Wow, there’s almost nothing I can add to what Violet said about this. The post is from a British police officer, who has published the supervisor notes after rapes have been reported to the police. Savvy readers (read: not MRAs) will notice a slight difference in how victims are treated according to gender.
1. Incident:
Caller reporting her 17-year-old daughter was raped last night by two named offenders after going out drinking at her local pub. Daughter is very distressed and sore.
Update from supervisor:
Officers to attend and establish the following:
1. Is the daughter making an allegation?
2. Names and descriptions of alleged offenders.
3. How much alcohol was consumed?
4. If allegation is being made, locate scene.
5. Will the victim attend court?
6. If allegation could be true, will she consent to a medical?2. Incident:
Caller reporting her 18-year-old son was raped last night by a male known to him, following a party at his house. Son is in pain and upset.
Update from supervisor:
Officers to attend and establish the following:
1. Locate the crime scene.
2. Arrange medical examination and take victim to rape suite.
3. Name/description of offender.
4. Preserve forensic evidence, seize clothing.
Jessica at Feministing is collecting examples of double standards for an upcoming book on the issue, and I think this is a big one—the double standard that says if a man is assaulted, he is a victim, but if a woman is assaulted, she must have done something to bring it on herself.
My heart goes out to both victims, of course. It’s a shame that only one looks like he’ll be seeing justice.
Plenty of feminist goodness at the 43rd carnival, by the way.
44 Responses to “The crime victim double standard”
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It’s not just that — it’s that she’s probably lying. The whole “Is she making an allegation?” bit. That’s not there at all with the male victim — a crime has been committed, and they’re going to treat it as such.
Not to mention, “sore” vs. “in pain.”
Good lord, they even put “alleged” in the first one and left it out of the second. Totally insane.
Good grief, what an amazingly gutsy thing to do. Does she still have her job?
I don’t know what it’s like in the U.K., but police forces in North America treat whistle blowers harshly, to say the least.
“6. If allegation could be true,”
That phrase says the big difference. They are starting with the assumption of a probable lie, when women report rape. I can’t think of anything except arson(so often the means of insurance fraud) that even MIGHT be met with such skepticism by the police.
“Distressed and sore.”
“Distressed and sore.”
Karma show them distressed and sore, the hideous monsters.
This double standard may reflect the fact that there is even more of a stigma attached to a man being raped than there is attached to a woman being raped. Therefore, the cop may have assumed that a man would be willing to report a rape only if it’s actually true. Supposedly, about half of rape accusaions are true and half are false. I’m not sure whether this figure refers to all instances of rape, or only rape of one gender.
the double standard that says if a man is assaulted, he is a victim, but if a woman is assaulted, she must have done something to bring it on herself.
Honestly, lately, I’ve been thinking that it wouldn’t matter one iota what the woman did, the actual assumption is that the woman is supposed to be the victim, and thus it isn’t a big deal, except that another man had his property violated. But a man being the victim? Well, stop the goddamn presses.
This makes me sick mainly because some asshat is going to come along and defend it. “Well maybe they had a reason to doubt her” they’ll say. Actually, I am surprised we’ve gotten six comments in without the MRA troll showing up.
I had thought Great B. was better than that. Apparently not.
That is seriously disturbing.
I thought the protocol in the States, or at least in California, was to automatically conduct a medical examination and provide counseling. Am I wrong?
And by the way, it wouldn’t hurt to clue in the TLA-challenged among us when you use something like MRA. Just saying.
Attitudes towards homosexual sex could play some role here too. Two men having sex with each other must be a crime, somehow! So it has to be rape. But as for men having sex with one girl — there’s nothing unnatural about that, and therefore no reason to be on the alert for criminal activity there.
bad Jim:
MRA == “men’s rights advocate”
Of course, it really should be “MPA,” or “male privlege advocate.”
Were those two sets of notes written by the same supervisor?
You left out the best part! - meaning, when the officer asks the victim/survivor, “what race are you?”
Clearly the most important question of the report; the officer I had to speak with had a good giggle with me over his having to ask me that. ‘Cause, y’know, if I weren’t white I probably would’ve been making it up, right?
[end derail]
Devil’s Advocate,
If you go to the site where the notes were posted, the police officer who posted them states that the first is pretty standard. So I’m not sure it really matters if the supervisor who wrote the second wrote the first as well. Unless the supervisor who wrote the second is exceptional compared to his/her peers, chances are he/she a has written more than one note like the first, even if he/she didn’t write that exact one.
