<p>@awcntdb
“If the school system is allowed to stay, no one is ever convicted of a crime, much less rape.”</p>
<p>“What is fascinating to me intellectually is there is court system already in place to inflict maximum punishment on alleged assaulters, yet female students are choosing a newer system that, by definition, can only deliver the least punishment. Why would someone choose a lesser punishment option for their attacker is my question? I do not get it.”</p>
<p>Reply
I am not suggesting that I think the “newer system” is a good one. I do not know enough about it yet. </p>
<p>What is clear is why many people prefer the newer system. The reason is that the old court system has been almost completely ineffective at identifying the guilty. The protection of the innocent in these cases has led to a failure to achieve justice for nearly all real victims. </p>
<p>The stiff penalties for rape are well intended, but they actually make matters worse because juries are even more hesitant to convict anyone. </p>
<p>Getting your rapist successfully removed from the college you are attending protects you and your peers. It is not optimal, but in the current legal system where even when you do everything you should do there is no punishment at all. The Michigan kicker rape case is a good example.</p>
<p>In that case, the report says that there was:
- No ambiguous consent signal given by the victim
- No delay in reporting
- A victim who was despondent immediately
- An immediate call to police who arrested the alleged rapist
- A rape kit executed that showed evidence of intercourse as well as physical injury to the victim</p>
<p>Result: The alleged assailant said it was consensual and the DA refused to take it to court at all.</p>
<p>This is the problem. The current system is not working even if the victim does everything right. People like to shift the discussion to cases where there were delays in reporting the incident, or the victim did not appear upset at the time, or there was no rape kit or the police were not called, or whether was a consent when a victim said “Whatever” instead of “Yes” or “No”. However, in reality, all of those discussions are pointless because even when the victim manages to do all of those things correctly, they can’t even get to court let alone get a conviction. How can that be justice?</p>
<p>The current system is also not the level playing field that you worry about so much. This standard is not applied in any other type of case.</p>
<p>In a robbery case, if a store keeper/victim: calls the police immediately, is despondent about being robbed, can demonstrate that items were taken and that they suffered physical injury at the hands of the assailant, the thief will be arrested and there will be a trial. </p>
<p>A DA will not refuse to go to trial for robbery just because the thief says “It was consensual. He said I could have this stuff.” The store keeper will not be discounted and grilled repeatedly because he admits giving gifts at Christmas, and donating to church and other charities, so how can we know that you did not donate to this person also? Maybe you wanted to donate and regretted it later. We can’t know for sure. The store owner does not have to prove that he did not say the thief could have these things before anything can be done. </p>
<p>If two people are in an office alone, and one of them shoots and kills the other one, that person will not get off by just saying that the victim threatened them and it was self-defense. Few people will say there is nothing we can do because he claims self defense and “We can’t know for sure because we were not there”. </p>
<p>The standards for proof and the level of skepticism and disbelief that women who are victims receive in rape cases is significantly higher than in any other type of crime.</p>
<p>How is that a level playing field? Why aren’t these standards consistent across varying types of crimes? Why do so many people see this happening and say nothing, but if there is even the slightest chance that a woman gets a break that a man does not receive, they are telling everyone that this proves women are inferior to men? Why is it acceptable that women who claim they have been victims of rape are treated as more dishonest and greeted with more skepticism than victims of any other crime. </p>
<p>How is that a level playing field? Why aren’t you posting that this higher standard shows that men are inferior?</p>