Tag: trainwreck

Cheerful Chavez Day!

While it is obviously intended as some sort of stupid snub to Christians, Google is only managing to look petty and underline the importance of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ by pointedly refusing to acknowledge the worldwide holiday:

On Easter Sunday, Google is honoring the birthday of the late labor organizer Cesar Chavez by placing a Chavez portrait within the middle “o” of the Google logo that appears on the homepage of the popular search engine. While Google frequently decorates its logo to celebrate various holidays and special events, it is unclear why the company chose specifically to honor Chavez’s birthday, instead of Easter Sunday.

No doubt some Christians, and even some sympathetic non-Christians will be outraged about this.  I’m not, because regardless of what the godless lords of Google may intend, I know that on thousands of Google-hosted sites, the Resurrection is being proclaimed and celebrated today.

Remember, sooner or later, EVERY knee will bow.  Sooner or later, EVERYONE will acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord. Obviously, this will be later in the case of Google. So what?  I’d much rather see a company in Google’s position illustrate the significance of Easter by this sort of intentional and painfully glaring omission instead of providing some sort of token nod in the form of bunny rabbits and painted eggs.

And really, what can you expect of a company that has to remind itself on a regular basis to not be evil?  If you worked next to a man and had to listen to him repeatedly telling himself, “don’t be evil, don’t be evil”, what would you conclude about his tendencies?

But in light of Google’s effort, if not their success, to control their natural instincts, I should like to wish everyone, not merely those readers who happen to belong to the United Farm Workers union, a Cheerful Chavez Day. (raises fist) Sí, se puede! Stay strong, my brothers!

UPDATE: The amusing thing is that, as Steve Sailer demonstrates, the sanctimonious seculars at Google couldn’t even find a picture of the very important man whose birthday they are celebrating today.

The Euro has failed

So much for the idea that the EU and its euro would lead to more economic freedom rather than less.  Time finally ran out on what was always a vast con. Cyprus passes a law installing capital controls, thus prohibiting money transfers out of the country:

While it is unknown if the Cypriot parliament will agree to, and enact into law, the Troika-demanded deposit haircuts, after the shocking vote of mutiny against Merkel earlier this week that saw not one politician vote for the Europe suggested deposit tax levy (and even the ruling party abstained), a vote which will once more take place tomorrow, moments ago Cyprus became the first Eurozone country to officially implement governmental capital controls into legislation. At this point it had no choice: whatever happens with the deposit haircut, or with everything else, it is now inevitable that the local Cypriots will do all they can to pull as much money from domestic banking system as possible following the complete loss of faith and trust in banks, which is why the government had no choice but to intervene with its own “controls.” Sadly, this marks a milestone in the development of the Eurozone – it’s all downhill, and accelerating, from here.

Nor is the banking debacle limited to Cyprus any longer, as Spain has announced its intention to steal from Spanish depositors:  “the Spanish Minister of Finance & Public Administration announced this week a tax or bank levy (probably 0.2%) to be imposed on bank deposits, without details on which deposits will be affected or timing.”

It is time for the disastrous Euro experiment to end.  Now.  Bring back the Deutsche Mark.  Bring back the Franc.  Bring back the Lira.  The Euro has failed.

UPDATE: The news out of Cyprus just keeps getting better.

“According to the rapidly shifting plan, depositors with
the biggest local bank, Bank of Cyprus, may see losses up to 25%…. Cyprus’ second largest bank, Cyprus Popular Bank, aka Laiki bank, where it appears the bulk of Russian cash is stored, will fare far, far worse with
deposit haircuts up to a stunning 70% on the table, and that is after
capital controls ease enough to allow for the deposit withdrawals!”

“A major, MAJOR game changer”

The CEO of Saxo Bank comments on the Cypriot bank raids:

This is full-blown socialism. It is difficult to describe the weekend bailout package to Cyprus in any other way. The confiscation of 6.75 percent of small depositors’ money and 9.9 percent of big depositors’ funds is without precedence that I can think of in a supposedly civilised and democratic society. But maybe the European Union (EU) is no longer a civilised democracy?

