by Clarice Feldman
The shift in language is to message that accusers must always be believed. It is, at heart, based on a gross distortion of statistics.
The performance of women this week – from Senator Dianne Feinstein to Christine Blasey Ford to the howling mobs on Capitol Hill – made me seriously consider surgically altering my sex. They are demanding special treatment because of their sex and in the process placing all of us – male and female alike – at peril of witch hunts against men and then, in time, against all who will not bow to their rule.
My Facebook friend Alex Bensky reminded me of the advantage to me of transgendering:
Ah, then we'd be unable to criticize your politics, your social viewpoints, your choice of teams to root for, and anything else you say because we'd be transphobic.
As a footnote, I've seen an estimate that the transgender population is about 0.05% of the population. This is hardly a warrant for beating up people but it is not clear to me why unless we substantially alter social arrangements that have existed in almost every known human society and celebrate...not just accept but celebrate...transgenderism, we are mean, hateful people.
Victor Davis Hanson offered up the most succinct summary of Blasey Ford's testimony:
I want you to pay attention to the distortions of language and statistics used to advance the gynocrats' agenda.
Since when do those accusing others of crimes become "survivors" rather than "accusers"? How you frame your self-description affects views, doesn't it? If you claimed that someone had raped you, why must we always believe you just because you tag yourself "a survivor"? Do we do this with those who claim to have been robbed or beaten? "I'm a robbery survivor, so you have to believe me when I say X robbed me." The shift in language is to message that accusers must always be believed. It is, at heart, based on a gross distortion of statistics.
It is difficult for many reasons to determine the percentage of false rape claims, to be sure, but like the claims about 97% of "climate scientists" and global warming, the assertion that only 2% of women's rape claims are false is itself demonstrably false. We don't know the answer, and since we don't, we should not upset laws and precepts guaranteeing due process for all those accused of the crime – men and women alike.
Indirect data, in fact, highly suggest that far more than two percent of rape accusations are false. The 2% genesis was a handout from Susan Brownmiller's file. (Brownmiller, the author of Against Our Will, Men, Women and Rape, argued that existing definitions of rape were a tool of male dominance.) It was her "interpretation of some data, now a quarter-century old, of unknown provenance from a single police department unit."
This fact is significant because based on this dubious statistic, efforts are made to transform rape accusations into a strict liability offense. Those who believe this nonsense contend that if only half of the accusations result in convictions, the definition of "consent" must be altered, making intent irrelevant to the crime and creating "a new breed of strict liability."
Brownmiller's desire to revise the definition (indeed, the meaning of sex crimes involving women) was not the only fake statistic used to turn the presumption of innocence on its head.
The same kind of jiggered statistics were used to justify Title IX tribunals in colleges where men were grossly mistreated following false accusations. The Duke lacrosse team and University of Virginia cases come to mind, but daily we read of men who fought back, were reinstated to college, and even won substantial damages because their schools followed the Obama Department of Education's gynocratic star chamber policies. Those policies were based on an equally suspect claim that 20% of college women experienced a sexual assault. Countless others doubtless lacked the financial ability to do so and had their lives damaged if not ruined by campus star chambers.
I have to agree with Powerline blog's John Hinderaker:
And the pussy-hatted women are telling us they can do this to you whether or not you are a Republican, as long as you are a man.
Really, guys, you have to fight this. You pick your weapon. You can march around in penis hats and accost senators in elevators demanding that since some men have been falsely accused of rape, all accusations of rape must be deemed falsely made. You can call a nationwide strike by men. Let the women dig the ditches, fix the electrical wires and telephone lines, fight all the fires and wars, and conduct all the police work and intricate surgeries. Do all the countless things men do every day to protect all of us – men and women alike.
Or maybe, like me, you can vow to never vote for a Democrat again and fight tooth and nail against such efforts to distort our constitutional rights to due process.
My Facebook friend Alex Bensky reminded me of the advantage to me of transgendering:
Ah, then we'd be unable to criticize your politics, your social viewpoints, your choice of teams to root for, and anything else you say because we'd be transphobic.
As a footnote, I've seen an estimate that the transgender population is about 0.05% of the population. This is hardly a warrant for beating up people but it is not clear to me why unless we substantially alter social arrangements that have existed in almost every known human society and celebrate...not just accept but celebrate...transgenderism, we are mean, hateful people.
Victor Davis Hanson offered up the most succinct summary of Blasey Ford's testimony:
The "process" of memorializing Ford's testimony involved a strange inversion of constitutional norms: The idea of a statute of limitations is ossified; hearsay is legitimate testimony; inexact and contradictory recall is proof of trauma, and therefore of validity; the burden of proof is on the accused, not the accuser; detail and evidence are subordinated to assumed sincerity; proof that one later relates an allegation to another is considered proof that the assault actually occurred in the manner alleged; motive is largely irrelevant; the accuser establishes the guidelines of the state's investigation of the allegations; and the individual allegation gains credence by cosmic resonance with all other such similar allegations.Unless, however, you do not want to transgender, I want to note how we came to such a place, a place both ridiculous and dangerous.
I want you to pay attention to the distortions of language and statistics used to advance the gynocrats' agenda.
Since when do those accusing others of crimes become "survivors" rather than "accusers"? How you frame your self-description affects views, doesn't it? If you claimed that someone had raped you, why must we always believe you just because you tag yourself "a survivor"? Do we do this with those who claim to have been robbed or beaten? "I'm a robbery survivor, so you have to believe me when I say X robbed me." The shift in language is to message that accusers must always be believed. It is, at heart, based on a gross distortion of statistics.
