Posted by Scott on December 31st, 2006 — Posted in Facts and Stats, Politics & Commentary
In my recent article, The Danger of False Accusations, I call false accusations of sexual victimization one of the greatest hindrances to the active opposition to sexual victimization. In the article, I contend that men tend to rightfully fear false accusations, and thus hesitate to support (one-sided) anti-rape and anti-sexual-assault programs.
Many people - mostly women - questioned the commonness or danger of false accusations, and thus questioned the rightfulness of men’s fear. However, numerous statistics exist on the matter:
According to a nine-year study conducted by former Purdue sociologist Eugene J. Kanin, in over 40 percent of the cases reviewed, the complainants eventually admitted that no rape had occurred (“Archives of Sexual Behavior,” Vol. 23, No. 1, 1994). Kanin also studied rape allegations in two large Midwestern universities and found that 50 percent of the allegations were recanted by the accuser.
Read entire article by Glenn Sacks.
According to Linda Fairstein, who heads the NYC District Attorney’s Sex Crime Unit, about half of all reported rape claims are false.
According to a 1996 Department of Justice Report, of approximately 10,000 sexual assault cases analyzed with DNA evidence, 2,000 excluded the primary suspect.
Wendy McElroy is the editor of ifeminists.com and author and editor of many books and articles, including the new book, Liberty for Women: Freedom and Feminism in the 21st Century. And, Wendy Mcelroy says that, “False accusations are not rare. They are common.”
Glenn Sacks describes the damage false accusations can cause by saying:
…rape is a horrible crime. But false accusations of rape are every bit as horrible. They are a form of psychological rape that can emotionally, socially, and economically destroy a person even if there is no conviction, especially for those of less fame and fortune than Bryant. The stigma attaches to the falsely accused for life. Few believe them and few care. Prosecutors systematically refuse to prosecute the perpetrators. And victims’ advocates like Murphy refuse to see falsely accused men as victims, and instead work to minimize and conceal the problem.
Most often false accusers aim their accusations at men. While the media and activist organizations tend to pressure men to sympathize with the threat women face of being sexually victimized, these same women seem to care little about the justified fear men have of false accusations. Even without a conviction, a false accusation can ruin a person’s life, financially, emotionally, and socially.
Unless anti-rape and anti-sexual-assault activists and organizations respect the prevalence of false accusations and the damage they cause men, these activists will fail. Men tend to fear false accusations as women tend to fear sexual victimization. I want to stop both sexual victimization and false accusations. I want to stop, prosecute, and jail both false accusers and sexual victimizers. To do that successfully, we all must work together to find ways to simultaneously prevent both false accusations and sexual victimizations.
Since one side fears false accusations and the other fears sexual victimizations, any organization that takes a one-sided approach and comes out fervently against only one of these problems meets with opposition from the other side. In contrast, an organization which simultaneously fights to prevent both false accusations and sexual victimization can get cooperative support from both sides.
What do you think?
1 Comment »
Posted by Scott on December 28th, 2006 — Posted in Guns
There is universality to the firearms and self-defense debate that surfaces in almost every country of the world. The debates over public policy in each country sound very similar to those we experience in the United States.
Perhaps that is because the issues are universal: people everywhere can debate the moral and social arguments for arming the good people against the threat of the evil ones who seem to be everywhere.
The British have pretty much outlawed not only guns but self-defense and crime has skyrocketed. As a result there are recent reports of members of Parliament who would revise the laws in an attempt to re-balance the scales in the battle between good and evil. It may not happen very soon, but the debate in Britain is shifting back to serious discussions about establishing some rules to allow people to defend themselves against the criminals who ignore all laws. In Canada, the debate which was once closed has also reopened.
“Firearms are used 60 times more often to protect lives than to take lives. Often times, the gun is never fired and no blood (including the criminal’s) is shed. For every accidental death, suicide or homicide with firearms, 10 lives are saved through defensive use,” Feria added.
Read entire Hawaii Reporter article by Joseph P. Tartaro.
