#MeToo has caught on, good thing or bad thing ?

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Permabear wrote: »

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Someone else said it. I was curious where you stand. You are still calling a large proportion of these people liars with 0 evidence (well sorry a tweet:p). The stance is entirely illogical, it is a complete assumption.

Is that what you want. People to come forward with their stories and be dismissed as liars? Why would any woman come forward if most will simply be dismissed as liars right off the bat?

I did not say you did not consider sexual assault a serious crime but you are dismissing a large proportion of the women using the hashtag as liars.

kylith

Permabear wrote: »

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So, one of your daughters comes home and says that she's upset and annoyed because some creep on the bus spent the whole journey staring at her breasts. What do you say to her?

Outlaw Pete

Permabear wrote: »

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That's exactly the kind of nonsense I was referring to and 99% of the what I have seen has been in a similar vein. Some of it even more trivial. Sure we even had the whole nonsense about how withholding sexual harassment is actually sexual harassment.

Anyway, I think this puts the whole #metoo nonsense well:

Beware the Rape Allegation Bandwagon

"#MeToo" is the social media meme of the moment. In a 24-hour period, the phrase was tweeted nearly a half million times and posted on Facebook 12 million times. Spearheaded by actress Alyssa Milano in the wake of Hollyweird's Harvey Weinstein sexual harassment scandal, women have flooded social media with their own long-buried accounts of being pestered, groped or assaulted by rapacious male predators in the workplace.

Count me out.

It's one thing to break down cultural stigmas constructively, but the #MeToo movement is collectivist virtue signaling of a very perilous sort. The New York Times heralded the phenomenon with multiple articles "to show how commonplace sexual assault and harassment are." The Washington Post credited #MeToo with making "the scale of sexual abuse go viral." And actress Emily Ratajkowski declared at a Marie Claire magazine's women's conference on Monday:

"The most important response to #metoo is 'I believe you.'"

No. I do not believe every woman who is now standing up to "share her story" or "tell her truth." I owe no blind allegiance to any other woman simply because we share the same pronoun. Assertions are not truths until they are established as facts and corroborated with evidence. Timing, context, motives and manner all matter.

Because I reserve the right to vet the claims of individual sexual assault complainants instead of championing them all knee-jerk and wholesale as "victims," I've been scolded as insensitive and inhumane.

"TIMING DOES NOT MATTER," a Twitter user named Meg Yarbrough fumed. "What matters is what is best for EACH INDIVIDUAL victim. You should be ashamed of yourself."

CNN anchor Jake Tapper informed me, "People coming forward should be applauded." But applauding people for "coming forward" is not a journalistic tenet. It's an advocacy tenet. Tapper responded that he was expressing the sentiment as a "human being not as a journalist." Last time I checked, humans have brains. The Weinstein scandal is not an excuse to turn them off and abdicate a basic responsibility to assess the credibility of accusers. It's an incontrovertible fact that not all accusers' claims are equal.

Some number of harrowing encounters described by Weinstein's accusers and the #MeToo hashtag activists no doubt occurred. But experience and scientific literature show us that a significant portion of these allegations will turn out to be half-truths, exaggerations or outright fabrications. That's not victim-blaming. It's reality-checking.

It is irresponsible for news outlets to extrapolate how "commonplace" sexual abuse is based on hashtag trends spread by celebrities, anonymous claimants and bots. The role of the press should be verification, not validation. Instead of interviewing activist actresses, reporters should be interviewing bona fide experts.

Brent Turvey, a forensic scientist and criminal profiler who heads the Forensic Criminology Institute, is author or co-author of 16 criminal justice books, including textbooks on rape investigation, crime reconstruction, behavioral evidence analysis and forensic victimology.

Turvey's most recent book, written with retired NYPD special victim squad detective John Savino and Mexico-based forensic psychologist Aurelio Coronado Mares, is "False Allegations: Investigative and Forensic Issues in Fraudulent Reports of Crime."

Based on their review of decades of scientific literature, Turvey and his colleagues explode the "2 percent myth" peddled by politicians, victims' advocates and journalists "claiming that the nationwide false report rate for rape and sexual assault is nonexistent." In fact, the statistic was traced to an unverified citation in a 1975 book by feminist author Susan Brownmiller.

"This figure is not only inaccurate," Turvey and his co-authors conclude, "but also it has no basis in reality."