Thanks, Dan. I’d guessed “Male Rape Apologist”.
I think a big part of this is that the first instance, being a male raping female thing, is more common while the second instance isn’t. So maybe things were left off the first list since they were too obvious to mention. And for police officers, knowing whether or not the victim will testify will (though it shouldn’t in the initial part of the investigation) affect the way they go about things. A medical examination and the gathering of evidence is needed in both cases, but it might have been specifically mentioned in the second case because it is a less common occurrence. That having been said, the bias is still pretty fucking obvious.
Um, Jon, no.
“6. If allegation could be true, will she consent to a medical?”
vs
“2. Arrange medical examination and take victim to rape suite”
Apparently, for girls, they decide if she was lying before they ask her to be examined. For the boy, they *aren’t* asking if he wants to prosecute before deciding whether to take action, nor do they assume he’s lying before even bother to get the medical evidence.
or compare “4. If allegation is being made, locate scene.” with “1. Locate the crime scene.”
They are clearly treating the male victim as a victim and taking the crime against him seriously, whereas a female victim must convince the police officers there was a crime.
Blabbermouth as I am, I always want to comment, but here–what is there to say? I can play “devil’s advocate” (had this not been pre-empted already) and come up with the mitigating arguments the police might want to make, but they’d be empty rationalizations. Clearly a double standard applies. I wish I could at least be surprised, but of course from listening to y’all over the years, I’m not.
Such ugliness there is in our world. Let this be a reminder to me to perservere in changing it.
I always thought MRA was “Male Republican Asshole”.
always thought MRA was “Male Republican Asshole”.
They are often, but not always, the same.
Well, it only took to comment 15 for the apologist asshat to arrive. What rape thread would be complete without someone trying to justify why police treat the rape of women as either not really a big deal or as so many lying women trying to bring down the menz?
That is so messed up.
Nah. It varies from county to county of course as to how seriously it’s taken. There was a program on tv in the UK a while ago about this sort of thing (not just dealing with rape crimes but all general police duties), with a female cop secretly filming her peers. It was pretty shocking, but at the same time, kinda expected, you know? Showing how some cops didn’t even bother to send the rape victims for medical exams, saying how they shouldn’t have worn short skirts etc. The same stuff as the US.
A small comment on the UK, from my (short) time spent visiting it - it’s a pretty highly sexist society, in ways more explicit than are polite in America.
Were those two sets of notes written by the same supervisor?
She doesn’t know, but in a way it’s not especially relevant when demonstrating systematic disregard.
I’ve got to say that I don’t blame them for being sceptical. False rape allegations when someone goes to the police and saying ‘I’ve been raped’ and is lying are very rare. But false rape allegations when a third party reports something based on hearsay aren’t.
I don’t doubt that people make these reports in good faith, but there are all sorts of reasons why they can be mistaken. So it makes sense to not jump to conclusions until the person who was there makes an allegation. I can’t help but thing that it’s the police’s reaction to the second case which is wrong.
One problem with that, James, is that in both cases the crime or alleged crime was reported by a third party.
And another double standard thing: the female victim story involves a pub, so drinking is obviously something to ask about. The male victim had a party at his house, so drinking (and whatever else) should have been asked about in the second case.
clearly a double standard, the second response should be the standard response. i can’t help wondering if there is more information that the officers writing the reports knew that doesn’t appear in the report (for instance maybe they had already confirmed that the second victim intended to prosecute?) but I can’t think of any reason why that info wouldn’t be in the report.
as for the difference in attitude, well men 18 and under are almost as likely to be raped as women (one in 6 as opposed to 1 in 4 in the US), but far far less likely to ever say anything about it, let along file a police report, because of the social stigma and demasculinazation that is projected onto male rape victims. based on that i’d guess that if a male gets to the point of actually reporting a rape he’s far more likely to prosecute. which could at least partly explain the impulse to treat it more seriously.
incidentally, there’s no way to prove it, but i bet if so many female rape victims didn’t decline to prosecute and let the rapists walk free police departments would treat rape much more seriously. cops and DA’s don’t want to spend time filing reports that’ll never go anywhere, all they’re concerned about its their conviction rate so they can sell themselves as tough on crime (yuck).
not an excuse, just a possible reason. doesn’t make the cops lack of professionalism and patronizing attitude toward the female victim at all acceptable.
