The Glade 4.0

Garages are found in motor pools in the Army, by definition.



Rafael told Xeq how a nuclear reactor works in another thread. Technically, Xeq needs to learn himself, or assume Raf is correct. This is a similar situation. Not all assumptions are created equal.



This is a terrible assumption. She is accusing someone of a serious crime. He is not here to tell us his side of the story; he was not there to tell Michael his side of the story, and while it might be nicer to Michael and his friend to assume she was telling the truth, the simple fact is that this thread is about the rape issue in general, not her personal story. People should not bring up a story in which they have a personal stake in order to make assertions about the overall national situation, and then reply on other people's politeness to avoid addressing the issue.

Making precisely this sort of assumption is exactly how the Rolling Stone mess happened, it's how the Duke rape case happened, and it's how the Army got caught trying to fry a Brigadier General for sexual assault in order to avoid feminist outrage if he was let off, rather than on actual facts. Note that LTC (formerly BG) Sinclair was guilty of adultery and other sorts of misconduct - but he was not a rapist or a sexual abuser - his sex partner fabricated that part to avoid the consequences of her own adultery, because while then-BG Sinclair significantly outranked her, the fact remained that she was still a Captain, not some young private.

Also, I apologize for the shitty source. The same basic article is available on CNN, but it avoids mention of the prosecutor's email and instead hides the misconduct of the government behind euphamisms.

Sexual assault is a problem in the military, but it is seriously aggravated by the military's unwillingness to confront it's own creation of an incentive for false accusations, and its outdated regulations about sexual conduct among its members. I can imagine a lot of scenarios under which a major could forcibly rape an enlisted soldier that do not require the coincidences this one does.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

No, that is not the better assumption.

I so rarely come out in support of Diamondeye, but our justice system is built upon the presumption of innocence until guilt is proven. The fact that the overwhelming majority of men feel compelled to believe a woman when she claims to have been raped does not change that. Furthermore, it is a well known aspect of the human condition that women excel at emotionally manipulating men. They have refined this technique over thousands of years in response to being smaller and possessing less muscle mass. All across the world, throughout the entirety of recorded human history, there are cases of women lying rape and paternity in order to exact vengeance, protect themselves, to secure a desired mate, or simply to secure resources. This is not in dispute. It is a thing that happens, and is known to happen. In fact, we have some very high profile court cases that show it happened recently.

This factoid about humanity is not limited to rape and paternity, nor is it limited to women. Humans all over the world lie about things that the civil and criminal court systems preside over, in order to benefit themselves. Rape and paternity are only significant in that they are believed at face value due to half of humanity being gullible schmucks who will believe anything a human with tits tells them.

Since we presume innocence, guilt has to be proven. You prove guilt not by demonstrating that something could have happened, but that it did happen. Kairtaine's personal anecdote about army motor pools does indeed demonstrate how the rape could have happened - a point Diamondeye is not refuting - but it does not demonstrate that it did happen. Diamondeye's rebuttal is that Kairtaine's personal anecdote is a deviation from established procedure, that the army practices measures to ensure that such deviations do not occur, and that there are very good reasons (which, incidentally, are totally unrelated to rape prevention) for these established procedures to be followed.

Lapses in protocol happen all the time, but that does not prove John raped Jane. You must first establish that a lapse in protocol happened at that particular time, or at least that discipline is extremely poor and lapses in protocol happen with alarming frequency. That is not enough, however. You must then go on to prove that John raped Jane.

I am an anonymous ******* on the internet, hearing about some gal I don't know got raped by some guy I don't know. Meanwhile, I have to cross-reference what I know about monkeys habitually lying to get other monkeys in trouble, with one monkey explaining how said rape would require a series of wildly improbably events, and another monkey claiming to have been in one of those wildly improbably events this one time at band camp.

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Buckle your pants or they might fall down.

An individual relaying an event to a friend is much, much more reliable than someguyontheinternet_01 saying the story is unlikely.

Rolling stone got into trouble by not doing their homework and assuming something based on their own bias. That is what you are doing here.

I generally give people the benefit of the doubt unless I see a reason not to. You have presented none. If I were rolling stone, I'd certainly look into the accusations a bit more before publishing something. But, if "Jackie" came to me with her story, I'd give her the benefit of the doubt long enough to investigate the story, rather than dismiss it based on some personal bias.