Published research has documented false rape and sexual assault rates ranging from 8 percent to 41 percent. Savino notes that in his NYPD's Manhattan Special Victim Squad, "our false report rate was in the double digits during all of my years. Sometimes, it was as high as 40 percent." Turvey, Savino, and Mares make clear to students that based on the evidence — as opposed to Facebook trends:

"False reports happen; they are recurrent; and there are laws in place to deal with them when they do. They are, for lack of a better word, common."

They are common because people lie for all sorts of reasons — from the need for attention to the lure of profit, out of anger or revenge, to conceal crimes or illicit activity, or because of addictions or mental health issues. Unlike activists or advocates "steeped in bias, denial or self-interest," Turvey and his colleagues teach criminal investigators and students that true professionals "do not seek confirmation of beliefs or ideas: they seek eradication of false theories. All reports of crime must be investigated. Otherwise, they are merely unconfirmed allegations that the ignorant or lazy may pass along as truth."

Rape is a devastating crime. So is lying about it. Ignorant advocates and lazy journalists can be as dangerous as derelict detectives and prosecutors driven by political agendas instead of facts.

When #MeToo bandwagons form in the midst of a panic, innocent people get run over.

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One eyed Jack

midlandsmissus wrote: »

Me and my female friends have long said amongst us that everyone of us have been sexually assaulted. I have said this to two of my decent male friends and they were complete oblivious to it happening.

It feels like a great release and relief to finally talk about all the pain we have suffered. There is great power in voices.

Women have long been treated as objects with no one caring about their thoughts feelings or emotions. You can argue this point, but look at all the victim blaming in Ireland alone, a queue of men shaking a sexual assaulter's hand in court, very few rape convictions, many women suffering.
Who cared, noone.
The men that didn't actually commit sexual assault, what did you do to help us while we were all suffering. What did you do? Women have been treated like **** for decades. You know this .

Your two decent male friends don't appear to have known about it? In fact, by your own admission they appeared to be completely oblivious! So everyone else knew, and everyone else is responsible for the historic mistreatment of women... except your two decent male friends who were completely oblivious to it. Bit convenient that really, isn't it?

I have no inclination to argue your point that women have been treated as objects with no-one caring about their thoughts, feelings or emotions, because again by your own admission, all your female friends have long since said among yourselves that every one of you has been sexually assaulted, and it feels like a great release to talk about all the pain you all have suffered, so on some level you must all care about each other surely?

The fact that you aren't aware of the work that men do and have done and continue to do and will do into the future to respect and protect women is only a testament to how oblivious you are to the work men do. Unlike you and your friends however (even the decent oblivious men!), I'm not aware of anyone among my friends both male and female who expects any praise for what they do. While you're all gathered round basking in the ambience of your echo chamber, other people are creating a world where you and your friends actually share the luxury of thinking you're making a difference in the world with your narcissistic ego massaging efforts.

ressem

midlandsmissus wrote: »

It feels like a great release and relief to finally talk about all the pain we have suffered. There is great power in voices.

The men that didn't actually commit sexual assault, what did you do to help us while we were all suffering. What did you do? Women have been treated like **** for decades. You know this .

When you're talking about the pub / nightclub scenario...

The men probably behave in either a "not-my-problem" or "take-my-lead-from-the-behaviour-of the-crowd" manner, as do other women.

As you say, there's power in voices and group standards so if sufficient women decide that the behaviour is beyond acceptable and yell, they will be backed up by other women and men.

When you are talking about the family abuse scenario, people can be even more paralyzed by hypothetical knock-on consequences and mind games.

mzungu

midlandsmissus wrote: »

Me and my female friends have long said amongst us that everyone of us have been sexually assaulted. I have said this to two of my decent male friends and they were complete oblivious to it happening.

Did all the assaults take place in front of these two friends?

midlandsmissus wrote: »

It feels like a great release and relief to finally talk about all the pain we have suffered. There is great power in voices.

Fair enough.

midlandsmissus wrote: »

Women have long been treated as objects with no one caring about their thoughts feelings or emotions.

