Cain
Straussian
Feminists typically claim 1/4 women are raped (as Bikewater says); if I recall correctly, the authors of Freakonomics say it's closer to 1/8, which is still astonishingly high.
Rape Statistics
- Thread starter bluesjnr
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I've heard some pretty big numbers for rape too. (I used to donate art work every year to the local rape crisis center.) I did find this PDF file about sexual violence. In this they define rape this way:
I looked, and found the PDF file for the NVAWS. I have not read the whole thing. It's 46 pages long. But anyway, the first PDF file reports a figure of:
Sources are listed. Bureau of Justice has a rape statistic page with a lot of information but I did not find a table or final figure as to % of women or men raped. I'm sure it's there, though. I will try and find it later when I have a few more minutes.
Interestingly though, although I could not find the table for rape (I'm sure it's there somewhere, I just couldn't find it) I did find tables for crime rates that show crime is going down. Here's the page. I would be interested to find out if the same has happened with cases of rape.
I looked, and found the PDF file for the NVAWS. I have not read the whole thing. It's 46 pages long. But anyway, the first PDF file reports a figure of:
Sources are listed. Bureau of Justice has a rape statistic page with a lot of information but I did not find a table or final figure as to % of women or men raped. I'm sure it's there, though. I will try and find it later when I have a few more minutes.
Interestingly though, although I could not find the table for rape (I'm sure it's there somewhere, I just couldn't find it) I did find tables for crime rates that show crime is going down. Here's the page. I would be interested to find out if the same has happened with cases of rape.
MikeMangum
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http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2008/data/table_01.html
The UCR is published every year, and fortunately, every category of violent crime has been going down for around 2 decades. The rate of rape for 2008 was 29.3 per 100k. If exactly half the population is female, and we assumed that all rape victims are female (pretended is more accurate - although I'll buy that the vast majority of reported rape victims are female - we'll just ignore all of the prison rape victims...we always do), that would give a percentage of 0.0586% of females raped per year. Or thereabouts. I'm sure someone who is better with statistics than I am could use that percentage along with average life expectancy to come up with a rough percentage of women raped over their lifetime. There would obviously be tons of caveats.
Professor Yaffle
Butterbeans and Breadcrumbs
Are those figures for reported crime, or something more like a crime survey? Because sexual assaults are majorly underreported.
When I've read their reports before it has always been for reported crime. Also note this is for the USA. It may not be the same world-wide.
Tragically, most of my female friends have been raped. My mother was threatened with rape at gun point but very fortunately escaped. It's a small sample size but still very tragic. It's not so hard for me to believe the fairly large percentages usually given, due to my life experience. I truly would like to see the numbers come down and I am happy to see that they apparently are.
On male friends, I am not so sure. Most are not so forthcoming with me. I know this crime is perpetrated on males also. One of the studies I cited stated that this crime should also be considered (for prisoners, I mean) and that it did not just take place between prisoners - that the staff at the facility could also be found guilty of this.
MikeMangum
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Reported crime.
I have seen many people assert that sexual assaults are under-reported, with extremely wide differences in the asserted rates of under-reporting. I'm curious if there are rigorous studies that actually try to find out what percentage of rapes are not reported.
Key word being "rigorous". I'm not sure how it could really be done with any degree of accuracy unless it is assumed that respondents don't lie.
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Carrying on from the OP - it seems to be the consensus that the figures are inaccurate and, dare I say it, inflated due to poor methodology or deflated due to non-reporting.
Then we have the amazing statement from Amapoloa (who I think is female) that most of her female friends have been raped and sadly her mother has also suffered a harrowing attempted rape.
To both sexes - do you think it is in poor taste to question these figures? Should those involved in the study of this terrible crime accept them and try to investigate causal factors or should they push for more rigorous methods of data gathering and reporting?
Then we have the amazing statement from Amapoloa (who I think is female) that most of her female friends have been raped and sadly her mother has also suffered a harrowing attempted rape.
To both sexes - do you think it is in poor taste to question these figures? Should those involved in the study of this terrible crime accept them and try to investigate causal factors or should they push for more rigorous methods of data gathering and reporting?
