comparisons and berate feminists.
That's not "debate"... that's the behavior of a petulant child... and delusional people.
I truly believe there is no study that has been done or ever will be done for that matter that you will be "happy" with unless it tells you EXACTLY WHAT YOU WANT TO HEAR.
Granted, from a professional standpoint, I do appreciate that this IS how delusions manifest and perpetuate themselves, hence the reason they're so difficult to treat. But it's always just a little sad to see it in action. While, I would never presume to make a real diagnosis without actually meeting with a person first, I think there's ample evidence to support my "suspicions" that you're not the "average troll" but rather have some other psychological issues and as such I will be heeding the sage advice from other posters to just stop responding to you as it only further fuels your delusion that the feminists are out to get you. It's my SINCERE hope that you'll take the lack of response from posters here as a sign that you should move on... and maybe get some help.
7:11 pm
squirrely girl
Im working off a mountian of empirical evidence that contradicts a faith based ideological view point and you have just described the state of being of an ideological view point and projected that on to me.
You've also projected the characteristics of feminist research on to the likes of Murray A. Straus, Richard J. Gelles, Eugene J. Kanin, Cristine Hoff Sommers and others attacking them personally and not provided a reason.
These people contradict your ideological POV and you claim their research has been ripped apart repeatedly... thats another projection, their research obliterates feminist research. They might well have been subject to persoanl attacks for not publishing studies that arent skewed to the ideological POV but personal attacks arent the same thing as "ripping apart".
Please, "rip apart" these two papers, one by Gelles on skewed political and ideology driven "research" and the other by Straus methods used to conceal and skew data used by feminists without attacking the authors or myself on a personal, professional level or crying rape.
http://www.familieslink.co.uk/download/july07/Politics%20of%20research.pdf
http://pubpages.unh.edu/~mas2/V74-gender-symmetry-with-gramham-Kevan-Method%208-.pdf
Show me how Straus and Gelles (google them if you dont know who they are) are disgraced and rejected by anyone bar ideological feminists.
Im happy to patiently back up everything I say with empirical evidence, can you provide evidence that Murray A. Straus, Richard J. Gelles, Eugene J. Kanin, Cristine Hoff Sommers et al are academically incompetent and rejected as you claim? No you can't, perhapse you will give them an online quack diagnosis?
Find a way to debate honestly, of you have a specific problem with something ive said or a study Ive posted, come back with something other than vitriol or slander.
A study or POV that differs from your ideology is not a personal attack nor does it justify personal attacks nor do persoan attacks or slander "win" debates.
2:29 pm
Melissa---
LSP's previous post did sort of allude to Eo and I being rapist and victim respectively because we do, occasionally engage in sexual activities when drunk. Clearly this is not the case and Eo IS right when he says this is a healthy and fun relationship---but there are a lot of men and women out there engaging in same,who are second guessing themselves, their activities and their relationships because the overall belief (for regular, everyday people who dont spend days blogging or pouring over the academic journals etc) is that if the WOMAN (not the man) has had ONE drink, or a bit of any other substance, that she can legally charge him with rape if she later regrets the activity. Maybe that's not accurate, but I'm telling you, the average Joe sure does believe it. You can counter this with "well if men are so concerned, they should research it themselves" or "then if they doubt their partners sobriety, best to not have sex then"...and maybe those are good points, and I dont disagree with them in theory. But how many 20 year old college students are going to do that? And look at the examples----Duke? Hofstra? Good God!
The message regarding these situations is unclear on the whole.