Historically speaking, that could be said about a large chunk of the population, bar the privileged few at the top. However, today, there is a massive emphasis (in the media and other places) on good health for women. This appears to be paying off. To give one example they are now more likely to score higher in school and go to college etc.

midlandsmissus wrote: »

You can argue this point, but look at all the victim blaming in Ireland alone, a queue of men shaking a sexual assaulter's hand in court,

This one crops up time and time again. You could feed half the world with the amount of dining out that has been done on that case. The country was up in arms. The reason this pops up time and time again was because it was so bloody insane.

midlandsmissus wrote: »

very few rape convictions, many women suffering.
Who cared, noone.

Burden of proof is high. Why? Because it is treated as a serious crime. That's why rates are so low.

If you have any suggestions for increasing the conviction rate then I'm all ears.

midlandsmissus wrote: »

The men that didn't actually commit sexual assault, what did you do to help us while we were all suffering. What did you do? Women have been treated like **** for decades. You know this .

Collective responsibility. Really? Then you don't mind if I blame you for the Moors murders while we are at it, do you?

Sexual assault usually (but not always) takes place behind closed doors, with people being none the wiser that anything untoward has taken place. I have no iota of what you expect people to have done about assaults they had no knowledge of.

Permabear wrote: »

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So you don't believe that they were sexually assaulted but you also don't think they are lying? Right that makes sense. Where are you getting data on women being fondled in nightclubs against their will btw?

Also safer =/= safe, or should they simply settle for safer?

I saw someone say that all women had been sexually assaulted? I saw someone say all her friends had but I might have missed it.

Edit: After rereading the comment I presume you are referring to you are absolutely misrepresenting that posters claim.

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Permabear wrote: »

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You stated that the data says incidents of sexual assaults are decreasing. Is your data incomplete? If so why say it which so much conviction.

I feel like it was a good assumption that you had complete data on sexual assaults and not simply a proportion then. Not making things up. Speaking of, where did someone say all women had been sexually assaulted?

anewme

Permabear wrote: »

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I think this is so important.

I do believe that most women will have a harassment experience if not many, at some point in their lives. The majority, I'd say all, have experience it from low level to serious.

For me, one of the worst ones was when I was very young, about 14. 3 of us used to walk to the town buy a can of coke and sweets and sit on the wall outside the petrol station with a radio for hours.

One night when we were walking on our travels, a mini bus pulled in. It had a load of guys with sports bags, obviously on the way to football training. They were guys in their mid-late 30's. They called us over. Excuse me girls? Over we shuffle, taking care not to go too close in case we were pulled in. . "Can you tell me the way to Pr*** Lane? I hear it's beside pussy Valley" big laugh and other comments about blow jobs, tits etc.

We were clearly only kids and there was absolutely no need for a group of adults to do that to kids(which is all we were) . I've had a lot of incidents down the years, many much worse and more serious . But for some reason I remember that incident was yesterday.

If I thought anyone I know said the same to kids, Id rip their fckn head off.

Christy42 wrote: »

Anything to avoid discussing that there might be a large issue here that people are uncomfortable discussing.

I suspect that most men wouldn't have any problem with women highlighting and discussing this problem if it was based on proven experiences and statistical analysis. Facts rather than opinions.

Is there any suggestion of validating the claims by the metoo contributors?

Surely if this was so widespread, there would be reports, and research papers to support it, since women rights movements/agencies receive quite a bit of funding/support these days? I'm not saying that there isn't a problem. I am saying that men would like to see some evidence of the problem before we all get thrown into the same social category as the weirdos/rapists/etc.

Deleted User wrote: »

I suspect that most men wouldn't have any problem with women highlighting and discussing this problem if it was based on proven experiences and statistical analysis. Facts rather than opinions.

Is there any suggestion of validating the claims by the metoo contributors?

Surely if this was so widespread, there would be reports, and research papers to support it, since women rights movements/agencies receive quite a bit of funding/support these days? I'm not saying that there isn't a problem. I am saying that men would like to see some evidence of the problem before we all get thrown into the same social category as the weirdos/rapists/etc.

If you have a good way of recording data then I would be all ears. Do you suggest ignoring it until we figure out a way?

Also nice throwing in the lie that all men are being accused by this campaign at the end.

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Permabear wrote: »

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Again do you have evidence of more minor incidents such simply being felt up by a stranger?

Christy42 wrote: »

If you have a good way of recording data then I would be all ears. Do you suggest ignoring it until we figure out a way?

You missed my point. I'm not seeking to ignore anything. I'm suggesting that proof be provided to show the validity of these claims.

