#MeToo - is it just different for men and women?

Soldato
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Interesting angle on R4pm, today, (pyschologist was it) that the disney frozen movie (apparently a 2nd movie imminent) is pushing a narrative of perfect body image on young girls, like the size zero discourse, also that the upper class / mobile characters, set unrealistic expectations of means ... so ban fairy tales ? and report it for ajudication to ASA
apparently the male characters do have more realistic body images though.

Are cinderella, sleeping beauty, Rapunzel, Goldilocks already deprecated too, just waiting for some less chivalrous tales to be written ?

I don't get the accolades attributed to the Margeret Atwood novels, which perpetuate a mysogonist theme, or should they be viewed as one possible future, like a christmas carol narrative ... I think they're a lot more devisive, and crude, versus 1984, though.
 
Caporegime
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Damn... if you ever thought that some of those porn casting videos etc.. were all fake and the "amateurs" trying porn for the first time etc.. were just pretending - well it turns out that some are genuine and worse than that the girls were blatantly tricked/pressured into it after being first offered modelling gigs and then being promised that the videos will only be released on DVDs overseas so people in their home town won't find out etc.. etc.. Of course in reality they weren't, they ended up on [well known hub containing lots of porn] and were part of [well known site involving girls doing some porn]:

Rolling Stone Story covering allegations above

But in addition to the above, turns out that there were also allegations that the main male "talent" is allegedly a full on rapist... not content with shagging very hot 18-23 yr old amateur girls on camera, he'd allegedly want to have a second go afterwards once the cameras had stopped rolling or try and coerce them into coming back to his apartment etc.... though it seems the accusers in relation to these charges have dropped them.

Super trustworthy newspaper of record mentioning additional charges

OK, I guess perhaps we shouldn't be too surprised... shock horror, male porn producers have been abusing/co-ercing women... but, tbh.. it is rather surprising that they'd try it these days - the authorities are blatantly going to come down on them like a ton of bricks over something like this - legit porn producers generally are super careful about checking ID's, filming evidence that they have checked IDs and that the talent consents and knows what they're doing etc... checking performers for STDs before hand and insisting on regular checks... not sure how they're doing that with random college girls "Oh btw... you need evidence of an STD check within the past fortnight before flying out for your bikini shoot". I mean these guys were running a multimillion dollar business, how stupid were they to have blowing it be doing something like this - having some idiot (alleged) sleazy rapist as the main talent (that's obviously going to backfire) and allegedly gas lighting the female talent. Instead of perhaps putting in a bit of extra work into recruiting female talent, being open about what they were shooting (perhaps flying out to Eastern Europe etc... too) and enjoying their millions they're potentially facing multiple years behind bars in a federal prison. They're pretty much ****ed now - federal prison sentences don't involve getting halved with good behaviour and let out on parole, you've pretty much got to serve almost the entire sentence and the feds hardly ever lose in court either - there is a ridiculously high conviction rate in federal courts.
 
Soldato
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... just a pity the government didn't manage to shut down the (majority?) juvenile's use of those sites ... they're problemably a worse ill against society/#metoo than Zuk&Co.
 
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Caporegime
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... just a pity the government didn't manage to shut down the (majority?) juvenile's use of those sites ... they're problemably a worse ill against society/#metoo than Zuk&Co.
The government's plans were unworkable.

There's a reason nobody else is trying to block porn on the internet. No other country, I mean. Excluding places like China who are blocking a whole lot more than porn.
 
Caporegime
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... just a pity the government didn't manage to shut down the (majority?) juvenile's use of those sites ... they're problemably a worse ill against society/#metoo than Zuk&Co.

Why does the government need to do that? Parents can do that individually - it doesn't require the government to introduce some verification scheme for all internet users in the UK.
 
Caporegime
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Despite the manifest feminist bias of this report, I am quite sure that it applies equally to male rape victims.
So what's the problem here, and what's your solution?

The quote says:
a) alleged victims don't want to disclose details (aka evidence?)
b) conviction rates are too low. How would they know? OK, so what % of those not convicted have "gotten away with it", and what % were innocent? Surely they must know if they can say that conviction rates are "too low".

So what's the solution?

Not to require evidence from the alleged victim?
To drive up conviction rates by any means possible?

I'm curious to hear what you feel needs to be done.
 
Soldato
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The quote says:
a) alleged victims don't want to disclose details (aka evidence?)
b) conviction rates are too low. How would they know? OK, so what % of those not convicted have "gotten away with it", and what % were innocent? Surely they must know if they can say that conviction rates are "too low".

