Questioning Tara Reade’s story doesn’t make one a rape apologist: On Joe Biden and #MeToo
Over almost three decades prosecuting criminals, I’ve been threatened, had a Santeria curse put on me, and been called a “fu--ing a--hole” on more occasions than I can count. But until my column for USA Today last week, “Why I’m skeptical about Reade’s sexual assault claim against Biden,” I’d never been called a “rape apologist.”
The murder, sexual assault, robbery and child pornography cases I dedicated my career to prosecuting have always put me firmly on the side of the victim. Protecting good people from bad ones was what motivated me to work for the Justice Department and decline the lucrative temptation of private practice. And placing my work for DOJ above my personal life was the never-ending argument that drove my partner of nine years to threaten to leave me.
So I was disturbed by the fallout emails, tweets and articles casting me as a perpetrator by the left for publicly airing apparent flaws in Tara Reade’s allegation of sexual assault against former Vice President Joe Biden. In order to be a “rape apologist,” I would have to believe a woman was raped, and then deny the assault — or offer an excuse on behalf of the man who assaulted her. I could never do either.
Most sexual assaults happen in private. Only the accused and the accuser know for certain if an assault occurred. But that does not stop people from convincing themselves that if they can see an assault in their mind’s eye, it’s as good as videotape evidence. It’s not. There are times when reasonable people can arrive at different conclusions, based on the available evidence.
The #MeToo movement that began in 2017 was born of legitimate anger over a century’s worth of ignoring and excusing men’s sexual assaults against women. But somewhere along the way, a righteous movement morphed into a command that every allegation of sexual assault be believed without hesitation. Any effort to investigate the facts is perceived as an attack on women and brings a swift public crushing.
There’s a danger in blind acceptance of every sexual assault allegation. An example of that risk played out last weekend when Eva Murry, the niece of failed Republican Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell, charged Joe Biden with making a sexually explicit comment about her breasts when she was 14. Murry said that the harassment happened when the two met at Delaware’s annual First State Gridiron Dinner & Show in 2008.-----------------------
It should not be this way. Knee-jerk acceptance of uninvestigated sexual assault allegations can ruin innocent men. More important, from #MeToo’s perspective, it only takes one publicized false allegation to undercut years of the movement’s progress and throw into question legitimate allegations of sexual assault for years to come.
In order for the #MeToo movement to remain viable for the long-haul, it must recalibrate. Statistics show that the vast majority of sexual assault allegations are truthful. This means believing women who say they have been assaulted is a reasonable default. But that cannot be where things end.
Alyssa Milano On Why She Still Supports Joe Biden & How She Would Advise Him About Tara Reade Allegations – Guest Column
Editors’ Note: Actress and activist Alyssa Milano has been a leader of the #MeToo movement, as her 2017 tweet calling on women to share their stories of sexual harassment and assault helped create a national conversation. Milano also endorsed Joe Biden in this year’s presidential election, having interviewed him for her podcast last year shortly after he got into the presidential race.
Tara Reade’s allegation against Biden, in which she claimed that he pinned her against a wall in a Senate building and sexually assaulted her, has been denied by the Biden campaign as something that “absolutely did not happen.” Milano addressed the allegations on Andy Cohen’s radio show earlier this month, telling him that “we have to sort of societally change that mindset to believing women, but that does not mean at the expense of not giving men their due process and investigating situations. It’s got to be fair in both directions.” That drew criticism, including from Reade, while Milano again addressed the accusations after new reports of two women who say that Reade told them about aspects of her claim in the 1990s.