The innocent people of society need to defend themselves from victimizers by putting the victimizers in jail, and denying victimizers the opportunity to use whatever tools and influences caused them or allowed them to commit their acts of victimization. Not only would it be detrimental for the society to waste its resources arresting innocent gun-owners, but also it would be detrimental to deny innocent people the freedom to protect themselves with guns.
Let all innocent people defend themselves however they want insofar as they do not offensively harm anyone else. (In fact, as a lover-of-freedom, I say let innocent people do whatever they want insofar as they do not offensively harm anyone else.) Put victimizers in jail regardless of whether or not they use guns to commit victimization.
What do you think?
3 Comments »
Posted by Scott on December 24th, 2006 — Posted in News, Politics & Commentary
Military sexual assault survivors and their advocates say the case of Suzanne Swift typifies the Pentagon’s failure to address the prevalence of sexual assault inside its ranks, as well as the unmet needs of survivors and the impunity enjoyed by assailants.
Swift went AWOL in January to avoid deployment with a battalion in which she underwent repeated incidents of sexual harassment and abuse. Now she is being thrown in the brig while only one of her three alleged transgressors has received so much as a letter of reprimand.
For her decision to evade the Army instead of deploying to Iraq with a unit she considered unsafe, Swift was demoted from specialist to private and given 30 days’ confinement.
In order to avoid a harsher sentence, she agreed to plead guilty and sign a Stipulation of Fact that states only that she was “harassed” and that she “engaged in a sexual relationship with her squad leader.” It mentions nothing about her allegations that the relationship was coerced and took place under threat of punishment.
A study headed by Anne Sadler, coordinator of the post-traumatic stress clinical team at the Veterans Administration hospital in Iowa City, found that Swift’s experience was not uncommon.
That nationwide survey, which included women whose terms of service fell between 1961 and 2003, found that more than three-quarters of the respondents reported experiencing sexual harassment during their military service; a third suffered one or more completed or attempted rapes.
However, only 26 percent of the rape survivors reported it through official channels while in active duty. The most common reasons given were fear that the report would negatively impact the survivor’s career or make things worse. A belief that nothing would be done and fear that they would be blamed by their co-workers were also prominent concerns. A shocking 19 percent thought that “rape [is] an expected part of military service.”
The VA study also found that among respondents who had experienced a rape or attempted rape, in most cases survivors did not report because the designated go-to man was either the rapist himself or a friend of the rapist.
Sexualized violence is reported at much higher rates in the military than in the general civilian population. According to the Centers for Disease Control, 17 percent of civilian women report having survived rape or attempted rape in contrast with 30 percent of women surveyed for the VA study.
While the reasons for elevated sexual violence inside the military are unclear, the VA study found that an overall climate where sexual harassment is condoned and “hostile work environments” were key factors. In addition, the study found, “officers allowing or initiating sexually demeaning comments or gestures towards female soldiers was associated with a three- to four-fold increase in likelihood of rape.”
Read entire NewStandard article by Jessica Pupovac.
I find it horrifically disturbing that the military administration and indeed the whole country systemically ignore the victimization of these troops such as Suzanne Swift who dedicate themselves to protecting the rest of us.
One could argue that Swift deserved her official punishment of confinement, in that she broke the law by abandoning her position and going AWOL. However, if the military administration hadn’t systemically ignored and covered up the rampant sexual victimizations taking place against innocent troops such as had happened to Swift beforehand, then Swift would have had no reason to go AWOL. The extremely disgusting failure of the military administration caused the understandable - but criminal - choice of Swift. Considering the exceptional circumstances, I personally would have liked to see the charges against Swift dropped, and let her leave her battalion and/or the army without reprimand, but clearly the military administrators just want to cover their own backs by covering up their tolerance of sexual victimization.
What do you thinK?
1 Comment »
Posted by Scott on December 21st, 2006 — Posted in News
Each holiday season, police departments and media remind people they would make fine targets for criminals.
Retailers prepare for billions in shoplifting losses.
The National Crime Prevention Council issues a pamphlet warning that crooks love the holidays because the season makes “an opportune time for crime.”
Do we really have more to fear during the holidays? And, if so, what can we do to protect ourselves?
The Times talked to police, security experts and academics for answers.
Does crime really leap?
