Issues related to sex- and gender-based harms/crimes

[gr8pumpkin]

I believe in math and science.  Believing in math and science as I do, I believe in statistics.  Statistics show, per Lisak 2010, that false rape accusations account for a mere 5.9% of rape accusations total.  So that means that when a woman accuses someone of sexual assault, I'm inclined to believe her.  Does this mean that the accused should not get his day in court?  Of course not.  Does this mean that the accused is not entitled to a vigorous defense under our system of justice?  Of course not.  But what it means is that for myself personally, because I believe the soundness of Dr. Lisak's peer-reviewed, journal-published study, when a woman claims that she was raped, between me, myself, I and the kitchen sink, you know, I tend to gauge her accusation with the probability of being 94% likely to be true.

 

What I find unhelpful is to have civil liberties and the concept of the rights of the accused mansplained as though these concepts were the first anyone had ever heard of them.  I'm a card-carrying ACLU member, was chair of my UG's ACLU chapter, and a staunch civil libertarian in general.  I would defend to the death the rights of the accused to be observed, and that he receive a fair trial.  But with a 94% accuracy rate for rape accusations?  Yeah, that does influence what I may personally believe.  It might mean that a helpful warning or two about so-and-so might reach the ears of women I happen to care about.

 

Now, given that rape accusations are, on the whole, accurate, what do you suppose the odds are that accusations of a far more ubiquitous practice--- sexual harassment--- are accurate too?  I have to concede that I don't have a hard number to rely on in this case, but my suspicion is that the accuracy rate of such accusations is probably pretty high too.  And of course the accused should have all the due process coming to him at whatever institution he is in.  No one ever said otherwise.  There is a distinction between the accused's legal or quasi-legal outcome through due process--- and what other people are entitled to personally surmise based on the rational sciences of probability and statistics and reliable, peer-reviewed journal findings.

[Establishment]

I believe in math and science.  Believing in math and science as I do, I believe in statistics. 

 

Wow, what are you, some sort of pinko-commie?