Stuart, “supposedly” half of all rape allegations are false? 50%? Where exactly did you pull that number out of?
Believe me when I say that I fully understand that attitudes towards rape as crime against women are shockingly and sickeningly blase. Blase or sensationalized to the point of being sexualized. It turns my stomach. I can never believe my ears when someone, in this day and age, pipes up with a number of different ways to blame the victim. That being said, I’m not certain that this particular instance is the best example. We don’t know if different people wrote each report (each having their own ’style’), nor if it was just one jackass who wrote both reports. I am probably being incredibly naive, but I’d like to think (hope) that most policemen/policewomen would take these crimes more seriously no matter what gender is involved.
This makes me sick mainly because some asshat is going to come along and defend it. “Well maybe they had a reason to doubt her” they’ll say.
Actually, I am surprised we’ve gotten six comments in without the MRA troll showing up.Now that some comments are out of the mod queue this is no longer true. The amended version: Gee, how unsurprising that we only had to wait six comments before the MRA troll arrived.
excuse me?!? i call bullshit.
i always heard that 8% are false - same as other crimes.
ugh, of course it’s the female rape victims’ fault, as always, for everything. fuck you
Blabbermouth as I am, I always want to comment, but here–what is there to say? I can play “devil’s advocate” (had this not been pre-empted already) and come up with the mitigating arguments the police might want to make, but they’d be empty rationalizations.
The *only* possibility is that the first is some sort of idiots-101 list for cadets, being all questions. However, the linked post cites them as “two examples of the kind of regular updates entered into Blandshire’s Incident Control System”, so put it down to a double standard.
Or two different supervisors, one of whom needs to go direct traffic in the Lothians until retirement.
There are worse police forces, shameful as it is to say.
I think the origin of the idea that rape is more likely to be falsely reported than other crimes has a lot to do with the victim’s realization after the initial report that she’ll be subjected to an invasive and dehumanizing trial process. I completely sympathize with those women who choose to drop charges at that point, since they have bigger fish to fry, namely taking care of themselves and their own road to recovery. The police notes above makes it pretty clear that the process of revictimization starts pretty damn early in the process. I wouldn’t be in the least bit surprised if someone subjected to the interrogation hinted at in the notes decided to put her own recovery above punishing the rapist.
I think the origin of the idea that rape is more likely to be falsely reported than other crimes has a lot to do with the victim’s realization after the initial report that she’ll be subjected to an invasive and dehumanizing trial process.
Exactly. As well as wankstains who think the phrase “Duke Rape Case” negates the existence of rape.
the 2002 British Crime Survey found that 47,000 women had experienced actual or attempted rape in the previous year.
In 2002/2003, there were 11,441 reported rapes of females, resulting in just 686 convictions.
This means that, essentially, a rapist in Britain can be nearly 99% certain that he will never be convicted of his crime.
It also shows that around 35,000 rapes go unreported every year, and a total of more than 46,000 go unpunished.
Which is more of a concern: more than 46,000 unpunished rapes per year, or a few false allegations of rape which, on this evidence are extremely unlikely to result in a conviction anyway?
Seems like a no-brainer to me……
“I completely sympathize with those women who choose to drop charges at that point, since they have bigger fish to fry, namely taking care of themselves and their own road to recovery.”
Good call. On my ten millionth call to the police (after I was still receiving threatening texts from the guy who had confessed) I got a huge runaround of, “Well, we’ve lost your case number - again; awfully sorry, but we’ve had ten rapes over the weekend…” as though the two might not be related - ignore a confessed rapist and all his information and - surprise! - more rapes happen.
Imagine that.
Funny how - in prosecution, in threads like this, and in everyday conversation on the topic - it’s always the survivor’s fault, either for pushing too hard for prosecution (you know you’re on that track when the heavy sighs from male officers start) or, as stated above, not hard enough. Or, just for being freaking alive after the fact.
Also for good measure, we survivors have been known to do that self-blamery thing to ourselves, too - just a thought.
And yet, it’s never the fault of the rapist (male or female, for good measure), nor the lazy police officers who can’t get their jobs straight. Funny how that always seems works out.
“I completely sympathize with those women who choose to drop charges at that point, since they have bigger fish to fry, namely taking care of themselves and their own road to recovery.”
