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#1 |
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See the entire article:
http://www.militarytimes.com/news/20...wsuit-121310w/ |
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#2 |
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For me, I tend to wonder how deep the ACLU is trying to search. Rape and Sexual Assault both have a certain level of confidentiality involved for reporting for the servicemember's protection. If that is among the information being denied to the ACLU then I absolutely understand our reluctance to release that type of information. To put it mildly, the ACLU has a fairly checkered history where actual civil liberties are concerned and I'd hesitate to give them anything that could later be used against us to suit their own agenda.
Fundamentally they make a good point, despite the policies in place, our military culture has not raised its level of awareness to really effectively handle the issues. Too ingrained in our lines of thinking are preconceived notions that the incidents are probably false reportings or that the victim's actions or attire prior to the incident helped enable the action. That or the impulse we tend to have to break down all confidentialily to engage in a full-out witchhunt make reporting of actual incidents sporadic at the best of times. I agree the problem persists. But, to what purpose does the comprehensive disclosure of this information serve? The problem here is culturally ingrained, and cannot be unilaterally solved at the leadership level. For the problem to be solved individuals have to believe it's a problem and to believe it's important to solve it. Barring that all we'd be doing is shoving redundant policy down our own throats. |
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#3 |
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I have no problems with giving the ACLU numbers and case disposition facts regarding cases involving sexual crimes where that crime would have an equivalent civilian charge. I do have an issue in some of what they are asking for.
It is the last part I have problems with: “The groups that filed suit want information on the number of acquittals, convictions and sentences, the number of disability claims related to sexual trauma that were accepted and rejected, and the number of sexual harassment complaints” If they are going to sue every corporation in America, every agency of the Federal government for the same statistics then have at it. When they are done, DoD can hand over the harassment complaint numbers. It is pretty obvious by what they are asking for what their agenda is. |
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#5 |
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I wonder if they are going to make a big fuss over all the "regret sex" (rapes) that never got prosecuted? I'd say they have a legitimate claim in stating the problem truly is pervasive in the military (although, since we're on the subject of more incidents occurring in the military rather than out, how many civilian incidents go unreported?) That being said, I don't see the ACLU assuming the role of IG doing anything to fix things. So then, what exactly do they expect to accomplish with all of this information? Hmmm..... |
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#6 |
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Honestly comments of this nature are what make our collective mindset a challenge where incident reporting is concerned. Do "regret sex" incident reports exist? Probably on occasion, but are significantly smaller in number by comparison to the actual incidents occurring. |
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#7 |
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For me, I tend to wonder how deep the ACLU is trying to search. Rape and Sexual Assault both have a certain level of confidentiality involved for reporting for the servicemember's protection. If that is among the information being denied to the ACLU then I absolutely understand our reluctance to release that type of information. To put it mildly, the ACLU has a fairly checkered history where actual civil liberties are concerned and I'd hesitate to give them anything that could later be used against us to suit their own agenda. It is true that there really is no way that the issues are being handled. The victim always gets punished regardless of gender or if it's sex or not. With females it's usually "Well she asked for it. Do you see how she dresses? She's such a slut she couldn't have said no." Yeah there are girls who have sex with anything that has a penis but anyone can say no. The ACLU needs to just stay out military matters honestly. |
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#8 |