Also a way to determine when these claims occurred, where they occurred, etc. A statistical analysis. Instead, you have women posting metoo about something that might have happened 40 years ago. Or five minutes ago. Or in Ireland, Britain, or Spain. There is no way to tell.

You want things to improve. I want things to improve. A genuine effort to gather and use the data would be far more productive for that positive change.

Also nice throwing in the lie that all men are being accused by this campaign at the end.

It's not a campaign highlighting sexual harassment by lesbians, transgenders, etc. It's a campaign that focuses on men. no?

lukesmom

Is staring at a womans breasts sexual assault though? No it's not. It's recognising that someone's breasts look good. Am I the only one who sees nothing wrong with that?

Deleted User wrote: »

You missed my point. I'm not seeking to ignore anything. I'm suggesting that proof be provided to show the validity of these claims.

Also a way to determine when these claims occurred, where they occurred, etc. A statistical analysis. Instead, you have women posting metoo about something that might have happened 40 years ago. Or five minutes ago. Or in Ireland, Britain, or Spain. There is no way to tell.

You want things to improve. I want things to improve. A genuine effort to gather and use the data would be far more productive for that positive change.

It's not a campaign highlighting sexual harassment by lesbians, transgenders, etc. It's a campaign that focuses on men. no?

You have changed from your claim that all men were being blamed. Sure men are most frequently the perps in these incidents but certainly I have no one suggest it is all men.

A full on study of the incidents by severity and time might be interesting actually. Decent idea, this was a decentralised campaign but it could well lead to something more as you suggest.

fullstop

midlandsmissus wrote: »

Women have long been treated as objects with no one caring about their thoughts feelings or emotions. You can argue this point, but look at all the victim blaming in Ireland alone, a queue of men shaking a sexual assaulter's hand in court, very few rape convictions, many women suffering.
Who cared, noone.
The men that didn't actually commit sexual assault, what did you do to help us while we were all suffering. What did you do? Women have been treated like **** for decades. You know this .

**** me are you still beating this drum :rolleyes: Didn't realise it was my fault someone was mean to you. Where were you when random women used to grope me crowded nightclubs? What did you do? Nothing.

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kylith

lukesmom wrote: »

Is staring at a womans breasts sexual assault though? No it's not. It's recognising that someone's breasts look good. Am I the only one who sees nothing wrong with that?

There's noticing that someone has breasts and there's staring at them like she's a piece of meat there solely for your enjoyment.

anewme

lukesmom wrote: »

Is staring at a womans breasts sexual assault though? No it's not. It's recognising that someone's breasts look good. Am I the only one who sees nothing wrong with that?

If you were sitting in a meeting in work and someone was deliberately staring at your boobs, I can see how something like this could be used as an intimidation and undermining tactic.

I mentioned on an earlier page that we had used to have a guy in work who stared at people's boobs and followed them across the room, his head literally bobbing up and down in time with their bouncing. He was a bit harmless and that's all there was to him, but it could be very annoying though.

I used him as a kind of barometer. When I put on weight, it goes straight on my boobs. If I saw the diddy watcher perk up like a meercat when I came into the room, I just thought ****, better hit the gym. It's time to lose weight.

Christy42 wrote: »

You have changed from your claim that all men were being blamed. Sure men are most frequently the perps in these incidents but certainly I have no one suggest it is all men.

Nope. I havent changed from that perspective. The posts here show that use of "men". Not some men, a few men... "men". there's very little in the way of trying to accuse a minority of men as being guilty. Instead, it's a widespread problem.

A full on study of the incidents by severity and time might be interesting actually. Decent idea, this was a decentralised campaign but it could well lead to something more as you suggest.

Then, I wouldn't have any objection to it. I just don't like being lumped in with a minority group that behaves in an awful manner, and I also recognize that some women will exaggerate the offense of some behavior they didn't appreciate.

It's like this. Feminists and SJW's have lost a lot of credibility because there's no hard data to support many of their claims. Instead, it's vague accusations which do nothing to truly support the need for change, and generally just seek to insult men.

Most men I've met in my life have behaved politely towards women. I've rarely seen the behavior described in this thread as being commonplace (outside of very dodgy bars). So, from my perspective, I would need to see some evidence/research to show that the problem is so widespread, rather than the accusations that have appeared with the metoo action. I suspect such behavior is more common with other cultural/economic groups that I don't associate with, but I have nothing to prove that. Hence my desire for actual evidence of such behavior.