And no, you don't have to wait for a court verdict before deciding to believe victims. You are not a court of law, you are allowed to draw your own conclusions.

We're gonna need truth and reconciliation commissions to cover sexual abuse.

Also @1, a history of telling strange lies is not the same thing as having a criminal history or character flaws. Suggesting that we shouldn't believe a victim because they are not 100% pure and perfect is unreasonable. And a powerful person using their fame, fortune, or political power to attack their accusers is a shitty thing to do regardless.

I am not nitpicking because I otherwise generally agree but 2-10% is not 'exceptionally rare'

My position is to not believe the accuser or the accused until I feel there is sufficient evidence either way. With respect to what qualifies as sufficient evidence, everyone's mileage varies. I don't automatically believe the word of strangers not because I'm a misogynist, but because I don't trust people generally. I spent a little too much time with cheaters, thieves and pathological liars in my day to take anyone's word at face value.

#6, please tell me you tell add this addendum every time you tell a victim you don't believe them.

#6, if you know that many crappy people, they surely have REAL victims behind their actions. If you can believe in the extreme shittiness of people, can't you believe the other side of the spectrum?

#6: I don't tell victims I don't believe them. Obviously if the victim is someone I know I will believe them. If I'm working at a crisis center, I will believe everyone who comes in because it's my job.

And let it be said, I don't give the accused the benefit of a doubt either. I'm happy to condemn them when I feel the evidence is overwhelming as in the case of virtually every accusation to come out of the MeToo movement.

I'm also well aware that shittiness goes both ways. I've seen violence against women first hand, and I've been acquainted with people who have committed sexual assaults. I know that the vast majority of accusations are true. But I don't like playing psychic when it comes to the lives of strangers.

#11: And by strangers, I mean people I've never met.

"When a woman says she’s been brutally raped by seven men at a public party on a bed of broken glass, as the UVA accuser did, and when that woman has a history of strange lies, as the UVA accuser also did, there’s nothing wrong with being skeptical."

Well a small number of people were skeptical because the account seemed implausible (it had nothing to do with the accuser's history, as she was anonymous), but nonetheless the story was printed due in large part because of the implicit bias against the accuser in favor of the accused. To the author of the RS story, every rape accusation looks like a real rape accusation.

The story had ramifications for the fraternity and the stability of campus life at UVA and many critics have suggested that it set back the public's view of rape accusations by pushing people to view rape claims with more skepticism if not outright disbelief.

To that last point, that's why it's so important, if you are reporting in the media about a claim, to get everything right before publishing it. Otherwise you may be not simply doing damage to the lives of the accused but also to real victims of such crimes. In that sense, a certain amount of skepticism is healthy.

I also agree with @2 that 2-10% is not exceptionally rare.

@13

She was anonymous to us, but I think what the author means is that she wasn't anonymous to the reporter, who IIRC lost her job because she didn't do due diligence.

as others have said, 2-10% is not rare.

@14 - I'm not so sure about that.

At the time RS retracted the story (April 2015), it said it would not fire the author (Sabrina Erdely). At the time the story was retracted RS also did not fire the managing editor, the story editor or any of the fact checkers, even though it attributed its failures to a lack of due diligence, among other things.

In May 2015 several parties filed suit against RS and Erdely for defamation with malice.

In Fall 2016 she was found guilty, responsible for $2 million in damages. In court documents filed at the time of the verdict, it was revealed that she had been fired, although it was not clear when. But plausibly, she was fired for being the subject of considerable controversy and the defendant in numerous lawsuits, not for failing in her due diligence.

While your story says that the falsely accused rarely ever face consequences the false accusers never face consequences. "Jackie", the woman who made the false accusations at the University of Virginia apparently got away with it scott free.

This is fundamentally a strawman:

there’s nothing wrong with being skeptical

This is absolutely, positively, not accepted in modern discourse. The Stranger just a week ago ran an article lambasting "If true" statements w/r/t Roy Moore, with commentors equating "skepticism" directly to "supporting rape" / being a rapist. The intellectual climate on the left is not quite as low as it is on the right, but there still racing towards it. The spiritual leaders of the progressive movement have completely forsaken procedural justice and instead have given themselves over entirely to emotional reasoning. Facism isn't just a trend on the right, folks. If you're against it you've got to take some positions that your friends won't like you for.

That Quartz piece is really really well done.

@20: Did the women accusing Moore have a history of strange lies?

No?

Then your comparison sucks.

We should believe women because they really don't just up and decide to lie about sexual assault. The ones who lie are either under duress (pregnant teens with u supportive parents for example, cheated on boyfriend/husband etc) or have a history of implausible lies.

If those circumstances are present, skepticism is warranted. If the are not, then it isn't.