Local police didn’t agree on a spike in general holiday season crime, but officials said a few specific crimes jump each year.
“One of your biggest things is thefts from vehicles,” said Assistant Chief Hollis Dorrough of the South Holland Police Department.
And more pockets are picked and purses snatched during the holidays, police agreed. Women make popular targets, Lansing Police Chief Daniel McDevitt said.
“Not that there aren’t some (thieves) that can do it, but it’s a … lot harder to get a wallet out of a man’s pants,” he said.
You might think burglaries would increase during the holidays, when homes are filled with new merchandise. But only one police official reported an increase in burglaries during the holidays. Burglaries shoot up in Gary during the holidays, said Lt. Roger Smith, a 23-year veteran of the department.
Myth’ of holiday crime
Neither residents nor retailers face dramatic jumps in old-fashioned, hands-on crime, said Chris McGoey, a security consultant for retailers nationwide. Stores are busier and malls are more stressful, but stores and parking lots are full of potential witnesses, he said.
Neither McGoey nor Purdue University Calumet criminologist Richard Van Orman could pinpoint any national crime statistics on the topic, but Van Orman agreed that crime as a whole doesn’t increase during the holidays.
Other than the depressing uptick in suicides — killing oneself is illegal — crime actually may decrease during the holidays, Van Orman said.
The National Retail Federation estimated stores lost $37.4 billion to crime in 2005. The federation said retailers expect to lose $3.5 billion on fraudulent returns alone this holiday season.
The biggest problems don’t come from shoplifters, McGoey said, but from employees and criminals committing fraud.
Read entire nwitimes.com article by Dan Hinkle.
I caught a few minutes of the TV news the other day and from the over-reporting of holiday crime viewers may get a mistaken picture. While property crime probably increases during the holiday season, the news appears to over-emphasize it. The article above seems to give a more accurate picture. Regardless, during the holiday season especially, people and stores want to protect themselves. Keep yourself safe, carry as little money as possible, and don’t leave merchandise or cash unattended.
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Posted by Scott on December 19th, 2006 — Posted in Facts and Stats
Take a look at preliminary violent crime rates during the first six months of 2006 compared with the first six months of 2005.
Violent crimes overall: +3.7 percent
Murders: +1.4 percent
Forcible rape: -0.1 percent
Robbery: +9.7 percent
Aggravated assault: +1.2 percent
Property crimes overall: -2.6 percent
Burglaries: +1.2 percent
Larceny-theft: -3.8 percent
Motor vehicle theft: -2.3 percent
Arson: +6.8 percent
Source: FBI Semiannual Uniform Crime Report, January-June 2006
With these numbers, overall I’d call the violent crime rates stagnant. Unfortunately, stagnant means that still nearly 100,000 forcible rapes take place yearly in the United States, and that U.S. citizens are the victims of around a quarter of a billion crimes per year. I find that horrifically ridiculous. Let’s stop wasting resources on such things as “victimless crimes” and start using our resources to drastically reduce the violent crime rates.
What do you think?
1 Comment »
Posted by Scott on December 18th, 2006 — Posted in Guns
Tampa Bay running back Errict Rhett was making a career of fearlessly confronting 300-pound linemen and rock-solid linebackers, but his first encounter with real, heart-thumping fright came the day he faced a .45-caliber muzzle.
That was a decade ago[…]
“My heart started beating so fast it was uncontrollable,” he said. “I’ve never been so scared. The whole world got quiet.”
That moment changed him. Rhett, like a lot of other professional athletes, decided he would never again leave home without his own concealed handgun.
While NBA and NFL officials decline to estimate how many players are licensed to carry weapons, a spate of recent gun incidents involving professional and college players has revealed that numerous athletes apparently are armed.
NBA Commissioner David Stern tackled the subject during his annual preseason conference call in October, saying he prefers that players keep their guns at home.
“We think this is an alarming subject,” Stern said. “Although you’ll read players saying how they feel safer with guns, in fact those guns actually make them less safe.”
The commissioner argued that carrying a gun dramatically increases “your chances of being shot by one.”
Todd Boyd, a critical studies professor at USC specializing in pop culture, calls guns part of the real world of many young athletes.