This works both ways. Presumption of innocence suggests she is not fabricating her story. DE is dismissing her story based on, well, nothing. Certainly we should assume the major is innocent until proven otherwise. But her story should not be dismissed out of hand under the assumption it's a fabrication either.

Fortunately, I'm not a court. There's no trial here. We can take the accusation seriously without proof. That's not to say we assume it's true (and I can see where I may have given that impression) but that DE's dismissal is not adequate to declare her a liar either. Quite the opposite - his argument hangs on the assumption people don't work in shops alone, which has been shown to be false based on discussion here.

I am not dismissing her story at all - I'm saying it's not credible. We do not have any corroborating evidence, and on the face of it, it relies on a number of assumptions - of which the "working alone" bit is only one - that are questionable individually, and taken together paint a story one must be excessively credulous, or simply completely unfamiliar with military norms to accept.

Presumption of innocence, moreover, applies only to the accused - not to an accuser. An accusation that is not substantiated does not automatically mean the accuser is lying, and even if it does that situation does not obtain until AFTER the original accused's case is disposed of.



That assumption has not been shown to be false, mainly because I never made it. I pointed out that it would be highly unusual, and very inadvisable to work in a shop alone, and therefore someone claiming that was the case arouses suspicion. Kairtaine talking about being "left in charge" of a motor pool is not the same thing, moreover, as actually working on vehicles. Standing around watching the place is a completely different matter than conducting maintenance work in terms of level of hazard - and Michael did specify she was under the vehicle, not merely "changing the windshield wipers" - which I struggle to imagine why a mechanic would be called upon to do anyhow.



Not really. Lots of people have friends with all kinds of issues. Moreover, if I'm "some guy on the internet" then obviously so is Michael.



Except that it isn't, because I am not saying the story is impossible or didn't happen. I am saying it's highly suspicious without more information than we have. I'm also highly familiar with normal military procedures and can recognize deviations from them whereas the author of the Rolling Stone article went based on stereotypes about frat behavior.



The reason I "haven't presented one" is because you are going out of your way to call into question my assertions because you do not understand why they are true. This is because you are simply too unfamiliar with the military to understand why this story is so ridiculous. Your "assumption" that the major didn't manipulate events to put this woman in the motor pool alone is particularly telling - it reflects a Hollywood version of the military command structure wherein officers have far more granular control of day-to-day operations than they actually do. The kind of granular control a major would need in order to be able to plausibly do this would mean certain underlying aspects of how the military fundamentally operates are not as they are. If you REALLY want me to explain this, it will take a very long time and frankly I don't see much reason to do so when most people will either find a reason why they want not to believe it or simply call it to TL;DR.

I really do not have the time to make a Second Lieutenant out of you either, so I'll explain it in these terms - it is not impossible for a major to arrange a situation where they could rape an enlisted soldier without witnesses. In fact, it isn't even terribly hard. The situation Michael described is simply not one of them. A much more plausible story would be that he arranged some pretext, through the chain of command, for her to come to his office late, got her in there, then began making his advances.

It might even be that's what actually happened. It might be that this young woman got herself into such a situation and then embellished the story for a number of reasons - for example, maybe she felt that she might appeared to have been consenting, or was angry, or just traumatized. It would not make her a "liar" as we normally understand it, even if some parts of the story were lies; it would make her a young woman trying to deal with a horrible situation.

It might also be there was an affair going on. It might be that the whole story happened as she told it; it might be that the story is total hogwash. We really don't know, but there is no reason in the face of the facts to regard it as a full and true account of an actual incident, especially being third-hand hearsay as it is.

Why are you so interested in regarding it as true? does it bother you to discount a woman's account? Does it bother you to have to call Michael's story into question?

Or better yet - what if the story were the other way around?

If Michael told a story about a friend who was a major and who told him about how his career was almost ruined by some nutball female private who made up some story about a rape because of her massive emotional instability (I am referring here to a hypothetical woman, not Michael's actual friend) would you just automatically disbelieve that story? Because it's this same story viewed from the other side? Or would you believe that story because "a story told to a friend is more credible?"

