5 ms·

The female student who was the focus of the article ("Jackie") spun a very specific story that involved specific acts, places, people, and times. We now know t

by Lazare 10y ago

The female student who was the focus of the article ("Jackie") spun a very specific story that involved specific acts, places, people, and times. We now know that, to a first approximation, everything she said was an outright lie. There were other stories she could have told about different people, places, times, and events that would have been true, and it's possible one of the versions of the story she told other people was true or mostly true. It's entirely possible that Jackie was, in fact, raped. But the specific story Jackie told Erdely was not true, and the specific rape Erdely wrote about did not occur. We know this due to the excellent investigative reporting of the Washington Post and others, to the damning report made by the CJR, and now to to this jury verdict which determined that the story was untrue, that Rolling Stone knew (or should have known) that it was untrue, and that Rolling Stone acted with reckless disregard for the truth in publishing the story. > Lots of truths wouldn't hold up in court, or be printable in a publication of repute. That's true, but not relevant. Merely publishing something you think is true but couldn't prove in a court of law doesn't put you at risk of losing a libel suit.

deleted 10y ago
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erikpukinskis 10y ago
I've read The Washington Post articles carefully multiple times and they never say the rapes didn't happen. They say things like "Key elements of Rolling Stone’s U-Va. gang rape allegations in doubt". They point out inconsistencies in her story. But they never come to the conclusion you did: that there was no rape and the story was entirely fabricated. In fact the editor says the opposite: “We told her we wouldn’t name her, in large part because we thought she was a sex-assault victim at that time and we don’t name victims of sexual assault without their permission,” said Mike Semel, The Post’s Metro editor. “That agreement for anonymity needs to be considered until we are absolutely certain that there was no assault at all.” In the OP for this thread, the WaPo only says "aspects of Jackie’s account were not true". I have yet to see a single piece of evidence presented by anyone that no rape occurred. As for the jury verdict this week, they only ruled that Rolling Stone knowingly omitted facts that would've painted the administration in a better light. They did not rule on the facts of the rape at all. You are doing the same thing the Rolling Stone writers did: presenting something as fact when the evidence is contradictory.
- mzw_mzw 10y ago
  How can anyone "prove that no rape occurred"? It's impossible to prove a negative. All we can do is notice that no rape seems to have happened at that fraternity, none of the alleged victim's statements can be backed up with evidence or testimony, and that the claimed rapist does not exist, and make a judgement call from there.
  - erikpukinskis 10y ago
    > How can anyone "prove that no rape occurred"? It's impossible to prove a negative. You find evidence that contradicts the story in its entirity. For example, if she claimed to have been raped on a night that there was evidence she was in a different country, that would be proof. > No rape seems to have happened You have no strong evidence that suggests that no rape happened. There's also no strong evidence that a rape did happen. Somehow out of that, you believe a rape didn't happen, which is illogical and cruel.
    - mzw_mzw 10y ago
      > You have no strong evidence that suggests that no rape happened. The alleged rapist not existing isn't strong evidence suggesting that it didn't happen? > There's also no strong evidence that a rape did happen. Somehow out of that, you believe a rape didn't happen, Wait, what? Even if there's no strong evidence that a rape did happen I should just believe it happened anyway? That's a fascinating approach. What other things should I believe even if there's no strong evidence for them? For example, what if somebody claimed you committed assault, but there was no evidence? > which is illogical and cruel. I suspect you wouldn't be resorting to crude appeals to emotion and playing to the cheap seats with rhetoric if you had a real argument to make here.
      - ptaipale 10y ago
        My understanding is that in the US, it is not really possible to prove that a person doesn't exist. People move from state to state, they change names. It's different in European welfare states which are big brother societies: you can actually get a reliable census by saying things like "select count(id) from population where alive is true;" But this is different from proving a certain name didn't appear among the students of a particular university/class, etc; we do know the Rolling Stone story was a hoax.

by Lazare 10y ago

deleted 10y ago

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erikpukinskis 10y ago

I've read The Washington Post articles carefully multiple times and they never say the rapes didn't happen. They say things like "Key elements of Rolling Stone’s U-Va. gang rape allegations in doubt". They point out inconsistencies in her story. But they never come to the conclusion you did: that there was no rape and the story was entirely fabricated. In fact the editor says the opposite: “We told her we wouldn’t name her, in large part because we thought she was a sex-assault victim at that time and we don’t name victims of sexual assault without their permission,” said Mike Semel, The Post’s Metro editor. “That agreement for anonymity needs to be considered until we are absolutely certain that there was no assault at all.” In the OP for this thread, the WaPo only says "aspects of Jackie’s account were not true". I have yet to see a single piece of evidence presented by anyone that no rape occurred. As for the jury verdict this week, they only ruled that Rolling Stone knowingly omitted facts that would've painted the administration in a better light. They did not rule on the facts of the rape at all. You are doing the same thing the Rolling Stone writers did: presenting something as fact when the evidence is contradictory.

mzw_mzw 10y ago
How can anyone "prove that no rape occurred"? It's impossible to prove a negative. All we can do is notice that no rape seems to have happened at that fraternity, none of the alleged victim's statements can be backed up with evidence or testimony, and that the claimed rapist does not exist, and make a judgement call from there.
- erikpukinskis 10y ago
  > How can anyone "prove that no rape occurred"? It's impossible to prove a negative. You find evidence that contradicts the story in its entirity. For example, if she claimed to have been raped on a night that there was evidence she was in a different country, that would be proof. > No rape seems to have happened You have no strong evidence that suggests that no rape happened. There's also no strong evidence that a rape did happen. Somehow out of that, you believe a rape didn't happen, which is illogical and cruel.
  - mzw_mzw 10y ago
    > You have no strong evidence that suggests that no rape happened. The alleged rapist not existing isn't strong evidence suggesting that it didn't happen? > There's also no strong evidence that a rape did happen. Somehow out of that, you believe a rape didn't happen, Wait, what? Even if there's no strong evidence that a rape did happen I should just believe it happened anyway? That's a fascinating approach. What other things should I believe even if there's no strong evidence for them? For example, what if somebody claimed you committed assault, but there was no evidence? > which is illogical and cruel. I suspect you wouldn't be resorting to crude appeals to emotion and playing to the cheap seats with rhetoric if you had a real argument to make here.
    - ptaipale 10y ago
      My understanding is that in the US, it is not really possible to prove that a person doesn't exist. People move from state to state, they change names. It's different in European welfare states which are big brother societies: you can actually get a reliable census by saying things like "select count(id) from population where alive is true;" But this is different from proving a certain name didn't appear among the students of a particular university/class, etc; we do know the Rolling Stone story was a hoax.