“So many of these players come from impoverished, urban or rural South environments,” Boyd said. “Now you talk about that kid becoming an NBA player, making a lot of money, wearing expensive jewelry, driving expensive cars, and coming from a culture where you have to protect yourself — it’s no surprise they’re taking steps to cover each other.
“Of course, the guys who are smart have guys around them with guns — bodyguards.”
After his encounter with the .45-caliber handgun at a Tampa carwash and barbershop, when Rhett was able to talk his way out of trouble, he went on to play another five seasons in the NFL — after the Buccaneers, he went to the Ravens and the Cleveland Browns.
And he remained an armed athlete.
“It’s a simple reason,” he said. “You want to protect yourself with a gun, not flaunt it.”
Read entire article by Lance Pugmire.
These young and glamorous athletes epitomize the same universal rules that apply to everyone else. Anyone can need or want guns, or other weapons, for self-defense. Guns and other weapons are tools. Used intelligently by someone who only wants to defend himself or others, guns help out a lot. However, used foolishly and/or maliciously, guns can put both the bearer and the rest of us in danger.
So long as someone does not offensively harm or try to offensively harm anyone else, then let them keep their self-defense tools, whether guns or something else. However, if someone commits a victimizing crime, such as assault, with a gun or not, then I say let us disallow that person from possessing guns and other tools that may drive the person to commit an act of victimization, or help the person commit an act of victimization.
I personally think that more often than not it is unwise to carry a gun, namely concerning untrained carriers. More often than not, I find guns less effective than other less-dangerous self-defense tools, such as pepper spray, tasers, or martial arts. Nonetheless, it is the judgment of the individual to decide which tools he or she wishes to use in their life. Accordingly, it is the decision of an innocent and mentally-competent person to decide if he/she wants to carry or not carry a gun.
What do you think?
3 Comments »
Posted by Scott on December 17th, 2006 — Posted in Politics & Commentary
by Scott Hughes
I have written quite a few published articles on self-defense and violence prevention. (See: Self-Defense: End Victimization and Women’s Safety: Tools For A Self-Defense Strategy.) Most adamantly, I have condemned rape and sexual assault. Not only have I condemned the sexual assailants themselves, but also I expressed my sickening disgust with us, the people of society, for not doing more to prevent sexual victimization.
Indeed, we similarly need to prevent all victimization, but I see sexual victimization as generally the most disgusting and horrific type of victimization.
Nonetheless, we need to realize and respect how easily a false accusation can indirectly victimize a non-victimizer.
We all already know this. For example, we know that a false accusation from a women about sexual crimes can essentially destroy a man’s life, and we know this happens often. We know the power of unfounded rumors, and false accusations are worse than rumors.
I think it’s possible that a false accusation can be worse than sexual victimization. For example, I think it’s possible that it could be worse to be accused of sexual assault than to be assaulted.
I think a lot of people, men especially, fear activism against sexual victimization for that reason, and rightfully so. People, women especially, fear sexual victimization. Also though, people, men especially, fear false accusations of sexual victimization.
Rape is a terrible thing, but so are false accusations. Both of those problems plague our society.
A false accusation of such magnitude as rape can turn an otherwise stable life upside down.
The point is that people, men especially, rightfully fear being falsely accused of sexual victimization.
That rightful fear hinders the active fight against sexual victimization. Our society is plagued by preventable victimization. We have the resources to prevent these terrible victimizations, including not only rape and sexual assault, but also murder, theft, and such. There’s an assortment of reasons why the people of society fail to prevent these disgusting crimes. These reasons do include simply laziness and distractedness, among many other causes. Nonetheless, activists oven overlook the major hindrance caused by the justified fear of false accusations.
When activists, who actively oppose sexual victimization, try to recruit the help and cooperation of others and society as a whole, these activists often fail to understand the hesitance of others and society. The rightful fear of false accusations motivates this hesitation.
We all want to prevent victimization, whether in the form of false accusations or sexual assault, or any other form of victimization. We need to recruit others to this cause and create empowered organizations based on voluntary solidarity to defend ourselves from victimization and rectify past victimizations (such as suing or fining a vandal for the cost of the damages the vandal caused).
