It has been an interesting month for sexual assault.
In the USA, allegations have been made against a Conservative judge, a man who has been nominated for the supreme court. It is a case of he said, she said, or in this case, he said, she, she and she said. Like with such cases, the odds are that we will never know the truth of what has happened as everyone has a tale to tell, and time has passed. The odds of everyone being honest about what happened at the time are low.
What I can discuss though are my views on this. In my life, I have met both men and women who have been assaulted or raped. Not everyone reported it, and while the law now takes allegations more seriously in most cases, convictions, which rightly require proof beyond reasonable doubt, are low. The women who I have met who did not want to press charges experienced issues such as self blame but mostly shame. In order to discuss press charges, they would have to admit it themselves. One woman actually said that before she was raped, she never believed women who did not report it at the time or who did not fight back. But despite saying that she would have fought back before she was raped, she froze. And afterwards, she did not report it, only accepting what had happened the day afterwards.
Yesterday, in testimony, two people told two different versions of events that happened many years ago. One has taken a lie detector test and has offered to bring in others as witnesses. One has the backing of many women as character witnesses, though one has since changed her mind over that was written by him about her. If I was on a jury, based on the evidence presented, I would have no choice but to find the man innocent, as I do not think that things can be proven beyond reasonable doubt. However, considering how the accused has defended himself, including the explanations for what he had written in his yearbook I still think that he is probably guilty.
I have seen how stressful it is for men and women who have been assaulted to describe what has happened to them. No one would make up an allegation knowing how women who engage in sex are judged.
What was interesting, was despite the inconsistencies in the story of the Judge, was that his story appears to be designed to appeal to the Conservative right in the USA. The Conservative Right who voted an adulterer into office in the White House over a woman who remain married to an adulterer. The Conservative Right who back that adulterer and castigate a porn star for having sex with him.
