Before I get into the article I want to point out that there are a ton of rape allegations in this piece with some more plausible than others. The fact that there's no evidence is still on of the biggest gripes I have about allegations made by anyone. Read the article and formulate your own opinions.

Context: Encounters various women had with Russell Simmons, Brett Ratner, and James Toback involving sexual misconduct.

Keri Khalighi on Simmons

Khalighi said that Simmons, who was then about twice her age, tried to force her to have intercourse. “I fought it wildly,” she said. He eventually relented and coerced her to perform oral sex, she alleged. “I guess I just acquiesced.”

Alright, so you say he attempted to rape you while you "wildly" fought him off until he stopped trying to rape you. At this point she didn't make an attempt to leave at all, but stayed long enough to be coerced into sucking the dudes dick and the allegedly have him come into the bathroom and try to rape you again.

Anonymous woman on Ratner

The pair’s conduct together has also been scrutinized by authorities. In 2001, a woman told Beverly Hills police that she was held against her will at Ratner’s mansion, Hilhaven Lodge, “by two males who both unlawfully touched her,” Lt. Elisabeth Albanese told The Times this month.

Where's the evidence though?

The Los Angeles County district attorney’s office declined to file criminal charges against Ratner and Simmons due to insufficient evidence.

Nice.

Tanya Reid on Ratner and Simmons

Simmons was also staying at the hotel, and, Reid said, the two men repeatedly called the front desk asking to speak to her. Simmons asked her to personally bring a toothbrush to him, but she deflected, saying a bellman would handle it. “I remember this very, very clearly, the exact words he said on the phone. He wanted me to come upstairs so Brett could hold me down and he could [perform oral sex],” Reid said.

This might be a form of sexual harrassment. Sounds like you'd want to avoid a guy like that.

One day, Ratner invited her up to his hotel room as she was leaving work. Spread out on his bed were photographs of models appearing in his video. Ratner asked if she wanted to be one of them, Reid recalled. She gave him her phone number. A couple of days later, he stopped by her apartment, a few blocks from the hotel. Not long after they sat down on her living room sofa, he exposed himself, put her hand on his crotch and asked for oral sex, she said.

So it was stated this guy was going to sexually harass her. Therefore, she took the precaution of giving him her phone number and then inviting him to her apartment where he tried to make her suck his dick.

Reid, who was an 18-year-old virgin, said she asked if they could just kiss. He then allegedly used his hand to push her head to his groin. Eventually, she said she gave in. Ratner left immediately after, and she never heard from him again.

You could make the case that she's just 18 years old and she doesn't know any better. But in recent months this kind of cognitive dissonance, especially in recently publicized rape cases is present in a vast majority of the allegations.

And for years, it has been just that. In January, Toback, the director who was accused of sexual harassment and misconduct by more than 300 women during a Times investigation, called it his “second home.”

I wonder how many of these are fake. You'd think that someone who was accused of sexual misconduct by one woman would be in jail... but 300? C'mon, in terms of numbers he's got Weinstein beat.

Jaymee Ong on Ratner

Ratner asked her to come to his bedroom. Once there, she said, he locked the door and began groping her. “I was saying, ‘No, stop, I don’t want to,’” she said. “And he took his pants off and he was trying to grab my hand and put it on him [saying], ‘Just touch it, just touch it, come on.’”

There are accounts that Ratner and Ong had a thing together so it's hard to tell whether this is actually the truth or not without evidence.

When Ong, then 21, refused, he masturbated and then ejaculated, she alleged. She said she left and immediately recounted the experience to her friends.

This instance happened in 2001. You're telling me you told your friends about this and they did NOTHING for 16 years? Seem like if they were your friends they'd help you come to terms with it and tell you not to wait 16 years to come forward about the story and file immediately.

She said Ratner traded seats to sit next to her for the transatlantic flight, and began making sexually explicit comments to her, showing her nude photographs of his famous then-girlfriend and graphically describing her body.

Don't ever do this. Making the mistake that you can treat a woman like you treat your best friend, or any guy for that matter when it comes to personal shit is a big mistake.

Sarah Shahi on Ratner

On the set of “Rush Hour 3,” Sarah Shahi, 37, said that on multiple occasions, Ratner approached her from behind, thrust his groin against her and made graphic sexual comments.

Sounds like there's something else going on here.

Despite the run-ins, Shahi stayed in touch with Ratner. She emailed him, sometimes to just say hello in flirtatious messages, and in other cases to ask for favors, such as when she solicited his vote for Maxim magazine’s “Hot 100” list. In 2011, she asked Ratner to give her sister, who had interned for the filmmaker, a job as an assistant.

Well here it is. I'd imagine it would be common for certain women in Hollywood to trade sexual favors for assets and special treatment. It seems like she's taking advantage of this situation spectacularly.

Situations like these are going to keep coming up left and right, use this as a lesson to make sure you guys protect yourselves especially when you have a lot of assets you could potentially lose to the woman (or women) making the allegations. Sure, evidence might come out that actually points to them doing this, but the point still stands.

TLDR; Record everything. Don't be creepy. Don't be unattractive. Potentially replace condoms with affirmative consent contracts?