This morning I was listening to CBC's The Current, and they opened with a program asking whether it was good for individuals accused of sexual assault to have their identities remain anonymous until proven guilty.

One of the guests was a worker at a women's shelter, and predictably she started spouting off "statistics" that I've seen discredited here several times before. And unfortunately no one on the show called her out on any of them.

Among the noteworthy claims:

  • "95% of perpetrators of sexual assaults are men"
  • "1 out of 3 women are being assaulted in their lifetime"
  • "we're talking about very small numbers here... only 2-3% of sexual assault accusations are false"

On a few occasions throughout the discussion she also said something to the effect of "we still have these myths so prevalent in our society...", oblivious to the irony.

Anyways, the program has a "mail day" - tomorrow - where they read feedback/commentary sent in by listeners. I'd like to submit a message calling out the inaccuracies. I know there are a lot of you out there with rebuttals and references at your fingertips, so if anyone can help me out in providing alternative stats (with sources) I would greatly appreciate it.

P.S. for those who may want to hear the full segment, they usually have the podcast posted here within a day or so.

TL;DR - need some help refuting the so-called "statistics" in the list above, with sources; any help would be appreciated!