One of the astonishing things about the news industry is that many stories with an outsized national impact turn out to have been completely falsified upon further review. One of its incentive structures is often “firstist with the mostist”; in other words, get to the story fast and report it incredibly quickly. But then, the reporting ends up being false. In retrospect, this does significant damage. This is true in regard to reporting about COVID or Black Lives Matter.
One of the signal examples of this is now being exposed for all the world to see.
18 years ago, in 2006, the Duke lacrosse rape case incited a wide variety of movements that would come into full flower over the course of the subsequent 10 years, particularly during the Obama era. The Duke lacrosse case was an inciting incident for Black Lives Matter and for the #MeToo movement.
In this case, a stripper accused a series of rich white lacrosse players at Duke University of having sexually assaulted her. It became one of the biggest cases in American criminal justice history, specifically because of its ripple effects.
Crystal Mangum, the stripper at the center of that case, has admitted she lied back in 2006. Until now, she has never publicly admitted she fabricated the rape allegation.
Three men, David Evans, Collin Finnerty, and Reade Seligmann, were arrested and put on trial before the case was dismissed. Mangum’s original allegation was that she had been performing at a team party off campus in March of 2006, had been sexually assaulted, and raped by a series of white Duke lacrosse players.
She was, indeed, at this party, but, apparently, she engaged in none of her “career activity,” shall we say, because she was high on drugs or intoxicated with alcohol. She ended up leaving early, and then these accusations were filed.
say?
We are listening to our students. We’re also listening to the Durham community, to Duke staff, and to each other. Regardless of the results of the police investigation, what is apparent everyday now is the anger and fear of many students who know themselves to be objects of racism and sexism; who see illuminated in this moment’s extraordinary spotlight what they live with everyday. They know that it isn’t just Duke, it isn’t everybody, and it isn’t just individuals making this disaster. But it is a disaster nonetheless. These students are shouting and whispering about what happened to this young woman and to themselves.
The ad then provided anonymous student statements about the issue. The seedbed for the Black Lives Matter movement here is obvious. And it turns out all of this was based on lies. It was all lies — beginning to end.
Eventually, the North Carolina attorney general, Roy Cooper, announced that the charges had, in fact, been dropped. (Cooper would go on to become the governor of North Carolina.) He announced:
Our attorneys and SBI agents have interviewed numerous people who were at the party, DNA and other experts, the Durham County district attorney, Durham police officers, defense attorneys, and the accusing witness on several occasions. We have reviewed statements given over the year, photographs, records, and other evidence. The result of our review and investigation shows clearly that there is insufficient evidence to proceed on any of the charges. Today, we are filing notices of dismissal for all charges against Reade Seligmann, Collin Finnerty, and David Evans. The result is that these cases are over, and no more criminal proceedings will occur.
Nifong ended up being disbarred for making false statements and hiding evidence from the defense. The president of Duke University later came out and offered an apology.
But here’s the issue: What was the fallout from this case? Was the fallout a lesson learned about people making false allegations? Of course not. Was the fallout about the rush to judgment by the media deeply desperate for a race case that they could magnify? Of course not; there have been dozens since.
The actual fallout in terms of policy was that in 2011, the Obama administration changed Title IX regulations so that you basically could not defend yourself against sexual harassment or sexual assault allegation on campus.
CNN reports that the administration,
…outlined guidelines for schools on how to handle sexual assault allegations in a memo referred to as a ‘dear colleague’ letter. The letter reminded schools of their legal obligation to address sexual violence amid concerns that schools were not taking the issue seriously enough, and called on schools to step up investigations of reports. It also provided guidelines for investigations and hearings.
And it gave the accused no due process. It made it so that a person did not actually have a right to face down someone who was accusing them. That was the actual legal implication drawn from the false allegations of the Duke lacrosse case.
This repeated itself later with similar allegations that were made about the University of Virginia frat members in 2014 accused by Rolling Stone of engaging in a gang rape, which turned out to be completely false as well. But that didn’t stop the momentum of the #MeToo movement.
False allegations are, unfortunately, the lifeblood of movements that require gas when there is no gas in the tank.
Yesterday, Mangum, the accuser in the Duke lacrosse case — who is serving time for murder right now — finally admitted (nearly 20 years later) that her accusations were all made up. She said in an interview:
I testified falsely against them by saying that they raped me when they didn’t. And that was wrong. And I betrayed the trust of a lot of other people who believed in me and made up a story that wasn’t true because I wanted validation from people and not from God. And that was wrong. And I hope that they can forgive me.
It was false, and everyone knew it was false at the time. Yet it led to another string of these sorts of cases ranging from: the University of Virginia false rape allegations; the false allegations regarding Michael Brown’s death in Ferguson, Missouri, which led to riots in 2014; the case of George Floyd, which is in fact a false case; and the Daniel Penny case.
It stretches forward because the media need these opportunities. They spin up these opportunities. They rely on these opportunities in order to “have the discussion.” They’re constantly looking for a news hook to have discussions on the issues that they find most interesting regardless of whether the underlying data is there or not.
The media are perfectly willing to jump into certain conversations. However, there are other conversations that the media are absolutely not willing to broach.
Was there a widespread investigation into false rape allegations, which was the actual story with regard to the Duke lacrosse case? Absolutely not. Was there a full-scale media blitz on the question of rape hoaxes, which is what happened in Duke lacrosse? Absolutely not. The way the mainstream media work, their way of deciding whether something is a national story or not, is not based on the truth or falsity of the statements or the good or bad action of the people in question.
They have a preset narrative, and then they look for a hook for that narrative. That is how spinning up a movement out of nothing becomes possible. And it is how polarizing the American body politic occurs.
For four decades, the national media have pursued a preset narrative agenda. Then, they look for a news hook for that agenda that allows them to spin it up into a national story.
That is why Americans are sick and tired of the national legacy media.
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We are listening to our students. We’re also listening to the Durham community, to Duke staff, and to each other. Regardless of the results of the police investigation, what is apparent everyday now is the anger and fear of many students who know themselves to be objects of racism and sexism; who see illuminated in this moment’s extraordinary spotlight what they live with everyday. They know that it isn’t just Duke, it isn’t everybody, and it isn’t just individuals making this disaster. But it is a disaster nonetheless. These students are shouting and whispering about what happened to this young woman and to themselves.
Our attorneys and SBI agents have interviewed numerous people who were at the party, DNA and other experts, the Durham County district attorney, Durham police officers, defense attorneys, and the accusing witness on several occasions. We have reviewed statements given over the year, photographs, records, and other evidence. The result of our review and investigation shows clearly that there is insufficient evidence to proceed on any of the charges. Today, we are filing notices of dismissal for all charges against Reade Seligmann, Collin Finnerty, and David Evans. The result is that these cases are over, and no more criminal proceedings will occur.
…outlined guidelines for schools on how to handle sexual assault allegations in a memo referred to as a ‘dear colleague’ letter. The letter reminded schools of their legal obligation to address sexual violence amid concerns that schools were not taking the issue seriously enough, and called on schools to step up investigations of reports. It also provided guidelines for investigations and hearings.
I testified falsely against them by saying that they raped me when they didn’t. And that was wrong. And I betrayed the trust of a lot of other people who believed in me and made up a story that wasn’t true because I wanted validation from people and not from God. And that was wrong. And I hope that they can forgive me.