Surely they are comparing the conviction rate to that of every other crime, and this stands out as different? The article has suggested that this can be attributed to lack of resources. Rape is notoriously difficult to prove, which means it's more costly to pursue a conviction.

As for the evidence issue, it goes back to the issue about a woman's past contributing to the [lack of] validity of her accusation.

In one “horror story” she recalled from the north-east, a young woman was accused of being a liar during a sexual exploitation trial because lawyers had found a letter she wrote when she was a pupil in which she forged her mother’s signature to get a day off school.
 
Soldato
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Almost half of rape victims are dropping out of investigations, as a growing proportion do not want to pursue a prosecution even when a suspect has been identified, according to a Cabinet Office report leaked to the Guardian.

The figures, which were prepared for a secret internal government review earlier this year, reveal a system in crisis as tens of thousands of women are reluctant to pursue their alleged attackers when faced with invasive disclosure demands, a lower likelihood of securing a conviction and lengthy delays in seeing their case brought to court. (LINK)

that article is badly written -

The figures, which were prepared for a secret internal government review earlier this year, reveal a system in crisis as tens of thousands of women are reluctant to pursue their alleged attackers when faced with invasive disclosure demands

...

“We did a survey in London with the Met of 500 cases and found that in 58% of them victims withdrew complaints. The main reason we are seeing that is [threats] to privacy from disclosure. People feel very pressured to consent. Victims don’t want to share all their personal details even if it’s only with the CPS and police. It’s a risk they don’t want to take.”

not sure who did that survey, was it part of the review ? or separate by Claire Waxman,
it was only a small sample anyway,
what was the ranking of the various reasons they gave and the statistical significance ... to really justify the premise
shoddy reporting
 
Soldato
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earlier guardian article ... they are trying to create news themselves, rather a one sided article ?

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/sep/21/people-report-rape-routine-demands-mobile-data

The Guardian found children and complainants in historical abuse cases whose phones had been analysed to gather evidence. Information gathered can be passed to the defence and used in cross-examination of the complainant if permitted in court.

The GUARDIAN surveys of frontline staff at Rape Crisis England & Wales found:

  • All had clients who had been asked for large amounts of personal information and most (86%) said it was now standard practice.

  • More than half said that when data was requested complainants were told it was required by the Crown Prosecution Service (53%) and the case might not proceed without it.

  • Almost all (95%) said the requests had a negative impact on complainants, with some noting it deterred people from coming forward.

  • The majority also noted that the requests were happening in some rape cases involving a stranger (61%). .

  • Support workers also noted that the information gathered from phones appeared to be disproportionate in some cases, with details about the complainants’ “previous sexual history” and “lifestyle” under scrutiny.
In one case known to the Guardian, the CPS refused to bring charges in a case of rape of a 12-year-old child unless his phone was submitted for investigation. The CPS maintained digital access was necessary, although the perpetrator had confessed the rape to the police.

In another case, Barbara, a victim of historical abuse, was asked to submit her phone although the abuse had taken place in the 1970s and 80s. Evidence gathered from her phone was used against her in court by her abuser’s defence to raise questions about her character.

I don't see how they proved disproportionality of the police demands

(edit: to be clearer - I mean the guardian is itself triggering people themselves, to believe there is an unreasonable police invasion of privacy - other newspapers the BBC etc. pick it up too ...'the guardian said it', so it must be true )

edit2: fascinating https://bigbrotherwatch.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Digital-Strip-Searches-Final.pdf

Mobile device extraction software from mobile forensics company MSAB is being used by at least 11 UK police forces.20 MSAB software allows the police to “overcome security and encryption challenges on locked devices”.21 It also allows police to “recover[ing] data beyond the mobile device” and access “online social media data and app-based information” for apps such as WhatsApp, iCloud, Facebook, Google, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat and others.22 MSAB has previously publicly claimed: “If you’ve got access to a sim card, you’ve got access to the whole of a person’s life”. 23 Cellebrite, used by at least 7 UK police forces,24 claims that its software can “extract, preserve and analyse public- and private-domain, social media data, instant messaging, file storage, web pages and other cloud-based content” as well as “detailed location information” and even “a subject’s history of text searches, visited pages, voice-search recordings and translations from Google web history”. 25
...
“If information is identified from your device that suggests the commission of a separate criminal offence, other than the offence(s) under investigation, the relevant data may be retained and investigated by the police. This data may be shared with other parties including, for example other police forces or a court in any criminal proceedings.” 80 The police also state that they may retain any information found on police intelligence databases, and that it may even be shared amongst other government agencies, including governments abroad: “If your device contains information that may assist in the prevention or detection of crime, or protecting the vulnerable, then the police may process and retain this information on our intelligence management system and/or share that information with relevant parties/agencies, including other police forces or government agencies, including those outside of the UK.” 81 [Emphasis added]
 
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Surely they are comparing the conviction rate to that of every other crime, and this stands out as different? The article has suggested that this can be attributed to lack of resources. Rape is notoriously difficult to prove, which means it's more costly to pursue a conviction.

