samiam
27d ago
Most of your post made some excellent points but I feel the final paragraph was not necessary, kind, nor true.
an infographic they made (and which doesn't render for me on the archived page—possibly a skill issue)
Yes, the infographic was removed from that page over the years. Here’s a picture of the infographic. As an aside, when Amanda Marcotte (a radical left-wing feminist, if you ask me) says the infographic is wrong, there probably are methodological issues with it.
Yes, I linked to that study, but since I linked to a contradicting study, I think it’s more fair and reasonable to conclude I don’t have an opinion either way than me making an “implication of equivalent credibility”. My general view is that I am not qualified to have a strong opinion on the issue, [1] although like you I think concluding only 0.2% of rape accusations are false is probably an emotional appeal which doesn’t survive cold logic (and even Amanda Marcotte feels that way, for the record). But I credit the Enliven project for at least showing their homework; most social media graphs like this are completely made up.
The only opinion I have is that there are enough false rape accusations out there that people accused of rape deserve due process and presumption of innocence, not this “believe all women” nonsense.
Something about that study, however, elicited a very intense emotional reaction from you, as evidenced by the bad faith accusations such as “throwing out links without reading them”.
When I read the entire PBS article, as I did when it first came out, my impression was that it discredited Reade’s accusation because, logistically, it just wasn’t possible for Biden to assault her that way in the place she claimed to have been assaulted.
The sense I get from other posters is a negative emotional reaction to PBS, since PBS is a “blue tribe” source of information, and some people here have a negative emotional reaction to any and all “blue tribe” sources. In the particular case of the Reade accusations, PBS had to present a strong case that Reade was full of it, but they had to, since their audience when they wrote that article had a large number of “believe all women” readers, do so in a way without directly contradicting the “believe all women” mantra, which is why the article presents a lot of evidence without making stronger conclusions.
Indeed, one thing I notice is that when I support the red tribe here, I get upvoted, but when I support the blue tribe, I get downvoted. I don’t think it’s helpful to be an echo chamber for either side, but since most places default to left-of-center opinions (where I often get downvoted and/or buried when I question blue tribe talking points), I also come here to try and get a balanced world view, ideally without excessive emotion.
[1] I do have strong opinions on other issues, such as the claim that 80% of the women sleep with 20% of the men, but that’s an issue I have researched deeply enough to have a strong opinion about.
She claimed in the complaint he wanted her to serve drinks. Other people said Biden wouldn’t ask a woman to serve drinks at a fundraiser in that manner, so the supposed complaint would clearly have false statements in it. Therefore the evidence points to there being no complaint. My argument was reasonable.
There were other arguments one could make that Reade's complaint was false, yes, which are also valid—you presented a different but also valid argument.
what happened to Tara's contemporaneous sexual harassment complaint?
There was no complaint because, as per the PBS article, people who worked with Biden did not corroborate Reade’s claim in the alleged complaint that she was asked to serve drinks.
What makes you think I didn’t read the article?
samiam
28d ago
Thanks for brining up the allegation against Kavanaugh, who, yes, is a supreme court justice today—we didn’t have a bunch of right wing political colleagues asking Kavanaugh to withdrawal after the allegation was made the way Platner right now is having a bunch of his left wing colleagues asking him to step down.
I actually have already directly addressed the allegation against Kavanaugh, as well as the allegations against Trump in this thread:
If he were a Republican, there’s a good chance he would still be standing (Kavanaugh, Trump, etc.) since conservatives are more inclined to believe in due process and presumption of innocence w.r.t. rape accusations.
Asking a bunch of people who worked or work for Biden if they thought he was a rapist while he is running for president is not a deep or serious investigation.
What constitutes a “serious investigation” in your book?
Keep in mind, the accusation happened in 2019, the alleged event happened in 1993, so we’re looking at a 26-year gap. They interviewed a bunch of people who were there, they checked out the architecture of the place where the rape supposedly happened.
What else could they do to investigate an event that supposedly happened 26 years before?
Now, if you ask me, if someone said “he raped me 26 years ago”, I would be very skeptical unless the person making the accusation had solid evidence backing up their claims. But, today in the post-woke era, there’s the notion that a man needs to prove his innocence if accused of any kind of sexual misconduct.
samiam
28d ago
I feel it was a through and honestly done investigation of what it was like at the time when Reade worked for Biden, and why her alleged sexual assault would had been just about impossible.
The layout of that route and building [where Reade alleged she was sexually assaulted by Biden] has not changed. A recent walk through that area showed the subway tunnel contains no out-of-view areas, like an alcove. The remaining portion of the route includes multiple stairwells as well as corridors lined with offices. It is a main thoroughfare for senators and staffers.
Some former staffers told the NewsHour that if Biden did assault Reade in any of these places, it would have been a brazen attack in an area with a high risk of being seen.
“When I worked in the Senate, it was always crowded [and] packed with lobbyists, staff and tourists,” said Sheila Nix, who was Biden’s chief of staff on the 2012 presidential campaign and previously worked as chief of staff to two other Democratic senators.
samiam
28d ago
There was a credible accusation against Biden and no one cared.
Ms. Reade’s accusation was taken very seriously and thoroughly investigated. One deep investigation concluded the “rape”, as described by Ms. Reade, was not feasible.
Whether it was necessary to go to that depth to prove Biden’s innocence is another question for another day.
samiam
28d ago
Just because Ms. Racicot said that Platner had non-consensual sex with him doesn’t mean that he did, of course. Right now, it’s a “he said—she said” situation, and there’s no way a prosecutor could charge Platner with no more evidence than her testimony, [1] but since there is a leftist “believe all women” streak in the Democratic party, since she has made the claim, Platner’s career is ruined. If he were a Republican, there’s a good chance he would still be standing (Kavanaugh, Trump, etc.) since conservatives are more inclined to believe in due process and presumption of innocence w.r.t. rape accusations.
About that “believe all women” streak, it’s an open question what percent of rape accusations are false rape accusations. I will list two sources with different conclusions:
- Source 1 claims 0.2% of rape accusations are false.
- Source 2 claims 28.8% of rape accusations are false.
Both sources show their homework, so people can look at them and see which source is more reasonable in its methodology.
[1] If she made a complaint right away after the 2021 alleged rape, they could had used a rape kit to prove beyond a reasonable doubt they had sex. It would then be a discussion about whether the sex was consensual, but police could had looked for signs of force being applied in the crime scene when it was still fresh. Five years after the fact, proving it happened is nay to impossible.
I’m really sorry you had to go through that.
As someone posted in a sister post, Scott Alexander wrote an article about false rape rates over 12 years ago and I will quote the relevant parts of that article as they apply to your life:
Some questionable methodologies claim that all false rape accusations are reported as real rapes to the police, but that kind of thinking comes off as motivated reasoning to me, and the false accusation you have had to endure shows that a lot of false accusations aren’t filed with police.
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