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Nope, sorry. Other way around from talking with OSI buddies few years ago. Their busiest days of the weeks are Saturday and Sunday dealing with what usually is referred to as "regret sex". The problem I have with the military is, that they will not investigate any male complaints against women because they only go under the assumption that there is no rape without penetration. That and if a woman has one beer, takes a man home who had 6-10 beers (whatever will trash him) she can claim rape because her judgement was "impaired". When I was an EO rep if a guy came to me with a serious complaint about rape or assault, I would've done my job. Even if I wasn't and a soldier came to me, male or female, and said they were assaulted I would try to help. I know of a female who harassed male junior enlisted soldiers and one time I overheard her talking inappropriately to a PFC. I scoffed at her and she said "Oh no mom is getting mad at me..." I said "No that's extremely inappropriate for you to say to anyone, let alone a married junior enlisted soldier." She walked away. Then she basically sexually assaulted a friend of mine in Iraq. He went to go show her where something was in the TOC break room or whatever and as they were walking around the corner she said "What else are you going to show me?" I was like "Inappropriate." Then he tells me later that as he was faced away from her, she grabbed his ass. He told her not to ever do it again but I asked if he wanted me to talk to her. He said "No it's okay. I handled it and it will make things worse." Gee sounds familiar. There are people who likely have "regret sex" but that's why people don't take someone seriously if they really were abused. That's why investigations are done if it's unrestricted. |
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#9 |
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Honestly comments of this nature are what make our collective mindset a challenge where incident reporting is concerned. Do "regret sex" incident reports exist? Probably on occasion, but are significantly smaller in number by comparison to the actual incidents occurring. Nope, sorry. Other way around from talking with OSI buddies few years ago. Their busiest days of the weeks are Saturday and Sunday dealing with what usually is referred to as "regret sex". The problem I have with the military is, that they will not investigate any male complaints against women because they only go under the assumption that there is no rape without penetration. That and if a woman has one beer, takes a man home who had 6-10 beers (whatever will trash him) she can claim rape because her judgement was "impaired". Which is to me yet another reason why our laws are too sexist.. I can be just as raped as a woman. If being drunk is making them inable to have sex, then i guess every guy who picks up a woman at a bar is a rapist.... You won't believe how many girls say "Guys can't get raped. If they don't get hard, what's the point?" In the first 11 years i was in, part of our shipboard medical training said that for guys, when you check for a neck break (fall or accident), the easiest way to tell if their neck IS broken is to see if they have a woodie.. That was also confirmed as being the case by civilian docs... Ergo a woman saying a man can't be raped if he got errect is flat out BSing. |
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#10 |
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In the first 11 years i was in, part of our shipboard medical training said that for guys, when you check for a neck break (fall or accident), the easiest way to tell if their neck IS broken is to see if they have a woodie.. That was also confirmed as being the case by civilian docs... Ergo a woman saying a man can't be raped if he got errect is flat out BSing. |
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#11 |
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Regarding the "regret sex" incidences you refer to from OSI, I'm curious what they define as "regret sex". The SAPR Office (and the DoD instruction), where I get my information from, include rape and sexual assault as occurring between individuals when one party "does not or cannot" consent. Which could include certain degrees of intoxication, and quite frequently alcohol is involved with military sexual assault reportings. Meaning if a man or woman passed out while intoxicated and the individual who they were already intimately involved with proceeded further without explicit consent, that individual could be brought up on rape charges. This type of thing is an extreme example but could fall under what people are referring to as "regret sex".
Me personally, I wholeheartedly agree we don't handle the male victims well in the least. The statistics the Navy SAPR office puts out is 1 in 4 women are raped or sexually assaulted and 1 in 6-7 men are within their lifetimes, The actual reportings that occur are almost unanimously comprised of women and even the people promoting awareness quite frequently refer to rape and sexual assault with terms like crimes or violence "againts women". That is a mindset that absolutely needs to change. If the people teaching our personnel about rape and sexual assault continue to refer to these as crimes "against women" it becomes extremely easy for all the men in the audience to write it off as "not my problem". Either way, every time we attempt to put the victim on the spot because "maybe they're lying or exaggerating" it emphasizes why it's already so difficult for victim's to come forth. The accuracy of the claims are for the courts to decide if it even gets that far. One of the hardest things to prove in court is incidences where rape and sexual assault do occur. He said/she said types of cases almost always favor the defendant. Legitimate processing of the victim for legal investigative purposes are intimidating and intrusive by nature. Bottom line, our own attitudes very much enable the lack of reporting occurring in our military, and only we can change that. |
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#12 |
