James Behan, spokesperson for men’s rights group Men’s Voices Ireland, talks about discrimination against men in family law courts, education and wider society. But are his points undermined by a group making false claims about the level of false rape accusations?

Mens-Advocate · 2016-07-26T00:20:56+00:00

Analysis of Campbell Article, Part 1

Archive of OP's linked article: http://archive.is/OJojU

TLDR: OP's article (authored by a certain Campbell) erroneously implies an Irish MRA, Behan, and an (Irish?) MR website, MensVoices2016, use false data.

Campbell is wrong.

Campbell appeared to intially blame Behan (later clarified as not responsible) for the MensVoices2016.com site's "claim that 90 per cent of rape allegations in Spain are false".

There are a considerable number of studies showing false rape claims to be in the 40% to 50% range, and at least one other study has shown 90% (Stewart). Thus the Spanish study cited by the site is not "false", but its inordinately high number bears as close examination as those claiming the inordinately low number of "2% to 10%".

The most common error among the low estimates is the mistake of taking the typical 10% provably false for the actual false figure, when it is simply a lower bound; that is, at least 10% of accusations are false.

When the criterion is likely (rather than provably) false, the number rises considerably, including:

multiple McDowell Studies finding the clearly false figure to be 27% and the likely false figure to be 52%
two Kanin studies finding 40% and 50% false respectively
former Colorado prosecutor Silverman's estimate of 35% (sometimes cited as 45%) false.
former NY prosecutor Fairstein's admission of 50% false.
fBI figures that 25-36% of DNA samples submitted to it by police do not match.

Campbell attempts to substitute the figures of 0.6%, 2%-2.5%, and 8% as the number of false complaints, when instead they represent (and even under-estmate) those provably false.

Campbell also includes - as if Behan's fault - an assertion that the MensVoices2016 website lied in claiming that, in Ireland, "at least nine per cent of rape cases are provably false". But the very study to which Campbell links states clearly, in its section on Ireland, on p. 78:
http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.473.8230&rep=rep1&type=pdf

A high proportion, compared to other countries, were designated false reports (9%).

In fact, in the section on Ireland beginning on p. 71, the report states:

Over three quarters of suspects were identified and the majority were interviewed. However, despite fairly low case attrition at the early stages of the legal process, only 18 suspects were charged, with 16 referred for trial. Among the 51 cases which were discontinued between the stages of suspect interview and charge were 13 (25%) where the victim had a mental health problem, which is a little higher than in the Irish sample as a whole (18%). In 45 cases (88% of 51), discontinued at this point, the victim had consumed alcohol, which is again slightly higher than in the sample overall (78%), and in 41 (80%) the suspect had consumed alcohol, which is also a higher proportion than among suspects in the whole sample (60%). In the majority (61%, n=31) the reason for not proceeding was insufficient evidence, and in most of the remainder (25%, n=13) it was the victim’s decision to retract, withdraw co-operation or decline to complete initial processes.

In other words, in Ireland, accusations discontinued before charge had a heavy component of "insufficient evidence" and various forms of retraction, indicating MensVoices2016 correct in taking the 9% figure to represent a minimum false figure.

Similar figures (9% deemed provably false, 34% "victim" withdrawal, 34% insufficient evidence) are also given in the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre's summary:
http://www.drcc.ie/2009/04/new-comparative-research-of-11-european-countries-including-ireland-highlights-the-low-levels-of-rape-cases-proceeding-to-court/.

So, Campbell is wrong in implying Behan or the MensVoices2016 website falsified their reports of the data.

Thus Campbell is either dishonest or incompetent and is certainly a male feminist of no consequence. Nobody should be demonised or called a liar for citing any study, rather than simply criticising the faulty methodology of the study itself. Nor should anyone be demonised just because the critic cannot read. Campbell's article chose to misrepresent Behan and MensVoices2016 rather than examine the data carefully.

Mens-Advocate · 2016-07-25T08:57:21+00:00

There were no false claims. The citation simply reported a study whose methodology needs analysis. Other studies have also reported high rates of false rape allegations, from 40% to 90%:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_accusation_of_rape

Campbell is obviously a gelded white knight attempting not only to deny the ubiquity of false rape accusations but to advance ludicrously low numbers for false rape accusations and also to shut up and demonise any MRAs with whom he disagrees.

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