It is difficult for many reasons to determine the percentage of false rape claims, to be sure, but like the claims about 97% of "climate scientists" and global warming, the assertion that only 2% of women's rape claims are false is itself demonstrably false. We don't know the answer, and since we don't, we should not upset laws and precepts guaranteeing due process for all those accused of the crime – men and women alike.
Indirect data, in fact, highly suggest that far more than two percent of rape accusations are false. The 2% genesis was a handout from Susan Brownmiller's file. (Brownmiller, the author of Against Our Will, Men, Women and Rape, argued that existing definitions of rape were a tool of male dominance.) It was her "interpretation of some data, now a quarter-century old, of unknown provenance from a single police department unit."
This fact is significant because based on this dubious statistic, efforts are made to transform rape accusations into a strict liability offense. Those who believe this nonsense contend that if only half of the accusations result in convictions, the definition of "consent" must be altered, making intent irrelevant to the crime and creating "a new breed of strict liability."
Brownmiller's desire to revise the definition (indeed, the meaning of sex crimes involving women) was not the only fake statistic used to turn the presumption of innocence on its head.
The same kind of jiggered statistics were used to justify Title IX tribunals in colleges where men were grossly mistreated following false accusations. The Duke lacrosse team and University of Virginia cases come to mind, but daily we read of men who fought back, were reinstated to college, and even won substantial damages because their schools followed the Obama Department of Education's gynocratic star chamber policies. Those policies were based on an equally suspect claim that 20% of college women experienced a sexual assault. Countless others doubtless lacked the financial ability to do so and had their lives damaged if not ruined by campus star chambers.
Statistics surrounding sexual assault are notoriously unreliable and inconsistent, primarily because of vague and expansive definitions of what qualifies as sexual assault. Christina Hoff Sommers of the American Enterprise Institute explains that the study often cited as the origin of the "one in five" factoid is an online survey conducted under a grant from the Justice Department. Surveyors employed such a broad definition that "'forced kissing" and even "attempted forced kissing" qualified as sexual assault.It is in this fevered atmosphere, where women are led to believe that all men are rapists or would-be rapists, that a charge made months earlier with a request for anonymity and kept hidden by Senator Feinstein (but not from the Washington Post) was finally disclosed, with demands for a reopened hearing on the suitability of Judge Brett Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court. He has, without doubt, a pristine reputation. The accusation was vague – no date, no place were given. The others she claimed were present, like the nominee, all denied the claim under penalty of perjury. On examination by a mild prosecutor, Rachel Mitchell from Arizona, Ford made a number of inconsistent statements and other assertions that were hardly credible. Miss Mitchell notified the committee that had she received this information as a prosecutor, she would not have filed a charge against Kavanaugh and doubted she would even have been able to get a search warrant issued.
The Bureau of Justice Statistics' "Violent Victimization of College Students" report tells a different and more plausible story about campus culture. During the years surveyed, 1995-2002, the DOJ found that there were six rapes or sexual assaults per thousand per year. Across the nation's four million female college students, that comes to about one victim in forty students. Other DOJ statistics show that the overall rape rate is in sharp decline: since 1995, the estimated rate of female rape or sexual assault victimizations has decreased by about 60 percent. ...
Bolstered by inflated statistics and alarmist depictions of campus culture, advocates have been successful in initiating policy changes designed to better protect victims of sexual violence. Duke, Swarthmore, Amherst, Emerson and the University of North Carolina are among the many institutions that have recently reviewed and revised their policies. It is not clear that these policies have made campuses safer places for women, but they have certainly made them treacherous places for falsely accused men.
I have to agree with Powerline blog's John Hinderaker:
If we can do this to the Boy Scout Brett Kavanaugh, we can do it to anyone. Are you thinking of serving in a Republican administration? Or accepting an appointment to the federal judiciary from a Republican president? Think twice, and then think again.Hinderaker is right about the strategy of the Democrats in Kavanaugh's case, but Brownmiller, the Obama Department of Education, and the various left-wing organizations and their media cohorts have created an atmosphere within which they could commit this outrage.
Because our smear machine will reach back to middle school if necessary. If we can't find any dirt on you, we will manufacture some. There is no depth to which we will not stoop, and your honesty, integrity and spotless reputation are no match for our control over the media and our determination to dredge up ridiculous allegations against anyone who stands in our way.
Really, the more ridiculous the better. If we can accuse Brett Kavanaugh, one of the most respected lawyers and judges in America, of gang rape, we can accuse anyone of anything! And our insane accusations will dominate the news.
That is the Democratic Party's message. And we have learned from the Christine Ford fiasco that accusations don't require corroborating evidence. A single wacky, false allegation will negate decades of hard work on behalf of the American people. ...
Given that strategy, the fact that they are smearing a man of obviously sterling character on absurdly flimsy grounds is not a bug, it is a feature. The fact that the Democrats' smears are so patently false is ultimately their main point.
The Democrats are telling us: Republicans, beware – if this can happen to Brett Kavanaugh, it can happen to anyone. You'd better go quietly and cede power to us.
And the pussy-hatted women are telling us they can do this to you whether or not you are a Republican, as long as you are a man.
Really, guys, you have to fight this. You pick your weapon. You can march around in penis hats and accost senators in elevators demanding that since some men have been falsely accused of rape, all accusations of rape must be deemed falsely made. You can call a nationwide strike by men. Let the women dig the ditches, fix the electrical wires and telephone lines, fight all the fires and wars, and conduct all the police work and intricate surgeries. Do all the countless things men do every day to protect all of us – men and women alike.
Or maybe, like me, you can vow to never vote for a Democrat again and fight tooth and nail against such efforts to distort our constitutional rights to due process.
Clarice Feldman
Source: https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2018/09/life_in_a_gynocracy.html
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