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Regarding the "regret sex" incidences you refer to from OSI, I'm curious what they define as "regret sex". The SAPR Office (and the DoD instruction), where I get my information from, include rape and sexual assault as occurring between individuals when one party "does not or cannot" consent. Which could include certain degrees of intoxication, and quite frequently alcohol is involved with military sexual assault reportings. Meaning if a man or woman passed out while intoxicated and the individual who they were already intimately involved with proceeded further without explicit consent, that individual could be brought up on rape charges. This type of thing is an extreme example but could fall under what people are referring to as "regret sex". Me personally, I wholeheartedly agree we don't handle the male victims well in the least. The statistics the Navy SAPR office puts out is 1 in 4 women are raped or sexually assaulted and 1 in 6-7 men are within their lifetimes, The actual reporting’s that occur are almost unanimously comprised of women and even the people promoting awareness quite frequently refer to rape and sexual assault with terms like crimes or violence "against women". That is a mindset that absolutely needs to change. If the people teaching our personnel about rape and sexual assault continue to refer to these as crimes "against women" it becomes extremely easy for all the men in the audience to write it off as "not my problem". And the numbers still count all the women that claim "regret sex" just because of it bumps up the numbers. Either way, every time we attempt to put the victim on the spot because "maybe they're lying or exaggerating" it emphasizes why it's already so difficult for victim's to come forth. The accuracy of the claims are for the courts to decide if it even gets that far. One of the hardest things to prove in court is incidences where rape and sexual assault do occur. He said/she said types of cases almost always favor the defendant. Legitimate processing of the victim for legal investigative purposes are intimidating and intrusive by nature. Bottom line, our own attitudes very much enable the lack of reporting occurring in our military, and only we can change that. |
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#13 |
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That is because our system is comprised on the notion of innocent until proven guilty. I am sure back a few years ago, the woman’s' word was stronger than the mans, but because of some many "fake rapes" accusing men, a lot of people, especially men, will not go solely off the woman’s' word anymore. Fake rape reports? Well, they're just very few in number, any installation resource coordinator will tell you that. If they're not involved somehow in any case occurring in the military we've already identified part of the problem. Fake reports exist but they're really not common enough to be significant compared to the number of unreported actual incidents. Again, not for me to decide. If I was educated to think like a trial lawyer and judge I'd expect to be paid like one as well. |
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#14 |
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Fake rape reports? Well, they're just very few in number, any installation resource coordinator will tell you that. If they're not involved somehow in any case occurring in the military we've already identified part of the problem. Fake reports exist but they're really not common enough to be significant compared to the number of unreported actual incidents. Again, not for me to decide. If I was educated to think like a trial lawyer and judge I'd expect to be paid like one as well. |
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#15 |
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I am sorry, I just think there are just as many "fake rape" reports from women as there are real rapes unreported by men and women combined. And I can bet that most of the real rapes that go unreported are of men getting seduced while drunk by women. There was a running joke about not going out to the smoke pit drunk in Kunsan because there was a specific woman that would try to "lure" you back to her room. How can that be a running joke? Cause "men can't be raped" is the mind set of the AF/DoD. Firstly, people confuse the terms "sexual harassment" and "sexual assault" quite frequently. While by definition the main difference is an "act" by application one is a term applicable to behavior that may offend somebody and make an uncomfortable work environment and the other is an act of violence which can lead to significant life-altering trauma and even suicide. Since many servicemembers fail to make this distinction many might claim a controversial claim of harassment is relatable to this topic. Especially since Sexual Harassment has that whole "yellow light" area where not everyone agrees on what is considered offensive. I'm not saying that universally applies here but it's worth consideration. Secondly, we tend to assume that because a case was taken up and the defendant was cleared because of insufficient evidence being presented, that no sexual assault or rape could have occurred. The "burden of proof" concept requiring a very timely and thorough forensic investigation ensures that any delays in the investigation by whatever cause may shoot a case down before it had a chance to even reach a courtroom. Simply put, I'd wager that 90% of any "false" reports people may be hearing about were maybe a little more true than we'd like to admit, especially if friends or respected associates were the accused. |
