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Should the Duke Accuser's Name be Published Now? | 97 comments (97 topical)
Re: Should the Duke Accuser's Name be Published No (none / 0) (#85)
by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 01:30:49 PM EST
Perhaps you and J Pierpont Flathead should be more concerned with the number of rapes that go unreported.... Thank you for your assurances on the impacts of actual rape. I had never heard that before. Let me assure you too, that the impacts of false allegations are devastating indeed, leading to the loss of friends and family, career devastation, financial ruin, and suicide. Assuming that false allegations of rape occur significantly more frequently than for other classes of crime, than why should I be any more or less concerned with the number of rapes that go unreported than with the number of false allegations of rape that are made? Why should society say that ruining ones life through rape is more or less horrible than the ruining of ones life through prosecution of a false allegation? In fact, it seems the prosecution of a false allegation is worse in that the former is an act of omission and the latter an act of comission. Is there any reason that my desire to bring down the number of false allegations of rape would conflict with my desire to both increase the amount of reports of actual rape, and bring down the incidents of actual rape itself? I believe these are all desirable goals and I do what I can to support all three. My concern is that if you try to increase the number of reports of actual rapes, but fail to consider how that might lead to an increase in the number of reports of false rape, than you will create a system with poor incentives. A system that ignores the reports of false rape. I worry that that is what we have, especially when I read the comments on this thread such as your own that cavalierly dismiss the impacts of false allegations.

Should the Duke Accuser's Name be Published Now? | 97 comments (97 topical)

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