Because I'll tell you right now, that story is a lot more credible than "I was in the motor pool when SUDDENLY RAPE!". On the other hand, if he told a story about a major friend of his that had his career nearly ruined by some female that claimed he raped her after he had her come to his office late to discuss something, my reaction would be "at best he's an idiot for having a female soldier alone in his office after hours, and it's quite likely that something untoward actually did happen."

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I have no horse in the race. However, I believe people to be honorable in general, and find any assumption without evidence that someone is lying (and I disagree with your suggestion that she may be falsely accusing but not lying) offensive. That said, you are aware of my views on presumption of innocence. It bothers me to discount it only in that there is no reason presented that I feel is reasonable.

My recitation of my friend's story is second hand. I have no reason to disbelieve her. I do believe DE is relying more on SOP and policy than addressing the issue. If it were just her I might be a little more skeptical, but it isn't just one story. It is a story repeated (with different details) by women all over the country. It is a story I have heard from different women in recovery groups over and over. Some women it destroys, some women take it in stride, and others fall in all the points of the spectrum in between. A friend at work, a retired CPO, told his daughters he would put them through college, help them start their careers, let them stay at home until they were ready to move out, as long as they did not join the service. He believes there is a major rape problem in the services. He doesn't want his daughters going through it.

I believe DE's position is one based on belief in his fellow soldiers, that they wouldn't do such things to their own, if at all. This belief, and its accompanying disbelief in the capability of men to be evil and skirt or break the rules and the law, are what makes rape in the military disappear off the records. It can't happen by the rules, so it doesn't happen. the women must be lying because the men wouldn't or couldn't do that. Because the women are lying they can't be depended on and get forced out of any position of trust.

However, from every corner I hear that the good old boys network is alive and well in the services and that a lot of the senior officers are of the opinion, unofficially and off the record, that women do not belong in the service in anything resembling a combat position and are taking a spot that should have gone to a man.

Life sucks, people are selfish beasts, and a percentage of men do rape, especially when the system tells them its okay and they won't get punished for it.

Sorry DE, but I don't believe your analysis. I think you are being naive and good-hearted, but are trusting SOP and policy and the rightness of your fellow troops way too much.

The incident, whatever happened that she calls rape, did happen in Germany.

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The U. S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. You have to catch up with it yourself. B. Franklin

"A mind needs books like a sword needs a whetstone." -- Tyrion Lannister, A Game of Thrones

I don't know why you would have a problem with the suggestion that an accusation might be unsupportable but also not a lie. People say things all the time that they believe to be true, and yet are actually not, or which cannot be verified.

I also find it rather bizarre that you think people are generally honorable, and yet have no problem regarding this story as credible. By necessity, this means regarding the major in the story as highly dishonorable based on nothing more than another person's word - I assume you regard rape as a highly dishonorable action? It strikes me as bizarre to regard one person as guilty of something really horrible simply to avoid the unpleasant implication that another person might be dishonorable in their accusation - and doubly so insofar as, as far as I can tell, the only reason to favor the female in this case is either A) that she's a female or B) that she's Michael's friend.

As for there being no reason you feel is reasonable to discount the story... You don't seem to have any actual basis for your determination.

Again, what if the situation were reversed and the major were Michael's friend, talking about how some lunatic almost ruined his career with a hogwash rape accusation? Would it suddenly be offensive to discount his story because that would mean regarding him as a liar?

It has very disturbing implications for our criminal justice system if we start assuming allegations to be true - whether they involve sexual assault or anything else - because to regard them with suspicion somehow means regarding the accuser as having filed a false report. It has equally disturbing social implications if we start regarding rape accusations as true simply because we don't want to imply that alleged victims might be lying.

These implications pertain both to individuals who then face the social consequences of being accused of sexual impropriety, and against which they essentially can't defend themselves, and for society in general, because we get ideas like "rape culture" that hinge on a prevalence of rape that itself is entirely the product of accusations that can't be questioned because we have decided that doing so is socially unacceptable.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I believe people to be generally honorable, but I am not naive. Rapes occur. Lying occurs. However, barring any evidence to the contrary (and we have none here), I tend to take people at their word.



No reasonable evidence has been provided.



