Columbia student carrying mattress until school expels her rapist

[Admiral Yi]

it sounds suspiciously close to calling anyone who doesn't agree with a liar.

[Barrister]

Similarly, we must guard against assuming that, since most due process outcomes are just, all due process outcomes are just.

I reject that premise.  I see more unjust outcomes than just ones every single day.

[Barrister]

When it comes to rape allegations I like to ask "what motivation is there to make up such a story"?  It's not as if identifying yourself as a rape victim is a badge of honour in this society.  Indeed - look at how she has opened herself up to getting every aspect of her life analyzed.

Now, sometimes there is a motive to make up a story.  You've done something you're not proud of, so you claim to be raped.  Maybe you're looking for some kind of financial payout.  In the right circumstances those factors can apply.

But for the large majority of rape allegations, they don't.  Which is why I tend to believe most rape victims.

Why does it have to be a rational reason?  Can't it be just pure vengeance (which, after a while, also becomes a story you're stuck with)?  Most people just move on with their lives, but you're not dealing with most people.  By its nature your job tends to deal with people that are often highly deviant in some way.

Even in the criminal court peoples responses are overwhelmingly rational.  Not maybe in cold Vulcan logic, but people respond out of their perceived best interests.  People who act in a completely illogical, unbalanced manner are vanishingly few and tend to have diagnosed mental illnesses.

[Malthus]

Do you believe her claim?

I don't see any reason not to.

Do you believe her?

Not really, no.

Yeah, that would have been my guess.

I'm guessing a lot of the responses to this case maps to whether people think fake rape accusations and attention whoring is something that happens more and/or is a bigger deal vs actual rapes happing and not being dealt with appropriately.

Not the case for me. I think it probable she is lying - that is, a less than 50% chance she was actually raped (though of course we cannot know for sure), and I also at the same time think that that "fake rape accusations and attention whoring" is a tiny, minor and unusual problem compared with " actual rapes happing and not being dealt with appropriately".

I've been lied to by clients who were a lot more sympathetic-sounding than her.

Reasons why I think her chances of being truthful are less than 50%:

(1) She had a hearing before an administrative tribunal in which the standard is (generally) 'preponderance of the evidence', that is, 51%; they presumably had available more evidence than we do, and they found against her. Which of course is not in and of itself proof she was lying.

(2) She refused to go through with charging the alleged perp. This is more troubling. Specifcally, the reasons she gave in her interview for not going through with it are troubling - that it was taking too long, and she did not want to bother - this, even though the by her own account the cops were pursuing the matter and thought there was a "case to pursue".

The last time we spoke you said you had filed a report with the NYPD and they were starting to investigate. What is the status of that?
It got transferred to the district attorney's office, and I decided I didn't want to pursue it any further because they told it me it would take nine months to a year to actually go to court, which would be after I graduated and probably wanting to erase all of my memories of Columbia from my brain anyway, so I decided not to pursue it.

Did the police seem to think there was a case there to pursue?
Yeah, they were going to contact the other women who reported against him, and they would have subpoenaed the information from the university files.

In another case, the 'I just want to put it all behind me' response would be sympathetic and make sense; it doesn't, from a woman devoting a whole year to carrying a matress around. It just doesn't add up, leading me to suspect that there is a greater-than-even chance she isn't telling the truth.

[Malthus]

When it comes to rape allegations I like to ask "what motivation is there to make up such a story"?  It's not as if identifying yourself as a rape victim is a badge of honour in this society.  Indeed - look at how she has opened herself up to getting every aspect of her life analyzed.

Now, sometimes there is a motive to make up a story.  You've done something you're not proud of, so you claim to be raped.  Maybe you're looking for some kind of financial payout.  In the right circumstances those factors can apply.

But for the large majority of rape allegations, they don't.  Which is why I tend to believe most rape victims.

Why does it have to be a rational reason?  Can't it be just pure vengeance (which, after a while, also becomes a story you're stuck with)?  Most people just move on with their lives, but you're not dealing with most people.  By its nature your job tends to deal with people that are often highly deviant in some way.

Even in the criminal court peoples responses are overwhelmingly rational.  Not maybe in cold Vulcan logic, but people respond out of their perceived best interests.  People who act in a completely illogical, unbalanced manner are vanishingly few and tend to have diagnosed mental illnesses.

In this particular case, she has at least two entirely rational, self-interested reasons for what she is doing - quite unlike most alleged rape victims: (1) it has gained her an immense amount of publicity and, evidently, popularity on campus; and (2) she is making an art project out of it.

[Barrister]

When it comes to rape allegations I like to ask "what motivation is there to make up such a story"?  It's not as if identifying yourself as a rape victim is a badge of honour in this society.  Indeed - look at how she has opened herself up to getting every aspect of her life analyzed.

Now, sometimes there is a motive to make up a story.  You've done something you're not proud of, so you claim to be raped.  Maybe you're looking for some kind of financial payout.  In the right circumstances those factors can apply.

