Do you tend to believe the accuser? *warning sensitive topics*

[Sonic_Spork]

Originally Posted by Maddie104

Often what it looks like is someone hiding in plain sight taking advantage of a position of power -- a boss, a priest, a teacher, a coach, a hollywood director, a doctor. These people know exactly what they were doing and norms haven't changed over time. It just isn't as easy to get away with it.

Yes, sometimes. But those men are still villains, in my opinion. People who hold a persistent belief that they can use their power to take something that they think that they are entitled to, which they are not, and who don't care about the harm that they are doing to others. It does not invalidate this truth, when I say that there are MANY possible scenarios where consent is violated, and not all of them look like this.

Originally Posted by fleetiebelle

I remember reading a thread from social media somewhere (reddit, probably) that went viral a few years ago where men looked back on their sexual behavior and remembered instances how they threatened or pressured or outright assaulted women sexually. It was very eye-opening, because many of these men were not "bad guys" or serial predators--they now had jobs and families and were generally responsible citizens, but they could look back on these instances and say, "I wanted something from her that she didn't want, and I took it." These men were not reported, but there are women in their pasts who don't look on them fondly.

This is more what I'm talking about.

But beyond that, I am a woman, and I violated someone's consent when we were both teenagers. The problem in this instance was one of IGNORANCE. I actually believed at the time, that as an attractive young female, if I wanted sex with a man, unless he was gay or in a relationship, he had no reason to say no to me. I did not want to take no for an answer. Granted, my actions were more a matter of excessive persistence than they were forcible assault, but what I did was still wrong. I just did not understand it until I was an adult.

But my mental concept of "rape" back then, was actually FORCING someone, and it had to be a man forcing someone, and so even when I was date raped, I did not think of it as rape because the moment he showed me that he didn't want to accept my no, and applied even a little force, I decided that it was easier to get it over with than to fight and maybe get hurt. But because I did not fight and scream, I did not think of it as rape at the time.

And so when I relentlessly persisted with a boy my age at the time, and wrestled around with him, we were both laughing, but he had clearly told me no and that he did not want to, and I was not listening, and eventually he complied... Was that rape? I did, much later, apologize to him. He brushed it aside as kids having fun and no harm done...and I told him that I was glad he was not carrying trauma from it, as I wish pain on no one, but that my apology stands, and if there is ever a way in which I can make amends to him, I'm here to hear it. What else can you do, decades later? But I got the space to learn and grow and people believe me when I say that I would never do such a thing as the woman I am today.

And I think that there are cases where people do stupid, ignorant things when younger, and they grow up and they learn better and they are genuinely sorry about it. And I'm just not on board with burning them to the ground regardless....though one does need to see that not only their words, but their behavior, is truly changed.

[Sonic_Spork]

And by the by, if it seems I trot out that story with no shame, it is only because I feel that it's important.

I have a strongly held belief that a great deal of pain in this world can be avoided altogether if people, starting young, learn better lessons about the concept of CONSENT.

And we can't get that done, unless people are able to talk about what has happened as a result of being ignorant. Ignorance, fortunately, is a curable condition. Where other kinds of narcissism, entitlement, or general villainy might not be. But it's only in anonymous spaces, that men are safe to admit mistakes made out of ignorance. We offer no path to redemption, for a man who has thusly transgressed. As a woman, and one who has already been offered forgiveness, it is safer for me to use my bad behavior to help educate other people, and I have sat in front of groups on panels and spoken about it. I am not proud, but it's the only way I know of, to try to make amends for things I can never take back.

Now we do have small steps happening in restorative justice programs. It is a start.

But I do push back against the idea that everyone always knew that certain things were wrong, in the exact same way that we know today. We are social animals, and we respond to what we perceive as social norms around us, and we usually learn what we are taught when we're young. A 15 year old is not going to be as wise as a 40 year old necessarily and we are not magically born knowing all of the right from wrong, if we aren't taught what we need to be taught.

But to the point, I want the world to become a better place. I think that most of us do. But if we want that, we have to let progress happen. We can't keep saying that it's exactly as bad now as it's ever been, or that everyone knew always what we know and believe today. There reaches a point where that is not only denying progress, it's saying that it is not even possible.

[Diane de Poitiers]

Originally Posted by msRB311

I also don't know why someone would say something that isn't true....but it happens. It sometimes feels like we just have to believe the accuser regardless.

Do you tend to believe the accusers of heinous crimes even when there is no proof?

That's very much how it was a few years ago, when my daughter was accused of being "inappropriate" with one of her younger cousins.

My family had a tradition of spending the July 4 holiday at our cabin in northern Arizona, and a few weeks after the 2013 trip, "Jocelyn" (my niece) suddenly comes out with a vague story about "Holly" (my daughter) having molested her at the cabin. I am not sure exactly what Jocelyn claimed had happened and when (the story kept changing), but my sister and her husband took their daughter's word for it, and decided to get the police involved.

Just to list some of the reasons why I did not believe the accuser in this situation....this comes from the few details which I did hear:

- supposedly, Holly had lured Jocelyn into one of the bedrooms, locked the door, and that's where "the incident" happened. That particular bedroom does not, and never did have a lock on the door.

- supposedly, this happened while everyone was sitting in the living room watching "Cinderella III" on DVD. Nobody else who was there remembers that, except for Jocelyn and her parents.