Without any evidence to the contrary, I would take him at his word. There is no conflict in this until I must act - in that event, more investigation and evidence is needed (see Rolling Stone).

Michael, I am not "relying on SOP and policy rather than addressing the issue", nor addressing the stories of "women all over the country." I'm addressing specifically this story that you decided to bring up, and the simple fact is that this story relies almost entirely on a major just happening to go to a motor pool for no apparent reason and at the same time a female mechanic working there by herself for no apparent reason. How fortuitous!

The military is a large organization - in fact, the largest single organization in the nation by numbers of personnel as far as I know. It therefore has problems. Rape does happen in the military. False accusations for various reasons also happen in the military. Many of the young women you know of have been sexually assaulted, many others had consensual sex they then determined later was rape for whatever reason, and many others are simply outright fabricating the whole thing.

As for what one retired CPO happens to believe - well, he's entitled to think what he thinks, but I can find all kinds of retired NCOs that think things that are complete hogwash. NCOs by definition are responsible for individual soldier (or sailor, for your CPO) issues and training, unless they are at VERY high levels they don't have much visibility of Army, Navy or military-wide issues. Officers, by definition, are responsible for unit issues and therefore do get that visibility much earlier on - and field-grade officers like me have been getting it for years.



Then you obviously did not bother to actually read my position. Yes, this could happen, but it simply does not make much sense. It doesn't require just a rule violation or departure from procedure, it requires everything about the situation to be completely out of the ordinary. Yes that could happen, but if I put this woman's story up against most other military rape stories, this one is near the bottom of the barrel in terms of credibility. I've made it perfectly clear, however, that rapes can and do happen in the military:










Your belief is not based on anything I've actually said, but rather on a complete and total caricature of my viewpoint. I've been perfectly clear that rapes can and do occur in the military, and you have absolutely no excuse whatsoever for believing I've said or think anything to the contrary.



I doubt very much that you have access to any "corners" at all. This bears absolutely no relation to what senior officers are saying - in fact if anything, they are pushing females in combat positions in order to avoid bad publicity.



A percentage of women make false accusations, especially when they know they'll be implicitly believed.



It takes a truly astounding arrogance on your part to make a statement like this. I'm coming up on 17 years of service. More importantly, I actually deal with this stuff. As a company commander I was required to maintain a unit Sexual Harassment and Assault Prevention Policy. I was required to make sure I had a trained SHARP representative, and to ensure that annual training on SHARP was provided to every soldier in my command. If a sexual assault had been reported, I had extensive regulatory requirements for what I would have had to do to deal with it - and failing to follow them could have had serious consequences for me.

Now that I'm the battalion XO, I am responsible for holding the company commanders' feet to the fire on this issue, just like on other issues. I am responsible for making sure the battalion staff executes its responsibilities in this regard- just like I am responsible for the staff in every other regard. Sexual assault is a huge issue in the military - keeping up with this stuff is not trivial, and since the XO speaks with the commanders' voice and is the commander's hatchet man so to speak, I deal with the details of managing this issue for the battalion commander - along with a great deal of other stuff.

I don't think you really grasp just how much time I spend dealing with Army issues. This is not some **** hobby for me; it's a whole second career I've been working on for 17 years. As far as I know you've never even signed so much as an enlistment paper, so don't come in here telling me I'm "naïve" because I don't believe everything every young female says or because some retired CPO said differently. I get this **** all the time; people think because they have friends or relatives in the military that they know all about it. You don't, any more than I have any business performing medical diagnosis just because I have a couple relatives who are doctors, and especially not when you can't even be bothered to read and understand my position in the first place.



When people deployed in foreign areas get "Dear John" letters, do you actually think the first thing they do is nip off to the maintenance area?

This isn't merely about technical violations of the rules - the behavior of the major is truly bizarre in this story. It isn't even the idea that he sexually assaulted someone out of anger - what's bizarre is that he gets a letter from his wife breaking up with him, decides for some reason to go to the motor pool (really? WTF?) and then inexplicably there's a female mechanic working all alone!

The entire combination of events is just a total non-sequiter. It just does not add up.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

You do realize there is an inherent problem with taking someone at their word when that word is directed against someone else and that other person has no opportunity to give their side of the story?