Niggle
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(Emphasis added.)
Isn't that what I just said? That they haven't defined what they're including as "attempted rape" (or rape, either, but that's usually a little easier to guess at) and may, therefore, be artificially inflating their figures by including not-legally-defined-as-attempted-rape acts?
It's what I meant, anyway. I'm sorry if that wasn't clear. If you have another objection, could you please explain?
Niggle
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Okay, PLEASE?!?
Seriously, you guys are talking about ass-grabbing and copping a feel and other such things as if they shouldn't count in these totals. To the one doing the grabbing or copping, they may not. Legally, they may actually count as sexual assault, not attempted rape, and so shouldn't be counted here. But to the grabee or the coppee, they may be perceived as attempted rape. The matter of degree seems to vary depending on which side of the equation you're on.
This study does not define those terms, so we don't know what acts were counted. Variation would also occur depending on how the figures were arrived at (e.g., interviewing random people on the street, police reports, court cases). Just asking a woman who was attacked by a horny teenaged male who tried to shove his hands down her pants might yield a report of an attempted rape. The same incident found in a search of police reports might be weeded out as a sexual assault, not an attempted rape.
To forstall lawyering, I know there are some generalizations in there, and I know men get raped, too, etc., etc., etc. I'm pretty sure you know what I mean.
Puppycow
Penultimate Amazing
Are you claiming that it holds true for the USA?
Also, there's actually a fairly large difference between one in three and one in five. So there's a big error bar here, and I don't see the basis for these numbers. And then there's the issue that this is based on self-reporting.
Frankly, I don't believe either one in three or one in five.
Niggle
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I wouldn't say it was in poor taste to question them in general, but it's in porr taste, IMHO, to do so with preconceived reasons expressed (e.g., the numbers are so high because they're counting harmless boys-being-boys acts as rape). We have no way of knowing if they're off high or off low. Amapola's experience would suggest that they might actually be low, whereas most of you have suggested that they're exaggeratedly high.
I don't think they can push for more rigorous methods of data gathering until they figure out why the numbers are off. It's often claimed that rapes and all such related crimes are under-reported. Why? What keeps women (or men) from reporting when they've been assaulted? How could the assaults that aren't showing up in police files be captured for this survey? Can they be captured without artificially inflating the number with spurious reports? Or can an educated guess be made about how much inflation would occur to adjust the numbers afterward? I know squat about statistics, can you tell?
Here's another question I haven't seen addressed. Are they assuming one victim/one crime? It's entirely possible that any given woman (or man) could be assaulted multiple times during life. Do they have a mechanism in place to account for multiple "hits" per person? If they're only counting one each, they could be off by several times the reported number, and in multiple categories.
In the meantime, it couldn't hurt to try to act on the information they do already have to reduce further crimes. If they've got enough incidents recorded to start tracing out common denominators, they could start implementing corrective action based on what they do know. Anything to reduce the numbers of victims is a good thing, yes?
Okay, PLEASE?!?
Seriously, you guys are talking about ass-grabbing and copping a feel and other such things as if they shouldn't count in these totals.
Don't tar everybody with the same brush, I and a good few others said nothing of the sort. This accusation is a good indicator why it's hard to get reliable data on anything let alone rape figures.
As previously requested, would you like to tell us your agenda, if any for the "what gender" question and you might even want to tell those of us who aren't familiar with you what gender YOU are in the interest of balance an' all.
No - It's just my poor writing style. I should have written "according to the report" as a qualifier. Sorry for the confusion. Having said that it's pretty clear I'm in dispute with the figures.
That was my motivation for the thread.
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brodski
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My point was that we have had three different sources quoted in the thread at the time, your criticism was valid for one of them but not for the other two. I seem to be doing a very bad job of communicating in this thread.
brodski
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so far we can't even be sure that there is a study which shows that one in five women suffer rape or attempted rape, the cite leads to a link trail that disappears at a 1997 WHO conference. We have no idea what was actually said, what was measured or how it was measured. The more robust studies (BCS, Geneva) with well defined categories and easily examined methodologies show lower rates.