Good call. On my ten millionth call to the police (after I was still receiving threatening texts from the guy who had confessed) I got a huge runaround of, “Well, we’ve lost your case number - again; awfully sorry, but we’ve had ten rapes over the weekend…” as though the two might not be related - ignore a confessed rapist and all his information and - surprise! - more rapes happen.
Imagine that.
Funny how - in prosecution, in threads like this, and in everyday conversation on the topic - it’s always the survivor’s fault, either for pushing too hard for prosecution (you know you’re on that track when the heavy sighs from male officers start) or, as stated above, not hard enough. Or, just for being freaking alive after the fact.
Also for good measure, we survivors have been known to do that self-blamery thing to ourselves, too - just a thought.
And yet, it’s never the fault of the rapist (male or female, for good measure), nor the lazy police officers who can’t get their jobs straight. Funny how that always seems works out.
“I completely sympathize with those women who choose to drop charges at that point, since they have bigger fish to fry, namely taking care of themselves and their own road to recovery.”
Good call. On my ten millionth call to the police (after I was still receiving threatening texts from the guy who had confessed) I got a huge runaround of, “Well, we’ve lost your case number - again; awfully sorry, but we’ve had ten rapes over the weekend…” as though the two might not be related - ignore a confessed rapist and all his information and - surprise! - more rapes happen.
Imagine that.
Funny how - in prosecution, in threads like this, and in everyday conversation on the topic - it’s always the survivor’s fault, either for pushing too hard for prosecution (you know you’re on that track when the heavy sighs from male officers start) or, as stated above, not hard enough. Or, just for being freaking alive after the fact.
Also for good measure, we survivors have been known to do that self-blamery thing to ourselves, too - just a thought.
And yet, it’s never the fault of the rapist (male or female, for good measure), nor the lazy police officers who can’t get their jobs straight. Funny how that always seems works out.
It’s the mothers who made the complaint. Perhaps the assumption is the mother of the girl is just upset at proof her daughter had sex and that the boy’s mother is reporting something more likely to be an actual crime (still heavily biased, but based on perceived bias of the parents).
Helen, that argument is based on the assumption of preferential treatment for boys, and the property status of female children that the patriarchy enforces with, among other things, rape.
Besides the fact, the mother concerned for her traumatized child is hardly to blame for how the *authorities* respond to her. If the police are indeed making that assumption, then they are treating the girl’s rape as justifiable/suspect and the boy’s rape as a crime.
I’m sure someone else has already brought this up, but I haven’t had time to read the entire thread. Stuart, you are absolutely 100% wrong when you state that half of all rape reports are true and half are false. In fact, there is no greater rate of false victim reports of rape than of any other crime. Please get that through your head. Plus, many women who are raped don’t even report it because they are ashamed and embarassed and because the system treats them like shit. If you think that there is no “stigma” attached to being a female rape victim, then you haven’t been paying attention. Going through a rape case is HELL ON EARTH on the victim. You are blamed for the assault, viewed with undeserved skepticism, and then you have to undergo the added humiliation and absolute horror of probably seeing your attacker go free.
Lynx — incidentally, there’s no way to prove it, but i bet if so many female rape victims didn’t decline to prosecute and let the rapists walk free police departments would treat rape much more seriously.
Right; the victim “declines to prosecute”. You’re conveniently overlooking the many-times documented police hassles, attempted shaming by society, a court system that far too often allows the accused rapist’s defense attorney to shred her reputation to bits and try to shift the blame to her (clothing, drinking, etc), frequent threats by the accused rapist and/or his friends to get her to recant. From all my reading, it’s apparent that most rape victims don’t “decline to prosecute” — they’re frightened out of / actively discouraged from prosecuting. It takes a strong, STRONG woman to stand up against that, especially when she knows that, statistically, her chances of seeing her rapist convicted are about 5%. In other words, your suggestion is merely another way of trying to shift the blame onto the victims, instead of laying it where it belongs — on the crappy societal attitudes that are evident in police, lawyers, and juries.
Read Why I Didn’t Report My Rape. And remember that we’ve seen (on a number of news reports and feminist blogs) that even videotape of a rape frequently does not get the rapist convicted.
But, of course, it’s all the women’s fault for “declining to prosecute”. I wish there was a way to measure the depth of my disgust at that callous statement.