In that case, we need to evaluate the story on its own merits, and the merits of this story are weak. It describes numerous coincidences and strange behavior on the part of both parties just to get them in the situation for the rape to occur. I don't see that a simple desire to regard people as honorable is sufficient reason to disregard these problems.



I pointed out several reasons to call the story into question. Additional evidence would be needed to address those concerns. Taking people at their word is not some sort of imperative.



So.. the person you take at their word is based solely on the fact that they happen to be the one presenting you with their side of the story?

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

There is not. I addressed that above. Unless I need to perform an action based on the incident, there is no problem. Further, as far as I know the other person would agree with her accounting of the incident. I have no evidence to suggest she is lying.



You're assuming I agree with your assessment. I do not.



I have no basis to assume someone is lying. So why wouldn't I take them at their word? The only reason would be to defend some sort of personal held bias.

You are a member of society. When society decides that this sort of thing is acceptable, problems do arise. This is how the Rolling Stone story happened. I do not see why this practice becomes a good idea just because someone is not being asked to take any action.

Also, I don't know why you think "as far as you know" the other person would agree with her story. It's an accusation of rape. Do you have some evidence to suggest that people generally admit to accusations of rape without further evidence? People have a strong incentive not to admit to such things, and practically none to admit to it - even more so if they actually did not do it.



For which you have given no actual reason.



This is astounding. Let me make sure I understand this.

If we take the exact same set of circumstances - as in, the hypothetical I am proposing, in terms of the alleged circumstances, is identical - with the ONLY differences being A) that the other party is relating it and B) that they are asserting that the story was a fabrication.

That whichever side of the exact same story happens to be the one relating it to you - or, if you prefer, through Michael, or even some other hypothetical intervening person - is the one you believe? If so, is this always true? Do you not ever, under any circumstances, regard someone relating events to you that you can't independently verify, with any suspicion at all?

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

It really doesn't matter if it was true or not.

Anecdotal evidence does not a problem with society make.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

No, it doesn't. However, its on stories like this that the "problem with society" is invented.

You can (or could a week or so ago when this was the main story) go on CNN and find a parade of morons telling people "well, it's not this story that matters, it's really the campus rape problem in general." The problem is, if people cannot identify an unsupportable allegation until their face is rubbed in it, and those same people are asserting a widespread problem with rape (or, for that matter, any other crime that's alleged to be some sort of epidemic) it seriously calls into question how widespread the problem actually is because now we have a problem of people telling us there is a rape epidemic that cannot be trusted to honestly vet rape allegations.

The same applies here. If we're told that there is a rape problem in the military, and then we're given an example like Michael's, it's possible to understand that rape does occur in the military, but at the same time be highly suspicious of the overall problem because we're being told about it by someone that obviously cannot vet claims for some reason or other - in his case, most likely just because he's close to the women in question and not disinterested enough to do so.

Moreover these claims have to be vetted with an eye to whether they could be substantiated beyond a reasonable doubt because that's the standard for crime, and we are trying to determine how widespread a crime is.

This is why feminists feel so threatened when a rape claim is publicly disproven. It isn't that they're worried that it will discredit other victims. It's a worry that it will discredit feminists - because they rely on anecdotes to make claims about widespread societal problems, and when one of those anecdotes is found to be hogwash, it calls into question just how many other similar allegations are hogwash.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I think it's safe to say, "Yes, people get raped."

I mean, rape is a thing. It happens. It's not a new thing. It's pretty much the way much of nature procreates. It's not necessarily the norm in most species, but the roots are there. However, it's not all that common in western society.

One could argue in some cultures, where women aren't given a choice in anything, all sex is rape... but even that would be naïve.

_________________
Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

In our (Air Force) most recent sexual assault prevention training they were covering consent and alcohol...the whole sleeping with a drunk woman is rape thing has gotten so silly that they're telling us that if your wife comes home after a night if drinking and initiates sex with you, if you go along with it it's rape....

Unfortunately, if you try to address it without acknowledging that it happens every other sentence people still want to claim you're either defending it or apologizing for it.



In those sorts of cultures, most of the men don't actually have that much more choice than the women.



Thankfully the Army has not departed quite this far from reality.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Taking people at their word is not a problem. If you must take action, or if there's some conflict (two people relating different sides of the story) then more information is needed. It's pretty basic.