We don't have to treat all accusers the same. And it's not at all hypocritical to say not believing Moore's accusers is supportive rape culture while not believing a woman who describes something that almost certainly couldn't have happened as merely healthy skepticism.

@22 You're missing the basic point. It's not about Moore at all. There's no difference between "if true, roy moore should..." and "if true, [confirmed-falsely-accused] should..." Process, process, process. If you feel that because in your estimation there's enough evidence that the process doesn't need to be followed, then you have no process whatsoever. And then we're fully into the "the truth is whatever I say it is" world. Which is one charismatic leader away from Fascism. The only defense is sticking to the process and not trusting your intuition.

@2,11,16 - While 2-10% isn't "exceptionally" rare as a bare numerical statistic, the other qualities of the false accusations effectively reduces the number further, especially for cases that come to the public's attention.

1. "Two different studies have found that almost half of all false rape complaints are lodged by someone other than the alleged victim, usually a parent."

So if ~half are made by parents --third-parties-- on behalf of their teenager's alibi spun out of control, esp. if that ratio is upheld by further studies, then we're really looking at 1-5%.

2. "Revenge wasn't a very common motivation. And regret or guilt...wasn't much of a factor at all."

(My science-brain would like to see numbers attached to those statements...however), removing Revenge, Regret, and Guilt as likely motives effectively undermines attempts by the accused to discredit their accuser(s) with these arguments. Which should lend more credence to those coming forward.

3. "False accusers almost never tell stories that could, by any stretch of the imagination, be seen as an innocent misunderstanding. In a study of false rape claims made to the LAPD, 78% involved claims of aggravated rape"

So again, if the claim is not basically aggravated rape, then the preponderance of credibility falls to the victim. As a simple heuristic, the lower the alleged level of violence, the greater the validity of the accusation.

With these three principles alone, it's pretty safe to say that believing the victims will be the correct conclusion in the vast majority of cases.

And any individual accused of sexual assault by multiple persons is basically 100% guilty.

"But even if a false accusation is made, the accused rarely face consequences"- the author wants all accused, regardless of guilt, to face consequences?

How many lives were damaged by that rare 1-10% false allegations in say just one instance. Lets ask The Rolling Stone...
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/13/busin…

What percentage of women who have been raped:
a) report it
b) see their attacker arrested
c) see their attacker charged with the crime
d) see their attacked tried in court
e) see their attacker found guilty
?
For the last one, statistics show that it's less than 1% of perpetrators who serve time for their crime.

@24: your corrections are misplaced. Following the links back to the original study:

All cases (N = 136) of sexual assault reported to a major Northeastern university over a 10-year period are analyzed to determine the percentage of false allegations. Of the 136 cases of sexual assault reported over the 10-year period, 8 (5.9%) are coded as false allegations. These results, taken in the context of an examination of previous research, indicate that the prevalence of false allegations is between 2% and 10%.

That's 2% to 10% or cases reported. (Note: the identity of the reporter -- for which you erroneously corrected -- does not matter.) If the assumption that rape is an under-reported crime is true, that 2-10% of reported cases looms even larger, because it means the number of false reports is a significant fraction of the total number of reports. Brownstone's editorial -- presented as if it was accurately representing the underlying statistics -- of false rape reports being "exceptionally rare" is thus even more egregiously wrong.

Since Brownstone, yet again, makes a false equivalence between the cases of Ray Moore and Ed Murray, let's look at some of the characteristics of false rape reports given in Quartz:

When one looks at a series of fabricated sexual assaults, on the other hand, patterns immediately begin to emerge. The most striking of these is that, almost invariably, adult false accusers who persist in pursuing charges have a previous history of bizarre fabrications or criminal fraud. Indeed, they’re often criminals whose family and friends are also criminals; broken people trapped in chaotic lives.

At least three of Murray's accusers are convicted criminals, two for crimes of fraud (identity theft for Heckard, forgery for Simpson). To describe Simpson's life as "chaotic" would be rather an understatement, as Brownstone's own profile of him shows.

Crystal Mangum, the accuser in the Duke lacrosse case, was the archetypal false accuser. She had previously reported another brutal rape/kidnapping in which no one was ever charged.

Simpson originally accused two former foster parents, Murray and another, of having molested him. Both men were investigated by the local police on those suspicions, but neither was ever charged.

These accusers often compulsively change their stories, adding dramatic details without regard either for the account they originally gave or the physical evidence.

Simpson has since dramatically changed his story, falsely claiming to Brownstone that Murray and Murray alone molested him:

Nobody has ever sexually molested me besides Ed Murray. So no, absolutely no, I haven't made false allegations. There have been no investigations of sexual abuse other than him. And those are not false.

Thank you, Sydney Brownstone, for giving us the profile of a false rape accuser.

