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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 20-Sep-2018
20-Sep-18 World View -- Is Christine Blasey Ford accusing the wrong person?

Web Log - September, 2018

20-Sep-18 World View -- Is Christine Blasey Ford accusing the wrong person?

The international #MeToo movement continues to harm women

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

The international #MeToo movement continues to harm women
Is Christine Blasey Ford accusing the wrong person?
The rape statistics

The international #MeToo movement continues to harm women

Brett Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford

Brett Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford

We're told that the #MeToo movement is becoming an increasingly global phenomenon.

In May, the International Labor Organization held a conference to debate whether or not to legislate for a global convention on sexual harassment and abuse in the workplace. Thousands of women in many countries have signed a letter urging international legislation, and saying that a job should never ever include sexual harassment, exploitation, coercion or abuse.

When I wrote about the #MeToo movement late last year, I described how much it was hurting women, just as women in the workplace were enormously harmed by the 1991 hearings for Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas, where Anita Hill accused Thomas of asking her out when they were both single and of telling her a couple of dirty jokes. ( "7-Dec-17 World View -- International #MeToo movement generates backlash against women from 'Mike Pence rule'")

Just as the Anita Hill accusations damaged women in the workplace for a decade, because many men didn't want to work with women, the #MeToo movement is having a similar effect today.

According to a recent survey, 63% of women are "How concerned ... about men being falsely accused of sexual assault and harassment." The same survey showed that 60% of women are "concerned ... about the #MeToo movement causing women to be denied professional opportunities because men are reluctant to work with them."

This corresponds to what I found talking to men in the 1990s, and talking to men today. Earlier this year, after several MeToo scandals broke, one man told me that "working with a woman is like working with an unexploded land mine -- you never know when you'll say the wrong thing a trigger an explosion."

Women need experienced men to be mentors, but today you can't turn on the television without hearing some feminist saying that all older men are automatically guilty, and all should be punished. Hatred of older men is rampant today.

And men know this. Researcher Sylvia Ann Hewlett at the Center for Talent Innovation found that men aren’t comfortable taking female protégés under their wings. "Our research shows that some 64% of senior men avoid solo interactions with junior women because they fear rumors about their motives." And as I said, fearing rumors about the men's motives isn't the half of it, as the quote above about the land mine illustrates.

In my lifetime, I've seen feminist politicians do enormous damage to women. It's OK with them that Bill Clinton allegedly violently raped seven women, but Clarence Thomas committed a crime by telling a dirty joke. That's completely screwed up, and it's feminists who are screwed up, and it's women that they're damaging. Guardian (London) and Law.com and Vox and World Economic Forum

Is Christine Blasey Ford accusing the wrong person?

If the #MeToo movement in general is a circus, then the circus act going on in Washington today is disgusting and pathetic beyond belief.

There's a woman, Christine Blasey Ford accusing a Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, of having attempted a failed sexual assault when they were in high school thirty years ago. This is the kind of pathetic situation that makes so many Americans completely disgusted with politicians and the media, and makes one wonder how the country will ever survive.

There are some statistics about rape that can clarify this situation, but which feminists don't talk about. I'll get to these statistics below.

I spent much of the 1990s decade doing research for a book on gender issues called Fraternizing with the Enemy - A book on gender issues for men and for women who care about men. I researched the whole range of gender issues - divorce, domestic violence, rape, teen motherhood, sexual harassment, child abuse, incest, including detailed discussions of the discussions of Clarence Thomas and Bill Clinton, and the "victims," including Anita Hill and Juanita Broaddrick. The book was based on thousands of interviews and online conversations, as well as extensive research into such things as "feminist legal theory" and "feminist social theory."

The book is available as a free PDF, on my download page, http://generationaldynamics.com/download/.

So here are the most important facts about the Kavanaugh situation, as I understand them:

According to Ford, she and Kavanaugh and a friend were at a party where everyone was drinking a lot, but she can't say exactly where or when, even what year, and her story contains inconsistencies.

According to Ford, Kavanaugh tried to remove her clothes, but she broke free and left the room.

Ford didn't tell anyone until years later, and then didn't mention Kavanaugh's name.

Kavanaugh denies the entire incident, says he doesn't know Ford, wasn't at any such party, and never did anything like that while in high school or after.

Democrats are reflexively saying that Ford is extremely honest, and is telling the truth. Republicans are saying that Kavanaugh is a man of the the highest integrity, but they're withholding judgment until they can look Ford in the eye and question her in a hearing.

