“Believe women” is a terrible slogan. Why? Because women lie. A lot. Because many women don’t have a sense of humor. Because many women don’t understand their own sexuality or how to use it. Because many women don’t know how to take a compliment. Notice how I keep saying “many” and not “all”, because not all women are the same. Listen, any type of abuse against women is horrible and all assailants must be persecuted but there’s a catch: there needs to be evidence. Otherwise it’s a story of she said/ he said and often involves a girl that cried wolf. Think about it: you wouldn’t prosecute a person for murder without concrete evidence and you certainly wouldn’t get a conviction, right? So why is sexual harassment any different? Why, in the age of #MeToo movement we have to blindly believe women but not men? Or at the very least give them a benefit of doubt? Some may find it surprising that at least 1 in 6 boys is sexually abused before their 18th birthday. This number rises to 1 in 4 men who experience unwanted sexual events across their lifetime. To wrap your head around those numbers, picture a large college football stadium filled with 100,000 seats. If the audience were solely male, that would mean that at least 25,000 men have been or will be sexually assaulted. That number is staggering. But somehow we’re ignoring all of this and only focusing on female voices. Voices that in many cases are spiteful and vengeful. Especially those that have the ear of the media and stand to further their careers or gain something financially. Voices that will stop at nothing in order to ruin a man who may have wronged them in the past. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, right? Trust, but verify that’s all I’m saying. We cannot allow another man be ripped apart by the media and society without concrete proof. We cannot prosecute and convict without due process. Believe men too.
Story by Cassandra Harris.