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#16 |
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Disturbing way to check to see if I broke my neck, but I guess that is something they wont show you on TV shows like "ER". Regarding the "regret sex" incidences you refer to from OSI, I'm curious what they define as "regret sex". Basically when either a woman has sex with someone on a dare or when they got drunk, the regrets it the morning after. The actual reportings that occur are almost unanimously comprised of women and even the people promoting awareness quite frequently refer to rape and sexual assault with terms like crimes or violence "againts women". And that is part nd parcel of the problem. heck, some judges and cops still think rape, sexual assault, sexual harassment is ONLY guys against Gals.. Same with spousal abuse. Either way, every time we attempt to put the victim on the spot because "maybe they're lying or exaggerating" it emphasizes why it's already so difficult for victim's to come forth. The accuracy of the claims are for the courts to decide if it even gets that far. One of the hardest things to prove in court is incidences where rape and sexual assault do occur. He said/she said types of cases almost always favor the defendant. BUT it is harder, much harder, to get the stigma of a false rape charge off of you. One worker we had who lived near us even WITH the "victim flat out coming out in court and saying it was all false", still took almost 20 years to get rid of te stigma.. The problem they determine "consent", a woman with any alcohol can say they didn't "consent". But a guy no matter how much he had, is consenting as long as he is doing the penetrating. He could be passed out, the woman could try to give him oral, and he would still be the one that gets charged because he penetrated her. Yup. My prior senior chief remembers a gunnersmate who got chumped up on harges even though the cops ADMITTED when they got there, he was still passed out from booze, and SHE was the one riding him.. (they were called for something else, but in their walking around the place saw the lass shagging him)... And the numbers still count all the women that claim "regret sex" just because of it bumps up the numbers. According to one LN i asked, the numbers also include those who's cases are dropped cause it is proven the charge was false, OR those which lacked evidence.. |
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#17 |
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That word in particular is significant when discussing why our military is not the greatest at handling Sexual Assault and Rapes. As far as numbers go, you can think what you like. The only people with definitive answers to that question are those with access to all of the restricted and unrestricted reports. I know what they've told me regarding that question and they tell me the numbers are not even comparable. 7–4. Definition a. Sexual harassment is a form of gender discrimination that involves unwelcomed sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature between the same or opposite genders when— (1) Submission to, or rejection of, such conduct is made either explicitly or implicitly a term or condition of a person’s job, pay, career, or (2) Submission to, or rejection of, such conduct by a person is used as a basis for career or employment decisions affecting that person, or (3) Such conduct has the purpose or effect of unreasonably interfering with an individual’s work performance or creates an intimidating, hostile, or offensive working environment. b. Any person in a supervisory or command position who uses or condones implicit or explicit sexual behavior to control, influence, or affect the career, pay, or job of a Soldier or civilian employee is engaging in sexual harassment. Similarly, any Soldier or civilian employee who makes deliberate or repeated unwelcome verbal comments, gestures, or physical contact of a sexual nature is engaging in sexual harassment. 7–5. Categories of sexual harassment a. Verbal. Examples of verbal sexual harassment may include telling sexual jokes; using sexually explicit profanity, threats, sexually oriented cadences, or sexual comments; whistling in a sexually suggestive manner; and describing certain attributes of one’s physical appearance in a sexual manner. Verbal sexual harassment may also include using terms of endearment such as "honey", “babe", “sweetheart", “dear", “stud", or “hunk" in referring to Soldiers, civilian co-workers, or Family members. b. Nonverbal. Examples of nonverbal sexual harassment may include staring at someone (that is, “undressing someone with one’s eyes"), blowing kisses, winking, or licking one’s lips in a suggestive manner. Nonverbal sexual harassment also includes printed material (for example, displaying sexually oriented pictures or cartoons); using sexually oriented screen savers on one’s computer; or sending sexually oriented notes, letters, faxes, or e-mail. c. Physical contact. Examples of physical sexual harassment may include touching, patting, pinching, bumping, grabbing, cornering, or blocking a passageway; kissing; and providing unsolicited back or neck rubs. Sexual assault and rape are extreme forms of sexual harassment and serious