I heard rumours about this when I visited Limassol last week, but dismissed them as completely outlandish. And yet, here we are. The consequences are unpredictable, but we are clearly looking at a significant paradigm shift.

This is a breach of fundamental property rights, dictated to a small country by foreign powers and it must make every bank depositor in Europe shiver. Although the representatives at the bailout press conference tried to present this as a one-off, they were not willing to rule out similar measures elsewhere – not that it would have mattered much as the trust is gone anyway. It is now difficult to expect any kind of limitation to what measures the Troika and EU might take when the crisis really starts to bite.

If you can do this once, you can do it again. if you can confiscate 10 percent of a bank customer’s money, you can confiscate 25, 50 or even 100 percent. I now believe we will see worse as the panic increases, with politicians desperately trying to keep the EUR alive.

Depositors in other prospective bailout countries must be running scared – is it safe to keep money in an Italian, Spanish or Greek bank any more? I dont know, must be the answer. Is it prudent to take the risk? You decide. I fear this will lead to massive capital outflows from weak Eurozone countries, just about the last thing they need right now. Even from the EU as a whole, I suspect, as the banking union is in place in most countries already.

Another open question is what will happen to the huge number of brokerages based in Cyprus? There is about 100 or more FX and other brokers currently operating under the relatively light Cypriot regulation. How will this impact the trustworthiness of these many small institutions? What IS the exact impact on the client deposits they might be holding in Cyprus? Will anyone dare to do business with them going forward?

This is a major, MAJOR game changer and the fallout will be with us for a long time to come. I believe it could be the beginning of the end for the Eurozone as this is an unbelievable blow to the already challenged trust that might be left among investors. Talk about a possible own goal.

Market reaction? it must be very good for gold – and for safe-haven countries like Switzerland, Singapore and economically more healthy non-Euro countries in, for example, Scandinavia. I would think the EUR and associated markets will be undermined by increasing lack of confidence when the full implications become clear for investors.

This is full-blown socialism and I still cannot believe this really happened.

I think it is safe to say that it is very bad news when the actions of the international bankers appalls even their lesser brethren, and when the initial test-action exceeds the worst expectations of about only people to correctly anticipate it coming.

And note that they expect similar actions to take place in the USA as well.  Meanwhile, none of the smugly verbose defenders of the people on the Left appear to have even noticed anything has happened… most likely because this sort of thing is completely beyond their capacity to even comprehend, let alone analyze or anticipate.

You will recall that I have been warning readers to stay out of the stock market and the banking system to the greatest extent possible for some time now.  This is only one of the many reasons why.  Those who were confident in the security of their 401ks should probably reconsider their opinions in light of these mandatory depository “contributions” to the cause of debt restructuring.  As Karl Denninger puts it: “$100 bills in your hand have just been declared to be worth
somewhere between 7-10% more than those “deposited” and “stored” in a
bank.”

I have to admit, once more I’m shown to be somewhat of an optimist.  I expected them to begin with pension and 401k seizures, I never imagined they would go right for the deposits.  But then, as a gangster of an earlier era said, the banks are where the money is.  And in case you were wondering what was going to bring the heavily overbought stock market’s 10-day winning streak to a customarily nasty end, you would appear to have gotten your answer.

UPDATE: Germany and the IMF were originally demanding 40 PERCENT of all bank deposits.

UPDATE II: The Monday bank holiday in Cyprus has already been extended to Tuesday, and will likely be extended to Wednesday as well.  Pay attention, this is how it will happen elsewhere.  If you wait until the announcements hit, you will not be able to do anything until it is too late.

UPDATE III: Now the Cypriot Parliament is belatedly wondering if robbing the entire savings class is a health-conscious decision and dragging its heels. “Cyprus’ parliament on Sunday postponed a debate
and vote on a controversial levy on all bank deposits that the
cash-strapped country’s creditors had demanded in exchange for (EURO)10
billion ($13 billion) in rescue money.  The vote, which had been
expected later Sunday, has been pushed back to Monday afternoon,
parliamentary official Antonis Koutalianos said.  The
announcement set off an immediate scramble among top European officials,
with reports that the European Central Bank was pressuring Cypriot
authorities to hold the vote without delay.”