Thus, we need to work in a way that protects people from both false accusations and sexual victimization. For example, we must respect the burden of proof and treat an accused sexual criminal as innocent until proven guilty. We must do that not simply for the sake of the accused person, buy also for the sake of victims and potential victims of sexual crimes, because if we make enemies of our peers by treating accused victimizers as guilty, thus making innocent people who may potentially be falsely accused one day fearful, then we will bicker and battle with each other, creating stagnation in our activism, and thus allowing sexual crime and false accusations to still reign. In contrast, if we treat people as both socially and legally innocent until proven guilty, then we can work together to prevent victimization and imprison proven victimizers.
In the same way we need to jail sexual victimizers or otherwise hold them criminally liable, we must also try to prevent the damage of false accusations by jailing false accusers or otherwise holding them criminally liable, but, still similarly, only if their accusations are proven false. Even if we suspect someone has made a false accusation, we must treat them innocent until proven guilty for the same reason we must treat someone who has allegedly committed assault as innocent until proven guilty.
If we go to war with each other without proof and don’t treat people as innocent until proven guilty, then we will waste our resources and effort while sexual victimization and false accusations still plague our society. In contrast, we need to work together to come up with solutions that both prevent sexual victimization and the damages caused by false accusations.
For the most part, the problem isn’t legal. In most modern jurisdictions, rape and sexual assault are already illegal. Similarly, in most modern jurisdictions, filing false police reports and perjury are already illegal. Legally speaking, the main obstacles are the lack of enforcement of current laws and the threat of not upholding the innocent until proven guilty standard.
For the most part, the problem is social. It’s private activists and non-governmental organizations who fail to work in such a way that prevents both sexual victimization and false accusations. It’s socially that we treat people as if they’re guilty before they’ve been proven so.
Additionally, once the victimization has taken place–whether it’s a sex crime or a false accusation–the damage has already been done. Granted, we need to jail victimizers–both false accusers and sexual criminals–to prevent them from continuing their victimizing behavior, and we need to rehabilitate them. Only the use of prevention can stop the problem. To stop the problem, we must keep potential victims out of dangerous situations and reduce the threat of victimization. Sure we need to utilize physical self-defense and the legal system, but once a person is attacked we’ve essentially already failed.
The onus is on activists, non-governmental organizations, and private individuals. Let’s work together to prevent victimization, and namely put an end to false accusations and sexual crime.
About The Author: Scott Hughes runs this blog.
19 Comments »
Posted by Scott on December 9th, 2006 — Posted in Politics & Commentary
A bill that would expand the limits of legal self-defense in Arkansas was pre-filed Thursday in advance of the 2007 legislative session, which starts Jan. 8.
State Rep. Mike Burris, D-Malvern, pre-filed House Bill 1027, the proposed “Stand Your Ground Law.”
The bill would permit the use of deadly force against a person forcibly entering a dwelling or occupiable structure, unless the person is a lawful resident of the structure and is not violating a protective order or no-contact order.
It also would permit the use of deadly force against a person who is removing a person from a dwelling or occupiable structure against his or her will, unless the person being removed is a child, grandchild or other person in the legal custody of the person doing the removing.
The bill would not permit the use of deadly force by a person engaged in unlawful activity, nor would it permit deadly force against a law enforcement officer who enters a structure in the performance of his or her duties, if the officer identifies himself or herself or if the person who uses deadly force knows or should know that the other person is a law enforcement officer.
The bill would eliminate language in the state’s existing self-defense law that requires a person to retreat, if possible, before using deadly force to defend a person.
Read entire Arkansas News Bureau article by John Lyon.
I adamantly oppose all forms of offensive harm, coercion, or violence. However, I wholeheartedly support the use of solely defensive force as a means to stop or prevent offensive harm.
Accordingly, I support this bill, and the rights protected by it. That does not mean I support violence or a “shoot-first” philosophy, but simply that I wish for citizens to have the legal right to choose to defend themselves in whatever way they feel necessary and best, insofar as they do not offensively harm any innocent person. In many cases, it may be wiser to flee rather than fight, but it’s the defenders prerogative to choose which option they feel is wiser. The last thing we need is a nanny-state using offensive coercion to tell people how to defend themselves.