criminal acts. When these acts occur, report them in accordance with the procedure outlined in chapter 8 and appendix H of this regulation. Definition of Sexual Assault 8–4. Definitions For the purpose of this policy— a. Sexual assault. Sexual assault is a crime defined as intentional sexual contact, characterized by use of force, physical threat or abuse of authority or when the victim does not or cannot consent. Sexual assault includes rape, nonconsensual sodomy (oral or anal sex), indecent assault (unwanted, inappropriate sexual contact or fondling), or attempts to commit these acts. Sexual assault can occur without regard to gender or spousal relationship or age of victim. “Consent” will not be deemed or construed to mean the failure by the victim to offer physical resistance. Consent is not given when a person uses force, threat of force, or coercion or when the victim is asleep, incapacitated, or unconscious. Yes there are women who lie about being raped. There are also men who lie about being raped or assaulted sometimes too although that's very few and far between as men are less inclined to report something because of the perception in our society that men are supposed to be "strong" and never show emotion. However people need to get the idea that a man can't get beat up by his spouse or can't get raped. It can happen. My mom used to hit, bite, kick, scratch my dad when they fought. The only time it physically hurt him was when she would knee him in the balls. One time he got tired of it and shoved her back -just pushed her away and supposedly she got a bruise on her arm (she bruises like a peach though). She was doing her drama spiel and he said "What if I told people what you do to me? What if I reported you for abuse?" She said "No one would believe you because you're bigger than me and you're a guy." What a crock. If I ever heard her say that I would've straightened her out. I hate bitches like that. My only point earlier with friends who say "Guys can't get raped because if they don't get hard, what is the point for the female to have sex with them?" Such as if they were passed out. Well what good does it do for a guy if a girl is passed out and not moving? It's not about sex or pleasure when a person rapes or assaults someone else. They are doing it for the power over that person. The other thing that irritates me is when we do our sexual assault classes and the instructor asks "Can a husband rape his wife?" there were about three or four guys in this one class who said "no." I said "Really? You think you just own your wife once you get married?" Some people think that it's their inherent right when married to get sex 24/7. That's not true. You don't own your spouse. I told those guys that. If I ever get married and my husband thinks he has the right to get sex from me when he snaps his fingers, he'll be sleeping on the couch or outside. Marriage isn't an automatic pass for sex and to take it whenever you want, male or female. Rape is wrong period. There are people who lie and they ruin it for those who actually get raped who won't report it because they fear no one will believe them. That's a shame because then you have perverts and sadistic pricks walking around who think they can do whatever they want to whomever they want (male and female types) and not get punished for it or have to deal with it. |
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#18 |
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My mom used to hit, bite, kick, scratch my dad when they fought. The only time it physically hurt him was when she would knee him in the balls. One time he got tired of it and shoved her back -just pushed her away and supposedly she got a bruise on her arm (she bruises like a peach though). She was doing her drama spiel and he said "What if I told people what you do to me? What if I reported you for abuse?" She said "No one would believe you because you're bigger than me and you're a guy." What a crock. If I ever heard her say that I would've straightened her out. I hate bitches like that. Reminds me of a fight that had happen on base housing when i was visiting Lakenheath (a comrade of my father) the wife was beating the hybby with anything and everything she could get her hands on to throw, glass, beer bottles, frying pans, picture frames (caused a total of 67 stitches), but the cops only cuffed him when he had enough and knocked her out (choke hold). I have been out in a restaurant when a woman had a hissy, and started beating several people up, WITH her high heel stilletos being used as a weapon. Her hubby got a nasty gash in his left arm, and used his right hand to knock her down.. Yup HE is the one who got arrested and charged with spousal abuse.. though admittedly she did also get arrested for agrivated assault (on the other people.. NOT for hitting her hubby).
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#19 |
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Well, at least the double edged sword is not just America's way of thinking about sex and rape. In Switzerland, first having consentual sex then either having a condom break or take it off means the guy is raping the woman. No matter what she said to do during the encounter, she can claim rape after. This is what Wikileaks founder is accused of after the 2 women talk together about having sex with the same person.
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#20 |
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