Most people think that either Ford or Kavanaugh must be lying, but that's not true. There's a perfectly reasonable scenario in which both are telling the truth. NBC News

The rape statistics

So here are the statistics about rape that feminists don't talk about:

6-7% of all rape charges are phony charges, made my women with emotional problems, or seeking revenge. This is comparable to phony charges in other crimes, so rape is no different than other crimes.

In 25% of stranger rape cases, the victim identifies the wrong person. Once again, this is typical of eyewitness identification in ALL crimes -- 25% of eyewitness identifications were wrong -- so rape is no different from other crimes.

It's this last statistic that may be relevant here. 25% is a very high number, and it's plausible that Ford was assaulted in the way she described, but not by Kavanaugh.

Based on all I've heard about the sincere statements from both Ford and Kavanaugh, a misidentification by Ford seems extremely likely to have happened. This is a perfectly reasonable explanation, and it would mean that both Ford and Kavanaugh are telling the truth, as they know it.

The above statistics about rape were not pulled out of the air. We know these figures because of a remarkable development that occurred in the 1990s -- the use of DNA evidence to identify rapists. In many cases in the 1980s, a man was convicted of rape simply because some woman accused him, and feminists would pipe up and say, "Women are never wrong about rape."

In the 1990s, Barry Scheck's Innocence Project was able to go back and perform DNA tests on the rape kits that had been preserved. Of the first 18,000 DNA tests, 5,000 accused suspects were eliminated -- 27.8%.

Here's a quote from my book, describing a story that was widely publicized in the 1990s:

"One disturbing story was presented on PBS's Frontline. In 1985, Ronald Cotton, a black man with a record, was convicted of raping two women, based on an identification by one of the victims, Jennifer Thomson, who was a very convincing and compelling witness during the trial.
In 1995, DNA tests were performed, and Cotton was exonerated and set free. Who was the real rapist? DNA tests showed it was Bobby Poole, someone whom Jennifer had actually watched testify in court, but who was excluded based on her eyewitness testimony.
According to Jennifer, "I remember feeling just an overwhelming sense of just guilt that if, indeed, we had made a mistake and I had contributed to taking away 11 years of this man's life.... I felt so bad. I fell apart."
But amazingly, she still doesn't recognize Poole as the man who actually raped her. She adds, "I have to accept the answer that's been given to me and put faith in our system that the DNA tests, the science, tells me we had the wrong guy. I just wish I had some answers. I still see Ronald Cotton. And I'm not saying that to point a finger. I'm just saying that's who I see. And I would love to erase that face out of my mind. I would do anything to erase that face out of my mind, but I can't. It's just .. it's in my head. Sometimes it's more fuzzy than others because my mind now says, 'Well, it's Bobby Poole.' But it's still the face I see."

When Bill Clinton was credibly charged by seven women as being a violent serial rapist, the feminists threw the women under the bus. Then Hillary Clinton raped them all again (to use the feminist phrase), along with Monica Lewinsky, by trashing all the women.

Now the feminists are throwing Ford under the bus as well. Senator Dianne Feinstein handled this whole situation in such a way as to inflict maximum damage on Ford. I cannot think of any way she could have harmed Ford more.

She received Ford's letter in July, and sat on it. Then she revealed it at the last minute, and is now refusing to release an unredacted version to the Republicans. This is disastrous for Ford because it suggests that when the letter is finally revealed, it will make Ford look bad, and maybe even exonerate Kavanaugh.

There's another comparison that had to be made. Anita Hill was hated by half of America in the 1990s. Bill Clinton's rape accusers, the ones who were publicly known, were hated by half the country and trashed by Democrats. And now, Ford is saying that she's receiving death threats and have to hide out. Once again, I blame the feminists for this. They're using her as a pawn, and they don't care how much she's hurt. Book: Fraternizing with the Enemy (PDF) and University of Florida and PBS Frontline and Fox News and Chicago Tribune

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(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the 20-Sep-18 World View -- Is Christine Blasey Ford accusing the wrong person? thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (20-Sep-2018) Permanent Link
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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 20-Sep-2018 20-Sep-18 World View -- Is Christine Blasey Ford accusing the wrong person?

The international #MeToo movement continues to harm women

Is Christine Blasey Ford accusing the wrong person?

The rape statistics

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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 20-Sep-2018
20-Sep-18 World View -- Is Christine Blasey Ford accusing the wrong person?