I don't need evidence to take someone at their word. I need evidence not to.



Too many "if"s and "should be"s. Conjecture.



Unless I have a reason not to believe what I'm being told, I go out of my way to take people at their word. It is the respectful thing to do, and it has served me VERY WELL. Again, I'm not naive, but I extend the same courtesy I would expect from others.

I don't see why one would change their method of reasoning just because one was called to take action on an issue - or to put it another way, I don't see why one would use a different approach to a problem just because one was not acting on it.



Why? what is so important about taking people at their word, to the point that you assert that as far as you know, the other party would admit to rape? Again, what leads you to believe that the normal reaction to an allegation of rape is to confess to it? (for clarity, a confession in the colloquial sense, not necessarily a legal confession)



You are taking issue with the idea that a story is unlikely to be true based on the fact that the reasons it is "unlikely" are not absolutely certain - despite the fact that lack of absolute certainty is part of the definition of unlikely in the first place - but require no evidence whatsoever to require that story as true because you think not regarding it as true is offensive?



So - you are taking issue with my evaluation of the likelihood of this story because of your personal practice of taking people at their word, because you regard doing so as respectful, and because you regard not doing so as offensive?

You are further taking issue with my assertion that the story is unlikely because you feel there is insufficient evidence it is not true, but in turn are regarding it as true simply because it is your personal practice to do so? I mean, you have articulated no factual merits to the story, but seem to have made it very clear that you are simply following your own personal standard practice, so this is my best understanding of what you are trying to say.

Well.... wow. This is an entirely novel form of reasoning. I'm really just not sure what else to say to that, other than that this is simply amazing.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Because people are generally honorable. Again the more appropriate question is - why not?. From what I've seen, I have no reason not to.



That's not what I said, is it?



Yes, I find the assumption that someone is lying without evidence offensive. Just as I would find the assumption that someone is guilty of a crime without evidence offensive.



No, I find issue with your evaluation of the story because I think your evaluation is nothing more than conjecture.



I have no facts in favor of or opposed to her story. Until I have either I have a simple choice. Take her at her word, or assume she is lying. I have no basis for either, so I choose to give her the benefit of the doubt.



Taking people at their word is amazing to you? You go around assuming everyone is lying? You must live in a really dark place.

Generally, people are honorable. I don't see why this would preclude not believing a story where the details of that story lead to suspicion that what is generally true is not true in this case. Generally, I find most stories believable. That is not the case with this one in particular.



It's exactly what you said:



Her accounting of the incident is one of a violent rape. If the other person (the major) were to agree to her accounting, he would be confessing to rape, would he not?



No one is assuming that anyone is lying here - what is being pointed out is that the story is unlikely to be true as related. The two are not the same thing. I am not making any statements about the reason the story might be implausible, only that it IS implausible. It is the responsibility of the person asserting facts to establish those facts; they cannot be excused from that responsibility nor excuse themselves by claiming that to doubt their assertions is an accusation of lying.

Furthermore, by assuming the story is true, you are assuming someone else - the major - is guilty of a crime.

I'm also unclear why you are criticizing my evaluation of the story on the basis that you find my evaluation offensive. Surely you do not think I am really going to change my evaluation because you're offended?



And you base this on what? In what way is pointing out that people generally do not act on information they do not have "conjecture"? In what way is pointing out that numerous circumstances which are all out of the ordinary must come together for this story to be true "conjecture"?

On what basis do you think my evaluation is conjecture? What puts you in a position to make such a determination?



So this is entirely a matter of your personal choice? All right, then why are you taking issue with other people making different choices?



Where did I say anything of the sort? I made clear that I evaluate a story's likelihood of truth based on the information it gives me, and I evaluate that in light of facts and probabilities I am already in possession of. I gave specific examples of other, hypothetical stories that I would be far more likely to regard as true. Most stories and relations of events I hear are generally plausible. This one is not. I do not know why you would think that disbelieving this story necessarily means disbelieving all - or even very many - others.

You seem to really be having trouble with the idea that believing a story is unlikely to be true is not the same thing as deciding it definitely is not true. In point of fact these are not the same thing.

