Does anyone dispute the fact that the 'false allegations of rape are common' myth is dangerous?

[Jim Lane]

189. One difference about rape allegations

You write, "For no other crime is there so much energy dedicated to focusing on false allegations." One possibility is that false allegations are easier, and therefore probably more common, in rape cases than for other major crimes.

In a murder case, for example, there's usually a dead body. I know there are times when a person has disappeared and yet a defendant is charged with murdering him or her, and there may be a few cases where it looks like suicide but the defendant is charged with cleverly setting up a murder to look that way. Nevertheless, usually it's undeniable that a crime occurred. That guy's still lying on the floor, he's still got two bullet holes in him, and he's still dead, no matter how any defense attorney tries to spin it. The only issue at trial is whether the defendant is the person who pulled the trigger.

Some rape cases are like that, too. The woman was walking through the park, a guy jumped out of the bushes and raped or tried to rape her, the police arrested someone, and the issue at trial isn't whether there was a crime but whether this defendant was the criminal.

In many other rape cases, though, the jury has to decide whether a crime occurred at all. It's clear that the defendant had sex with the woman, but he says it was consensual and she says it wasn't. Quite often there's little or no objective evidence that would help a jury decide which version to credit.

In both rape and murder, there can be a false accusation that the defendant was the person who committed what was clearly a crime. In rape, however, there's much more scope for an additional type of false accusation, that of falsely alleging that there was a crime.

In a society completely free of rape culture and patriarchal influence, therefore, one would still expect to find more false accusations of rape than of many other crimes, and, consequently, more concern about false accusations.

Of course, there can be many other factors influencing the presence or absence of false accusations, and the presence or absence of concern about false accusations. I'm just noting that the "he said - she said" aspect creates a problem with comparing rape cases to other criminal cases.