Insofar as a person does not offensively harm any innocent people, let them have the freedom to defend themselves (and indeed the freedom to do anything) in any way they choose.
The right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness includes the right to defend those rights.
What do you think?
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Posted by Scott on December 6th, 2006 — Posted in News
An off-duty St. Louis city police officer is being questioned after investigators say he shot his sister during an argument around 2:00 a.m. Wednesday on Vera Cruz in Affton.
St. Louis County Police say the woman was grazed in the head and suffered non-life threatening injuries.
Investigators add the off-duty officer acted in self-defense.
There is no word on why the two were arguing.
Read myfoxstl.com article.
Although we have to wait for all the facts to get out before making a judgment, I find it very suspicious for a fully-trained off-duty police officer to need to shoot his sister in an argument in “self-defense.” Why couldn’t he just leave before the argument? Even if his sister had attacked him, was shooting her really necessary? Couldn’t he have diffused the situation before it came to that, anyway?
What do you think?
4 Comments »
Posted by Scott on December 4th, 2006 — Posted in TBTN
The phrases “Reclaim The Night” and “Take Back the Night” refer to international marches and rallies intended as direct action and protests opposing forms of violence against women such as rape. It originated with the radical feminist movement.
The term “Take Back the Night” comes from the title of a memorial read by Anne Pride in 1977 at a Pittsburgh anti-violence rally. The first march of “Reclaim the Night” was held in 1976 in Belgium by the women attending the International Tribunal on Crimes Against Women. The women marched together in solidarity, holding candles to protest the ways in which violence permeates the lives of women globally.
Events usually consist of a rally, followed by a march, and often finished with a candlelight vigil or speak-out on violence against women. The marches are often intentionally women-only, in order to symbolize women’s individual walk through darkness, and to demonstrate that united women can resist violence and fear. (Other marches include men; the organization differs as each event is organized locally.)
In agreement with TBTN, this blog adamantly opposes violence against women. It tears my heart apart to think of preventable suffering inflicted on women by other human beings, including the nearly 100,000 rapes that take place in the U.S. yearly. See: Self-Defense: End Victimization! and Tools For Self-Defense Strategy. I have included the following links about TBTN:
Take Back the Night at James Madison University
Take Back the Night - Will County, Illinois
History Of Reclaim The Night
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Posted by Scott on December 2nd, 2006 — Posted in News
“There is a serious problem with store-bought accessories,” points out Guy Dar, an expert in self-defense who teaches a hand-to-hand combat technique. In most cases, notes Dar, you do not have enough time to pull out the stun gun or tear gas canister, and thus it is much better to first try reacting with your hands or with articles that are readily available in any case. Dar believes the most effective self-defense items are ordinary items that you usually carry in your purse anyway. In this category he includes such easily accessible articles as keys, pencils, rings, even the purse itself.
The advantage of these items is twofold. First, you do not have to prepare them in advance or dig them out from the bottom of your purse. Second, they can take your assailant by surprise: They look innocent and, besides, he is probably assuming that you are a weak and completely defenseless woman.
“A woman who is attacked is not interested in fighting her assailant to overcome him,” explains Dar. “The only thing she wants to do is to stun him for a few seconds so that she can run away or call for help.”
In Dar’s view, the first principle in self-defense should be prevention: Spend a few more seconds surveying the area before you emerge from your car, take a closer look at the dark stairwell before you ascend it, and look to your left and your right before entering an elevator.
Another way of protecting yourself, says Dar, is to think ahead: “Women who are afraid of being attacked - and that is the situation we are facing today - should conduct a few mental exercises, in which they say to themselves what they plan to do if the worst happens, and they are attacked.” According to Dar, that way of thinking can prepare you for such an emergency and can promote a more effective response in a real-life crisis.
Read entire Harretz article.
This article points out an important point about self-defense: it doesn’t matter what weapons or tools a woman has on her; they’re useless without education. Education on self-defense, prevention, and avoidance teaches the student how to defend themselves, which the student needs to successfully defend themselves.
What do you think?
5 Comments »
