Innocent until proven guilty: What 6 years of MeToo has taught us!

In North America, our law system is based on the presumption of innocence. Anybody accused of a crime is assumed innocent until proven guilty. But what happens when the fate of the accused is decided before they even see the inside of a courtroom? Welcome to the MeToo Era.

Wikipedia describes the MeToo movement as a social movement against sexual abuse, sexual harassment, and rape culture. In principle, this sounds like something I should and would support. I am definitely against sexual abuse, sexual harassment, and rape, and I’m sure you are too!

The movement went viral on social media under the hashtag MeToo back in October 2017, when numerous sexual abuse allegations were made against long-time film producer Harvey Weinstein. Then on October 16th, actress Alyssa Milano, one of the movement’s top representatives, wrote on her Twitter: If all the women who have been sexually harassed or assaulted wrote ‘Me too’ as a status, we might give people a sense of the magnitude of the problem’’.

But what have we learned in 6 years of MeToo?

Turns out that Weinstein had been taking advantage of his movie mogul status since the 80s. 86 women came forward with accusations of sexual harassment and sexual abuse. He was found guilty of the rape of an Italian actor and model and is now serving a 16 years prison sentence. Rapists deserve much harsher consequences than prison, but this is a topic for another blog.

Although the accusations first came out in October 2017, it took almost 6 years for him to be found guilty. He was accused by more than 80 women, but he was found guilty of only 1 rape. Why is that? With so many accusations, why is he in prison for 1 rape?

Don’t get me wrong, 1 rape is 1 rape too many. Forcing yourself on someone is unforgivable, but why was he condemned for only 1, considering all the women that came forward?

This makes me wonder…

Another thing worth asking is, did he ever stand a chance? Was it possible for jurors to be impartial to him and not be influenced by the years of media coverage of these alleged accusations?

We can’t be naive; however you feel about him, you must admit that he had been crucified on the public square way before even setting foot in a courtroom. Why do we go out of our way to make sure our jurors are not exposed to public opinions during very important court cases, then? To ensure they are only listening to what is said in court, thus providing the accused a fair chance of defending himself.

And this is where lies the issue…

What does the data show?

‘’A recent national survey conducted by YouGov reveals 8% of Americans report being falsely accused of domestic violence, child abuse, sexual assault, or other forms of abuse. The 2,407 survey respondents were representative of the U.S. adult population. The 8% figure represents 20.4 million adults. In 62% of cases, the false accusers were reported to be females.’’ Center For Prosecutor Integrity.

But why would people even want to falsely accuse someone else?

Attention seeking, financial gains, fabrication, fraud, intoxication, insecurity and fear, cover-up, malicious intent, etc. The list goes on and on!

If 8% wasn’t scary enough, as per CPI, 99% of false accusations go unpunished! Not only are there a ton of reasons to falsely accuse someone, but there are virtually no consequences for falsely accusing someone of a crime! But the life of the accused is forever tarnished. Even if proven innocent, his life will never be the same…

Here’s a MeToo-related Quora post that is worth sharing:

In the light of everything mentioned in this blog, I want to ask you the following questions:

Should we automatically believe what a woman says just because she says it? Or should we give the accused the benefit of the doubt? Shouldn’t we always assume someone is innocent until proven guilty? If you were falsely accused of something, wouldn’t you want the opportunity to have a non-biased jury?

After all, the plaintiff and prosecutor generally have the burden of proving the case, including every element of it.

Let me know what you think in the comments below!

Until next time, remember that the world is changed one man at a time and that it only takes one man to change the world!

Peace

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