Professor Yaffle
Butterbeans and Breadcrumbs
I haven't had time to look into the studies, but here's what wikipedia says:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_statistics#Over-_and_under-reporting
TragicMonkey
Poisoned Waffles
Why can't we do both? Part of solving a problem is finding out the scope of it.
NoZed Avenger
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True, but some people doing these types of studies have in the past ignored any legal definition in favor of their own.
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brodski
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It's essential in knowing whether the things we do to solve the problem are working or not.
Bikewer
Penultimate Amazing
"True, but some people doing these types of studies have in the past ignored any legal definition in favor of their own. "
That's precisely what I maintained. We have had, on occasion, particularly vociferous "women's" groups on campus who have maintained that virtually any sex act is rape.
Legally, we have various degrees (usually First, Second, and Third) of sexual abuse, sexual assault, and rape. Certain criteria (we refer to "elements") must be present in each in order to sustain a charge for that offense.
The reporting of rape has been made vastly less traumatic for the victim over the 40 years I've been in law enforcement. It's still no picnic, of course...
Back in the late 60s, it seemed to be the intent of detectives involved in such investigations to "****-can" as many reported cases as possible, and only vigorously pursue those wherein the victim was severely attacked as well as raped.
It was felt that unless the woman resisted (and suffered considerable physical trauma) no "real" rape had occurred.
Of course, we are familiar with claims of rape made to spite someone.... In reality, such cases are rare.
(we had one here where a woman claimed to have been abducted, raped, and robbed.
It turned out that she had gambled away her paycheck at the racetrack, and fabricated the story to explain the loss....)
Now, things are handled with considerably more sensitivity. Most departments have female "sexual assault" detectives to interview victims, and most all such officers have undergone special training in the investigation of such crimes.
Gone for the most part is the adversarial atmosphere (which extended to the courtroom) which made the victim often feel as if they were "being raped all over again".
That's precisely what I maintained. We have had, on occasion, particularly vociferous "women's" groups on campus who have maintained that virtually any sex act is rape.
Legally, we have various degrees (usually First, Second, and Third) of sexual abuse, sexual assault, and rape. Certain criteria (we refer to "elements") must be present in each in order to sustain a charge for that offense.
The reporting of rape has been made vastly less traumatic for the victim over the 40 years I've been in law enforcement. It's still no picnic, of course...
Back in the late 60s, it seemed to be the intent of detectives involved in such investigations to "****-can" as many reported cases as possible, and only vigorously pursue those wherein the victim was severely attacked as well as raped.
It was felt that unless the woman resisted (and suffered considerable physical trauma) no "real" rape had occurred.
Of course, we are familiar with claims of rape made to spite someone.... In reality, such cases are rare.
(we had one here where a woman claimed to have been abducted, raped, and robbed.
It turned out that she had gambled away her paycheck at the racetrack, and fabricated the story to explain the loss....)
Now, things are handled with considerably more sensitivity. Most departments have female "sexual assault" detectives to interview victims, and most all such officers have undergone special training in the investigation of such crimes.
Gone for the most part is the adversarial atmosphere (which extended to the courtroom) which made the victim often feel as if they were "being raped all over again".
jer_j
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The contention that it's out of line to question a factual claim always sets off red flags for me.
Rape is definitely a most horrific crime and should never be taken lightly - and any discussion of it should be done in the context of realizing what a sensitive topic it is and doing our best to fight it. However, it's in equally poor taste for a political movement (not saying this includes you, bluesjnr) to throw out a statistic and then use the seriousness of rape as a shield to hide their claim from examination.
The questioning of all claims, when done in a tasteful and measured way, is always important. I attended a very liberal university, where "statistics" and "facts" of all kinds were used to whip up hysteria and righteous indignation. It created an anti-intellectual and anti-scholarly culture that was harmful in its own right, and as a skeptic I think it is always healthy to question what we hear.
My understanding is that the 1/4 or 1/3 (or even 1/3 during the college years) figures are very inflated, often falling back onto broad definitions of rape and throwing in large numbers of incidences that involved any use of alcohol. I don't doubt that rape is more prevalent than most people realize. But these figures, and the culture that produces them, are highly questionable.