I expect the confiscations will go through, such things almost always do, but notice how it is always the executive branch that is the first to surrender.  And what a surprise, that the anti-democratic fascists of the EU failed to take into account that they’d have to get the support of the parliament in order to complete their little bank heist.  Also, look for the “Russian money laundering” angle to be talked up on the financial news in an attempt to justify the theft and reduce fears outside of Cyprus, which is, of course, the only place that any thing of the sort could possibly happen just this one time due to impossible-to-foresee emergency circumstances.

UPDATE IV: In what surely is completely unrelated news, the Russian Navy had an announcement today as well: “Russia will dispatch a permanent group of five to six combat ships to
the Mediterranean Sea, Russian Navy chief Admiral Viktor Chirkov said.
Frigates and cruisers will make up the core of the fleet.”

How not to be SFWA president II

John Scalzi doubles down, not only in terms of jacking up his levels of emotion, irrationality, and vulgarity, but by expanding his attack on Random House to include ALL publishers who utilize a no-advance model:

So why are so many eBook-only publishers attempting to run with the “no advances” business model? If I had to guess, I would say because many of these then-erstwhile publishers assumed that publishing electronically had a low financial threshold of entry (not true, if you’re serious about it) and they fancied being publishers, so they started their businesses undercapitalized, and are now currently in the process of passing the consequences of that undercapitalization unto the authors they would like to work with. Alternately, as appears to be the case with Random House, they’re looking for a way to pass as much of the initial cost of publishing onto the author as possible, and one of the best ways to bring down those initial costs is to avoid paying the author anything up front. Both of these are bad business models, although one is more maliciously so, and both are to be avoided. Just because someone has stupidly or maliciously planned their business, doesn’t mean you’re obliged to sign a contract with them.

But, these publishers and their defenders may say (and have said), the publisher takes all the risk in producing a book! Yeah? Hey, to publishers and their defenders who say that: Fuck you. Fuck you for asserting that the author has shouldered no risk, when she’s invested the time, opportunity cost and material outlay required to create a manuscript. Fuck you for asserting the the author sees no risk to her own career from the choices that the publisher imposes on the publishing process that the author has no control of: everything from cover art (which, if horrible and/or out of step with the market, can sink a book) to the size and distribution of the initial print run, to the marketing plan the publisher has for retail.

Fuck you for lightly passing over the risk that the author has if the book fails — that any additional books in the contract might be cancelled or put out with the bare minimum of contractual obligation, that the author might not be able to sell another book to the publisher or other publishers because of a track record of poor sales — and for lightly passing over the fact the a publisher mitigates its own risk of the failure of a single book by having an entire portfolio of releases. If one single book fails but the publisher’s line holds up generally, then the risk the publisher encounters to its livelihood is minimal. The risk to the author, on the other hand, is substantially greater. Yes, to all of that, “fuck you,” is probably the politest thing to say in response.

Now, I could certainly point out that this is an incredibly stupid, unprofessional, and irresponsible thing to do, especially in light of how the Guardian has already mistaken one of his previous posts on the subject for the SFWA’s position.  So, given the dedicated journalistic commitment to calm and reasonable discourse, it would not be a surprise if we soon see headlines of this sort: SFWA To All Publishers: “FUCK YOU”.

However, I think that’s all readily apparent.  Being an Award-Winning Cruelty Artist, I happen to find it much more amusing to demonstrate that Scalzi simply doesn’t know what he’s talking about, and moreover, to show that his observed inability to understand the potential benefits of the no-advance, revenue-share system has already cost him hundreds of thousands of dollars in 2012 alone.