I also don't see what "dark place" I do or do not live in has to do with anything, especially based as it is on a straw man. Really, that's not the issue at hand.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I never said the "normal reaction to an allegation of rape is to confess it" did I? I said I don't know what his stance on it is, and would have to assume he did not confess. People do confess to rape, and I don't go out of my way to assume someone is lying.



Which you are welcome to do. I'm not sold on your explanation. It's not enough for me to choose not to give her the benefit of the doubt until better information is revealed. Don't understand what's so difficult about this.



I've addressed this. The above statement is not correct. There is no conflict.



Who asked you to change your opinion?



Conjecture. Formation of an opinion or theory without sufficient evidence or proof. It fits.



There's no evidence either way. So I choose to give people the benefit of the doubt. I've never said you can't do the opposite, I just expressed that I find that pretty ridiculous.

I never said the "normal reaction to an allegation of rape is to confess it" did I? I said I don't know what his stance on it is, and would have to assume he did not confess. People do confess to rape, and I don't go out of my way to assume someone is lying.[/quote]

You have to assume he did not confess, but for all you know he would agree to it? Yes, people do confess to rape, but I didn't ask if they EVER confessed to rape; I asked why it's logical to assume someone would. You are not "going out of your way to assume someone is lying" by assuming another person will behave in a fashion that is in their own best interests. You may be assuming the first person is lying, but you are definitely not "going out of your way" to do so.

In any case, this objection to assuming people are lying is really entirely your problem. I don't see any assumption of lying going on, and even if I did that would be of minimal importance.



The fact that your personal desire to give her the benefit of the doubt is really not the issue here. The anecdote was in support of an assertion of broader "rape culture". The problem is that if we are basing the existence of a "rape culture" simply on a desire to avoid accusing victims of lying, we, as a society, are accepting the existence of a problem based on a criteria that has nothing to do with whether it actually exists or not.

You've taken this discussion of onto a tangent of whether you personally want to believe her or not, but that's really to germane to the issue. Neither, for that matter, is my personal disbelief of the story - except that I've based my disbelief on the inconsistencies of the facts as presented, whereas you have made it quite clear that you base your belief on a desire to give her the benefit of the doubt.



You have not addressed this at all, except to acknowledge that if the situation were reversed and the major would tell you the story, you would believe him for the simple expedient of giving him the benefit of the doubt. This explanation is absurd - the truth of a story has nothing to do with which party is presenting it -, unless your purpose is purely to explain what you personally would do. You're entitled to do whatever you want, but I don't really see why you are discussing it with me then, because I'm using it as an example of a highly unbelievable story that calls into question the reliability of people that believe in a "rape culture." If they cannot be relied upon to vet rape stories then we really cannot believe any generalized conclusions they present to us. Either you're interested in the broader societal implications of this, in which case you have not explained why we should generally take rape allegations at face value, or you're just expounding upon your personal preferences in which case all I can do is repeat that you are entitled to personally do as your conscience dictates.



You're taking issue with my assessment of the situation. By definition, you are trying to convince me of the merits of your own position. Either that, or you are simply repeating yourself for no apparent reason.



I have more than sufficient evidence that majors do not customarily know the exact status of individual soldiers in their battalions or brigades (given the position of a major within a battalion or brigade and the sizes of MTOE battalions, or brigades) mechanics do not work alone in motor pools during hours when no one else is there, and that majors (or for that matter anyone else) do not go to motor pools they have every reason to think are not occupied as a response to getting a "Dear John" letter from a spouse, and that the motor pool is not the logical place to go if one wants to find a female to attack, since either a lot of people will be there, or it is near-certain that no one will be there.

While it's not unbelievable that any one of those things might happen, ALL of them would need to happen at once for this rape to have occurred and that is wildly improbable. In point of fact, it's you who is engaging in conjecture by believing the story without sufficient proof - you are assuming that ALL of these unlikely things happened at once based on totally insufficient evidence; the uncorroborated story of a person which we are getting second-hand is the sum total of the evidence - and you are doing so in support of a story that alleges a very serious crime.



That's nice. I find it pretty ridiculous that you give people the benefit of the doubt rather than evaluate a story based on the likelyhood of the events it relates, and that you won't accept evidence from a very experienced person explaining why those events are highly unlikely.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."