CF, I will just note that you use the word “all” a lot of times, suggesting that I said something about “all” cases of various types. I really wish you would try a little harder not to recast what I’m saying in this way.
I’m very prepared to believe that the DA in Missoula, or any other place, is terrible. That doesn’t affect my opinion that folks are substantially overestimating the number of additional successful prosecutions for acquaintance rape that would result from proper procedures. And it’s unpleasant to point this out, but you are asking prosecutors to either get more resources, or to divert resources from other kinds of cases, if you want significantly more prosecutions of acquaintance rape cases.
Are we? I thought we were talking, at least in part, about the great mass of unreported cases. You seem to think they are as likely as reported cases to have evidence; I don’t think so.
And just one other note about the Missoula prosecutor–did the situation with the Duke lacrosse team prove to you that prosecutors are overzealous and pursuing false rape claims against thousands of innocent men across the nation? It didn’t make me think that. Examples can only go so far in determining the real shape of a problem.
Both uses of “all” in this come from you, not from me. Since you say that you don’t “accept” these ideas, that suggests that somebody–me?–is making this argument. But I didn’t.
To put it another way, it’s easier for you to argue with my points if you translate “many” or “most” into “all,” or “few” into “none.”
I think what we all want is significantly fewer rapes. The last chapter of the book is about the changes being made at UM, the PD, and the prosecutors office, and what effects they expect from those changes. Most of the changes cost very little. Some cost money but are necessary to atone for past dysfunction.
A point of the Jordan Johnson trial (Kirsten Pabst took a year off from being a prosecutor to make sure he wasn’t punished) is how defense attorneys can play on a juries false beliefs about rape victims, the idea that if she is not screaming and clawing at his eyes then it must have been consensual at the time. Ultimately we, as a society, need to understand the victims before juries will stop letting so many rapists walk free. The book is a good step.
Don’t put words in my mouth, particularly when I have just said the opposite:
I’m using the numbers YOU gave me, to figure out what the consequence of what YOU are saying. YOU said, what if reporting goes up 100%, but convictions go up only 5-10%. I say, OK, let’s figure out what that means.
Let’s say for every 100 women who report rapes in the current regime, 20 get prosecuted and 18 get convictions. Now we double the number of reported rapes: we have 200 reported rapes. According to the hypothetical YOU gave me, Hunt, we have 5-10% more convictions: 1 or 2 more. So, out of the 100 newly reported rapes, in 98 or 99 of them, the accused rapist goes free. In other words, those 100 new reporters shouldn’t have reported their rape, since they had a miniscule chance that their rapist would be convicted and a 99% chance of going through an awful process to no benefit. If I thought that the numbers were as you said, Hunt, I would tell those women not to report.
Yes you did. If you say, as you did, that a doubling of rape reports will result in only a 5-10% increase in convictions-- at least, when you gave me that hypothetical, I assumed that you believed that was the case, rather than that you were intentionally lowballing what you believe–you are saying that 1% of the new reports will result in a conviction, and 99% (in other words, essentially all) will result in the accused rapist going free.
I think you are wrong about the types of cases that go unreported. I think they are more similar to the reported cases than you apparently believe, and that more than 1-2% would result in convictions if reported.
alh asked if more reports would cause a decline in criminal sexual conduct. It’s interesting because historically we have expanded the definition of criminal sexual conduct but the incidence of it is decreasing statistically as a couple of posters on other threads have posted. Much will also depend on how states classify criminal sexual behavior, as Hunt points out all behavior is not equal nor is it equal in the eyes of the law in many states. The open ended question the book leaves is no one can really predict is if more accusations and more prosecutions will result in more convictions or more plea bargains and of course no one can predict how judges and juries will adjudicate the punishment as there is great latitude in determining that outcome.
Has anyone posted any statistics that show the incidence of acquaintance rape is decreasing? Violent crimes like murder, mugging and armed robbery have been decreasing (since we’ve gotten rid of lead; it’s all about lead poisoning), so we should expect that stranger rape would also be decreasing. But acquaintance rape is different. Has anyone seen statistics showing that acquaintance rape has been decreasing?