@29 “If the assumption that rape is an under-reported crime is true, that 2-10% of reported cases looms even larger”
Do you math? Say there are 100 reported cases and 10 are false = 10%. But say in reality there are another 100 unreported cases. So, in total 190 rapes and 10 false accusations, or 5%.

@29 Since you brought up the issue of Crystal Mangum it should be noted that her false accusation caused a tremendous amount of trouble for both Duke University and the city of Durhan, No. Carolina. The la crosse team members and their families were subjected to tremendous harassment and ultimately it cost Duke plenty in lawsuits. In regards to this case though, Crystal Mangum faced no sanctions or charges, the Rainbow Coalition even paid for her college tuition.

@29- I agree with fizzy, your math is backwards. But it also begs the question asked by doggie, Exactly what percentage of all rapes are *not* reported? 20%? 50%? 70%?
Anyone have any data on that?

We can safely assume UNreported rapes are never 'false accusations'. So when we add the number of UNreported rapes, to the number of reported, the # of false accusations remains solidly within the number of reported alone.

Which reduces the percentage of false accusations even further within the total number of *all* rapes.

So again, if a third-party is not bringing the rape accusation, then the possibility the accusation is false is 1-5% within the number of reported rapes. Within the number of all rapes --reported and unreported-- how much smaller is that percentage?
0.5-2%? 0.25-1%?
We don't know. But it's getting notably small.

I'll just leave this here.

So NOW you believe Juanita Broaddrick????

Do you math?

Do you read? Here's the entire sentence from which you quoted. I'll even add the part you missed, and put it in bold text for you:

"If the assumption that rape is an under-reported crime is true, that 2-10% of reported cases looms even larger, because it means the number of false reports is a significant fraction of the total number of reports."

In other words, our assumption that rape is an under-reported crime is contradicted by these statistics, because the number of false reports is a significant number of the total number of reports.

Your doing math on fake numbers you just made up means nothing.

I agree with fizzy, your math is backwards.

See above.

We can safely assume UNreported rapes are never 'false accusations'.

Wrong. If Jeff Sampson's accusations of rape by Ed Murray are false, then they were equally false when he attempted to make them in 2009. That thwarted effort would therefore be an unreported false accusation.

So again, if a third-party is not bringing the rape accusation, then the possibility the accusation is false is 1-5% within the number of reported rapes.

Look, we get it: you want to believe Brownstone's self-serving assertion that false reports are rare, so you're assuming a huge number of un-reported rapes, and bizarrely asserting a false report made by a third party just does not count. But your latter assertion is plain wrong, and your assumption means nothing.

I'll reiterate what others here have said: 2-10% is not "rare", and given the ability of rape accusations to bring trauma to entire populations, these false reports are a serious problem. They contradict the idea, unquestioned here, that rape is an under-reported problem; indeed, by these numbers, it is an over-reported one.

@30 and @32, so you concur the percentage of false accusations in reported cases is 2-10%.

But then in @32's argument: "We can safely assume UNreported rapes are never 'false accusations'."

And in @30's argument: "Say there are 100 reported cases and 10 are false = 10%. But say in reality there are another 100 unreported cases. So, in total 190 rapes and 10 false accusations, or 5%"

So @32 is claiming the percentage of false claims in unreported cases is 0%, while @30 argues it is 5%.

With both of you, the ratio of false accusations to truthful accusations doesn't carry over to unreported cases. Why? Just because you say so, by some magical unexplained mechanism. And you say @29 can't do math?

I don't think *you* are doing so great with math, statistical analysis, or logic.

Why would the ratio of false accusations in unreported cases magically be zero? Why wouldn't it be the same?

Particularly, as when someone says they are raped, but does not report it there are fewer consequences for the accuser (unless someone reports it for them) to make false claims, precisely because their claims will not undergo any rigorous evidentiary scrutiny or go to trial. As such, it would seem plausible there could be *more* false claims in unreported rapes.

And I'll see your pithy link mic drop harrumphs, and raise you these:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/03/educa…

http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/d…

...the ratio of false accusations to truthful accusations doesn't carry over to unreported cases. Why? Just because you say so, by some magical unexplained mechanism.

In a related point, the belief that there are a large number of unreported rapes, whether true or false, creates an incentive for the false accuser. The false accuser can cite that belief to support his or her claim of having been one of the unreported cases.

This belief is what Murray's accusers were, and are, using: their accusations, claiming actions which allegedly took place decades ago, are supposedly unreported rapes from those long-ago days.

Brownstone's motive may have been to pre-empt any positive effect from the Quartz article; in this short post, she repeatedly pours scorn on the idea that false rape allegations can have harmful consequences for the wrongly accused. If that was indeed her intent, it backfired badly, with multiple commenters here rejecting both her claims that false reports are rare, and if they do happen, they are no big deal.

Seattle may be getting a new mayor for no other reason than false reports of rape.