But for the large majority of rape allegations, they don't.  Which is why I tend to believe most rape victims.

Why does it have to be a rational reason?  Can't it be just pure vengeance (which, after a while, also becomes a story you're stuck with)?  Most people just move on with their lives, but you're not dealing with most people.  By its nature your job tends to deal with people that are often highly deviant in some way.

Even in the criminal court peoples responses are overwhelmingly rational.  Not maybe in cold Vulcan logic, but people respond out of their perceived best interests.  People who act in a completely illogical, unbalanced manner are vanishingly few and tend to have diagnosed mental illnesses.

In this particular case, she has at least two entirely rational, self-interested reasons for what she is doing - quite unlike most alleged rape victims: (1) it has gained her an immense amount of publicity and, evidently, popularity on campus; and (2) she is making an art project out of it.

But both arose months after the initial allegation.  It's impossible to imagine this was her initial plan.

[Kleves]

At best she seems like a poor role model for other victims to emulate. At worst, she is a monster who is making it more difficult for actual victims to get justice.

[garbon]

it sounds suspiciously close to calling anyone who doesn't agree with a liar.

I don't think so as that isn't the intent at all. I've just yet to see any stats on how many claimed rapes are actually false and any look at what impact that has on attitudes towards rape. Presumably, someone making the claim that false rapes are just as big a problem as rapes would have some cites for that, right?

[garbon]

When it comes to rape allegations I like to ask "what motivation is there to make up such a story"?  It's not as if identifying yourself as a rape victim is a badge of honour in this society.  Indeed - look at how she has opened herself up to getting every aspect of her life analyzed.

Now, sometimes there is a motive to make up a story.  You've done something you're not proud of, so you claim to be raped.  Maybe you're looking for some kind of financial payout.  In the right circumstances those factors can apply.

But for the large majority of rape allegations, they don't.  Which is why I tend to believe most rape victims.

Why does it have to be a rational reason?  Can't it be just pure vengeance (which, after a while, also becomes a story you're stuck with)?  Most people just move on with their lives, but you're not dealing with most people.  By its nature your job tends to deal with people that are often highly deviant in some way.

Even in the criminal court peoples responses are overwhelmingly rational.  Not maybe in cold Vulcan logic, but people respond out of their perceived best interests.  People who act in a completely illogical, unbalanced manner are vanishingly few and tend to have diagnosed mental illnesses.

In this particular case, she has at least two entirely rational, self-interested reasons for what she is doing - quite unlike most alleged rape victims: (1) it has gained her an immense amount of publicity and, evidently, popularity on campus; and (2) she is making an art project out of it.

But both arose months after the initial allegation.  It's impossible to imagine this was her initial plan.

And wouldn't both have been better performed as part of this plan if she had done so shortly after her supposed rape then waiting years to do so?

[garbon]

(1) She had a hearing before an administrative tribunal in which the standard is (generally) 'preponderance of the evidence', that is, 51%; they presumably had available more evidence than we do, and they found against her. Which of course is not in and of itself proof she was lying.

What sort of evidence would there be beyond she said, he said, when the tribunal was taken place more than a year post the rape?

[Jacob]

In another case, the 'I just want to put it all behind me' response would be sympathetic and make sense; it doesn't, from a woman devoting a whole year to carrying a matress around. It just doesn't add up, leading me to suspect that there is a greater-than-even chance she isn't telling the truth.

For me your analysis is very unconvincing. There is a big difference between:

1) Having the police tell her and her friends that she's probably lying and facing university authorities who're, at best, saying "it may have happened, but yeah really there's nothing we can do; and hey, your friend needs to write an essay from the point of view of the person who you say raped you" on one hand; NS

2) Making a public statement and getting support from your peers and others, drawing attention to a problem which you think is being dealt with inappropriately by the authorities, and turning something bad that happened to you into fuel for your art practice, on the other.

The first is an exercise in frustration, being marginalized, and dismissed. It seems eminently reasonable to feel it's not worth it to pursue something in a system that appears explicitly designed to create that outcome (especially in light of the NYPD officer they dealt with saying there's a 20:1 ratio of false:true accusations and it's his job to figure out which is which by being abrasive).

The second is an exercise in trying to empower yourself in the face of adversity and turning something negative into something positive.

I do not at all find choosing to abandon effort on 1) in favour of 2) strange or otherwise indicative of dishonesty. It makes perfect sense.

Now I understand that some see the preference of 2) over 1) as indicative of wanting to "attention whore", and that those actions in and of themselves provide a credible motive for lying. I do not find that line of reasoning convincing, myself.

[Malthus]

When it comes to rape allegations I like to ask "what motivation is there to make up such a story"?  It's not as if identifying yourself as a rape victim is a badge of honour in this society.  Indeed - look at how she has opened herself up to getting every aspect of her life analyzed.

Now, sometimes there is a motive to make up a story.  You've done something you're not proud of, so you claim to be raped.  Maybe you're looking for some kind of financial payout.  In the right circumstances those factors can apply.