I was not suggesting acquaintance rape has decreased. I, personally, don’t think we even have a handle on how pervasive it is. My hope is that increased reporting may be a deterrent. And that would be a good thing, even when it is impossible to get a conviction in a “he said/she said” case. I don’t think we have really seen much of an increased reporting of acquaintance rape yet. It will be very interesting to me to see what sort of impact, if any, the actions of women like Alison Huguet, Adrea Pino and Emma Sulcowicz have on acquaintance rape reporting. Already, I think the fact they refuse to be silenced encourages other women to report. That is a huge shift in the status quo. imho.
adding: When there is more media attention, there is more chance bystanders will recognize what they are seeing is rape and intervene. imho. As dstark wrote, carrying drunken women upstairs used to be a norm. Some don’t accept that norm today.
Obviously there is no classification for “acquaintance” rape… as CF has often implied rape is rape. i have equally often pointed out that some states have different degrees of criminal sexual conduct and some states don’t even use the term “rape.” This is from 2010, but has been cited before on these forums and the term used is sexual violence. There is no national “language” unfortunately, but criminal sexual conduct i like because it feels like it covers the totality of what can be classified as criminal.
The idea that the majority of accusers of criminal sexual conduct know their accusers is pretty much not disputed.
And this was interesting as I’m a huge advocate for swift reporting to the police by accusers and firmly in favor of mandatory reporting by hospitals, schools, colleges and universities and such…
This is just dopiness. The numbers in this study are small. They are giving the point estimates (29, 56, 35) but the margin of error here is something like 15 or 20.
I do not like the term “criminal sexual conduct” or “sexual violence” if it is being used to define what we commonly understand to be rape. Rape is rape and there is no getting around it. The characterization of rape as anything other than what it is, is just an attempt to minimize or obfuscate a very violent act. Society has a common understanding of what the word rape means and some people want to change that. We don’t need a new word to describe rape, we all know what it is.
Right but we know that some states are moving in the right direction. I know Gov. Cuomo is working with the legislature in NY to get all three classified as rape. Right now in NY only vaginal penetration is considered rape.
The point I’m making is, you say rape is rape and there is no getting around it, but I say that the definition of “rape” is ambiguous. The legal terminology is not standardized, and the word “rape” in common use does not have a standard definition. You want to say, we all know what rape is, but I say we don’t all agree what rape is.
The common understanding of the word has only been made ambiguous by the constant adjusting of state statutes which sometimes is the result of political agendas. I do think there is a common understanding that the word “rape” means non-consensual sexual penetration. The word rape is an emotionally charged word that many want to discard in favor of terms that dilute the gravity of the action. I don’t necessarily subscribe to the thinking that there are different “shades” of rape.
If you kill a person you are a “murderer.” If you steal you are a “thief.” But if you force yourself on someone sexually somehow people are now jumping through hoops not to call your actions “rape.” I am not sure how we begin to find solutions to this problem if we are not willing to label something for what it is.
At the end of the day questions of proof will sometimes be problematic but I see no value in discarding the term “rape” in favor of terms that are less emotionally charged. The cultural baggage that comes along with the word is important in terms of preserving the understanding of the gravity of the crime.
Ah but there is manslaughter, murder in the 1st degree, murder in the 2nd degree. For theft there is larceny and petty larceny and probably more degrees of crime…I think people “get” that some degree of criminal sexual conduct probably “fits” their definition of rape…and it does in every state it just doesn’t match the legal terms.
I don’t agree. I think that legislators of good will defined “rape” as vaginal penetration because that’s what the word meant to them. In law, in the US, there is no standard definition of “rape.”
The situation is even worse for the term “sexual assault.” In some jurisdictions, sexual assault is any nonconsensual sexual touching short of rape. In other jurisdictions, it’s any nonconsensual penetration (what you would define as “rape,” HarvestMoon1). In still other jurisdictions it’s an umbrella term for all unwanted sexual touching.
In some jurisdictions, the crime we think of as rape is classified as “sexual battery.”