It also means that there are only two possible outcomes when compared with crimes that are easier to prove:

1) A lower conviction rate or
2) A lower standard of evidence required for conviction.

There are no other possibilities, regardless of how much is spent on resources. One or the other has to be picked.

In addition to that, there's the fact that the conviction rate as a percentage of reports is strongly tied to the reporting rate. The easier it is to report a rape, the lower the conviction rate will be unless the whole idea of a trial is dropped and we have summary convictions (with or without a facade trial).

I'll illustrate what I mean with some fictional numbers:

There are 10,000 rapes in Country1 in some period of time. In the same period of time, there are also 10,000 rapes in Country2.

In Country1, a man reporting being raped stands no chance of the case succeeding and will almost certainly be ridiculed and villified if the attacker was a woman and imprisoned, whipped or killed for homosexuality if the attacker was a man.
In Country1, a woman reporting being raped has no chance of the case succeeding unless she can provide at least 2 witnesses and medical evidence. If not, she will almost certainly be villified and probably whipped or imprisoned for extra-marital sex if the attacker was a man and imprisoned, whipped or killed for homosexuality if the attacker was a woman.

As a result, from those 10,000 rapes only 50 were reported because those victims were women who could provide at least 2 witnesses and medical evidence. 40 of those cases resulted in convictions, due to the extemely high level of evidence. The other 10 were blatant corruption in the legal system.

So the conviction rate as a percentage of reports in Country1 is 80% despite that blatant corruption.

In Country2, the situation is almost the opposite. The police are ordered to assume that anyone who is accused of rape is guilty, especially if they have a lower status biological group identity than the plaintiff. Evidence to the contrary is witheld. Presumption of guilt is social norm. There are support services and financial payments.

As a result, from those 10,000 rapes 5000 are reported and 500 false reports are made. Since the court system in Country2 was still stuck in the old-fashioned and "non-progressive" system of requiring proof of guilt beyond reasonable doubt, only 250 of those cases resulted in convictions because while the required level of evidence was lower than in Country1 it was still high.

So the conviction rate as a percentage of reports in Country2 is 4.5%.

Which country handles rape reports better? Does Country1 handle them 18 times better than Country2 because the conviction rate as a percentage of reports is 18 times higher?

As for the evidence issue, it goes back to the issue about a woman's past contributing to the [lack of] validity of her accusation.

And it goes to the issue of whether or not a defendant is to be allowed a fair trial, which requires all relevant evidence to be made available to the investigation and the jury if it goes to trial.
 
Soldato
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It also means that there are only two possible outcomes when compared with crimes that are easier to prove
The comparison in the case of the report was against previous years (in the UK) rather than other crimes, as string had conjectured (google threw that up quickly) so there is a degree of consistancy, same legal system, burden of proof, but,
reports of rapes have increased, and the hypothesis is that inadequate resources, to pursue the prosecution to the same extent, is the explanation for lower conviction rate.
 
Man of Honour
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The comparison in the case of the report was against previous years (in the UK) rather than other crimes, as string had conjectured (google threw that up quickly) so there is a degree of consistancy, same legal system, burden of proof, but,
reports of rapes have increased, and the hypothesis is that inadequate resources, to pursue the prosecution to the same extent, is the explanation for lower conviction rate.

Evidence for that hypothesis? Evidence for how it applies more than it does to other crimes?

Alternative hypotheses:

1) The percentage of rapes that are reported has increased. That would decrease the percentage of reported rapes that result in a conviction unless the standard of evidence required for conviction decreased by a greater amount over the same period of time.
2) The number of false reports of rape has increased. That would also decrease the percentage of reported rapes that result in a conviction unless presumption of guilt increased by a greater amount over the same period of time.
3) The presumption of guilt has decreased.

Or, of course, any combination of the 4.

But all the hypotheses, while plausible, lack evidence.
 
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