Following the Me Too Movement’s 2017 momentum gathering, we started to hear feminist pleas all over to “believe all women.” This cry responded to the astounding number of female public personalities who came forward to tell about their mistreatment and sexual assault at the hands of influential men who threatened them into quiet. Feminists were offended. We wanted to make sure the road was open for female victims to disclose sexual assault safely and could rely on their being believed.
Critics greeted this call to action with questions. “What about innocent men who are falsely accused?” sceptics wondered. We brushed this awkward subject under the ground, noting how shockingly rare such unfounded accusations are. Our mission, believe all women, was laser-focused.
According to modern studies, some men’s impressions of sexual assault suggest that our impulse to rug-sweep this question was a mistake. Alternatively, maybe, to put it more kindly, it is a miscalculation.
Government fact sheets and published empirical studies abound on the frequency of sexual assault against both cisgender and transgender women (see Centres for Disease Control, 2022; Fedina et al., 2018; Kantor & Twohey, 2019). Still, many men actively disregard or even reject these conclusions. Such assertions, according to them, are plain lies or exaggerations created by enraged women to exact revenge against males who mistreated them or to ease the guilt resulting from “sex regret” (Bonher et al., 2009; Muehlenhard et al., 2017; Triggs, 2018). With (primarily) male scientific researchers stating that such study has grown too political or biased, supported chiefly by feminist fanatics with an axe to grind, sadly, even inside the academia, there is a growing sense of mistrust towards sexual assault research (Levine, 2021).
Of course, not all men uphold this attitude, and facts cannot support it. Indeed, we know that most males who doubt the legitimacy of sexual assault reports have hostile sexist beliefs, which is not the case for all men. Men who view women as power-hungry, manipulative, emasculating, and eager to “cry wolf” to obtain some apparent advantage over men believe these women are These males hang to this tiny figure to discredit all sexual assault claims, even though modern studies indicate that only 2–8% of allegations of sexual assault are found to be fraudulent. They are more worried about the tiny slice of innocent men who might be wrongly convicted than about the one in four women who have experienced sexual assault at some point in their lives.
Though none of anyone wants to be in the business of coddling the egos of sexist males, maybe we might rethink our approach to the conversation to inspire understanding and compassion from men instead of hostility. Here are some ideas we might keep in mind while we negotiate challenging dialogues:
Examining False Allegations Closely: The challenging truth feminists must deal with is that, although it is tiny and hard to measure, there is a non-zero percentage of false complaints of sexual assault. Men who use that fact will always exist to discount women’s narratives. While it is tempting to ignore the inconvenient truth of false accusations under the rug, that path helps to solidify hostile and anti-feminist men into their rape-denying perspective. Maybe one approach to get men on board is for feminists to hold women responsible for false allegations of sexual assault. This is our business. Should women’s allegations of sexual assault prove to be entirely and verifiable false—which are pretty rare—we should be the first to criticise this behaviour. After all, women who pass for victims not only discredit the real stories of victims but also support some men’s existing negative views of women.
Separating the Individual from the Collective: Many guys find hearing us when we speak in totalities difficult. We find ourselves in the mire of the “not all men” debate, as nobody enjoys being condemned based on their inherent and inescapable qualities. Showing men that although we must speak out against the injustices done by many men against women, we acknowledge that individual men may not be part of that problem and approach the conversation in a caring way that produces allies instead of enemies.
Getting Men to See It as a “Us” Issue: Some men say they feel powerless about the subject of sexual assault or that they view it as a women’s issue free from the concern of decent guys like themselves. Good communication could inform males how sexual assault is an “us” issue, undermining chances for trust, closeness, and connection between men and women. Inviting men to see themselves as allies in the fight against sexual assault instead of the assumed offenders of such, we may eliminate defensiveness and hostility—equipping men to be with us instead of against us.
Having to tone-police ourselves to persuade such men to care about sexual assault makes me feel fantastic. Not. Ultimately, though, we have to deal with the current reality, and our goal should be to find partners rather than empower adversaries.
References
Bohner G., Eyssel F., Pina A., Siebler F., & Viki T. (2009). Rape myth acceptance: Cognitive, affective, and behavioural effects of beliefs that blame the victim and exonerate the perpetrator. In Horvath M., Brown J. (Eds.), Rape: Challenging Contemporary Thinking (pp. 17–45). Willan Publishing.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2022, June 22). Preventing sexual violence fact sheet. https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/sexualviolence/fastfact.html
Fedina L., Holmes J. L., & Backes B. L. (2018). Campus sexual assault: A systematic review of prevalence research from 2000 to 2015. Trauma, Violence & Abuse, 19(1), 76–93.
Kantor J., Twohey M. (2019). She said: Breaking the sexual harassment story that helped ignite a movement. Penguin Press.
Muehlenhard C. L., Peterson Z. D., Humphreys T. P., & Jozkowski K. N. (2017). Evaluating the one-in-five statistic: Women’s risk of sexual assault while in college. The Journal of Sex Research, 54(4-5), 549–576.
Triggs OBE, C. (2018). False allegations of sexual violence: The reality. Women and the criminal justice system: Failing victims and offenders?, 43-66.