But for the large majority of rape allegations, they don't.  Which is why I tend to believe most rape victims.

Why does it have to be a rational reason?  Can't it be just pure vengeance (which, after a while, also becomes a story you're stuck with)?  Most people just move on with their lives, but you're not dealing with most people.  By its nature your job tends to deal with people that are often highly deviant in some way.

Even in the criminal court peoples responses are overwhelmingly rational.  Not maybe in cold Vulcan logic, but people respond out of their perceived best interests.  People who act in a completely illogical, unbalanced manner are vanishingly few and tend to have diagnosed mental illnesses.

In this particular case, she has at least two entirely rational, self-interested reasons for what she is doing - quite unlike most alleged rape victims: (1) it has gained her an immense amount of publicity and, evidently, popularity on campus; and (2) she is making an art project out of it.

But both arose months after the initial allegation.  It's impossible to imagine this was her initial plan.

True, those are the reasons for what she is doing right now.

A rational reason for lodging an accusation against this particular person with the university could very easily be personal dislike of this person, with whom we know she was, at one point, she was having a sexual relationship. Lots of people who break up do so in ways leaving one party or another with a grievance. 

The reasons against lodging such an accusation, as you put them, are typically fear of the ensuing publicity - and as you put it "getting every aspect of her life analyzed" in public, no less. This is an entirely rational reason to doubt the falseness of an accusation as a generality -- except, perhaps, in the case of a woman who willingly courts publicity by lugging a matress about in public. Such a person, it seems to me, is less likely than the average to fear having her private life exposed in public, or be concerned about a "victim stigma".

[Malthus]

(1) She had a hearing before an administrative tribunal in which the standard is (generally) 'preponderance of the evidence', that is, 51%; they presumably had available more evidence than we do, and they found against her. Which of course is not in and of itself proof she was lying.

What sort of evidence would there be beyond she said, he said, when the tribunal was taken place more than a year post the rape?

I have no idea.

[Jacob]

A rational reason for lodging an accusation against this particular person with the university could very easily be personal dislike of this person, with whom we know she was, at one point, she was having a sexual relationship. Lots of people who break up do so in ways leaving one party or another with a grievance. 

The reasons against lodging such an accusation, as you put them, are typically fear of the ensuing publicity - and as you put it "getting every aspect of her life analyzed" in public, no less. This is an entirely rational reason to doubt the falseness of an accusation as a generality -- except, perhaps, in the case of a woman who willingly courts publicity by lugging a matress about in public. Such a person, it seems to me, is less likely than the average to fear having her private life exposed in public, or be concerned about a "victim stigma".

So because she chooses to speak out now and face public scrutiny on her own terms, she can never credibly have made decisions wanting to avoid public scrutiny on other terms in the past?

I'm not convinced.

[Malthus]

In another case, the 'I just want to put it all behind me' response would be sympathetic and make sense; it doesn't, from a woman devoting a whole year to carrying a matress around. It just doesn't add up, leading me to suspect that there is a greater-than-even chance she isn't telling the truth.

For me your analysis is very unconvincing. There is a big difference between:

1) Having the police tell her and her friends that she's probably lying and facing university authorities who're, at best, saying "it may have happened, but yeah really there's nothing we can do; and hey, your friend needs to write an essay from the point of view of the person who you say raped you" on one hand; NS

2) Making a public statement and getting support from your peers and others, drawing attention to a problem which you think is being dealt with inappropriately by the authorities, and turning something bad that happened to you into fuel for your art practice, on the other.

The first is an exercise in frustration, being marginalized, and dismissed. It seems eminently reasonable to feel it's not worth it to pursue something in a system that appears explicitly designed to create that outcome (especially in light of the NYPD officer they dealt with saying there's a 20:1 ratio of false:true accusations and it's his job to figure out which is which by being abrasive).

The second is an exercise in trying to empower yourself in the face of adversity and turning something negative into something positive.

I do not at all find choosing to abandon effort on 1) in favour of 2) strange or otherwise indicative of dishonesty. It makes perfect sense.

Now I understand that some see the preference of 2) over 1) as indicative of wanting to "attention whore", and that those actions in and of themselves provide a credible motive for lying. I do not find that line of reasoning convincing, myself.

Seems like there is a fallacy somewhere in basing an analysis on whether or not she's lying entirely on her version of events. If she is, in fact, lying, isn't she likely to lie about (or at least exaggerate) what the cops said to her, to make herself look more the victim - given that the cops won't comment, and her friends will back her up?

OTOH, if you look at other statements made by her, it doesn't add up to her case being "marginalized and dismissed" by the cops. According to her interview, she said that the cops believed there was a case to answer, and it was her who dropped the case - not because she was "margenalized and dismissed", but becaise it would take nine months to a year, and she did not care to think about it that long. Was she lying about that?

Look again at her complaints, and while some of them were serious, a lot of them appear bizzarely petty. They had muzak on. They made her drive to the Special Victims Unit. A cop was smoking.