Scalzi has publicly stated that Tor sold
35,667 eBook versions of Redshirts at $11.99, 17,008 audiobooks at $19.95 and 26,604 hardcovers at $24.95.  If we assume that he gets the
standard 20% royalty on ebooks that Tor author Robert Sawyer says Tor is paying its authors, the customary 10(5K)-12.5(5K)-15% on hardcovers, and 8% on audio books, his royalty revenues under the traditional publishing model he is defending so vigorously are likely in the vicinity of the following:

Ebook: $59,870.62
Hardcover: $90,479.22
Audiobook: $27,144.77
Total royalties: $177,494.61

That’s excellent performance by any measure, almost surely in excess of whatever advance he received for Redshirts.  One must congratulate Scalzi on his ability to write fiction that people want to buy, regardless of what one thinks of the man or the fiction.  However, one also has to seriously question his financial acumen, because if he had the very sort of publishing deal that he is claiming is so dreadful and indefensible, he would have done considerably better.

Let’s be realistic and assume that in addition to the revenue-sharing model, his contract contains an amount of chargeable overhead as many of these 50/50 contracts do.  The largest of which I am aware permitted the publisher to charge the author up to a maximum of $10,000 from the author’s royalties.  Based on the same channel discount structure as above, but this time splitting the resulting revenue equally between Tor and the author results in the following figures:

Ebook: $149,676.57
Hardcover: $165,942.45
Audiobook: $84,827.40
Total royalties: $400,446.42
(less overhead charge $10,000)
Net author revenue: $390,446.42.  

In other words, Scalzi has already thrown away $212,951.81 in additional royalty revenue due to his insistence on an advance and his inability to understand that the no-advance, 50/50 revenue-sharing model is not intrinsically unfair, disadvantageous to the writer, or predatory.  In fact, if he wasn’t such an angry and short-sighted fool, he would go to Tor and very politely ask them to publish his future books under the very no-advance model he is so vigorously decrying.  As it stands, every dollar he henceforth collects from Tor on Redshirts represents $2.55 (and counting) that he would have received had he the courage and foresight to accept the risk of foregoing a pre-payment on his royalties.

No doubt some authors believe that it is a good idea to heed the advice of a successful author when it comes to book contracts.  And that is quite often true.  But is it really a good idea to avoid no-advance, 50/50 publishing deals on the advice of an author dumb enough to hand over 54.5 percent of his potential royalties to the publisher for nothing more than the privilege of collecting part of the income beforehand?

UPDATE:  John Scalzi demonstrates that he not only can’t do math, he can’t read either:

The
fellow in question has no idea how my contract is structured, so he
hasn’t the slightest idea what I’m making. I will say his estimates
amuse me. His estimates about production and marketing costs likewise
suggest a profound ignorance of the real world (that $10,000 would have
covered this for a week, at most). Additionally, if the fellow is trying
to use the example of an outlier (i.e., a bestselling author with a
large and healthy following) in an overly-simplistic “all other things
being equal” sort of comparison, grounded in bad numbers, to show why
these sorts of contracts might be beneficial to other writers,
particularly new writers, then he’s, at best, once again letting his
need to get his mancrush on get in the way of clear and rational
thinking, or useful advice to other authors.

Ignorant and
mendacious is not a great combination, basically. And that’s all I will
say about that. It’s nice he’s still making money for those various
organizations, however.

As noted here, I have no problems with
authors choosing not to take advances — or making any other sort of
contractual maneuvers they choose — when the author has decided that it
is in his or her own best interests to do so, based on several factors.
This is manifestly different from the publisher having “no advances” as
its default setting. Anyone who doesn’t recognize the difference between
those two probably should not be dispensing career advice to anyone
else.

First, Scalzi is attempting to have it both
ways here.  I cited the standard royalty rates for ebooks, hardcovers,
and audio books from Tor Books in doing my calculations.  It is entirely
possible that as one of their leading authors, he gets better royalty
rates from them, although I very much doubt he is getting the 50 percent
royalties that Hydra is offering or that I get from my publishers.  The
numbers are not bad, they are standard and other writers, particularly
new writers, are not likely to get better royalty rates than those I
cited.

They are certainly more relevant than the numbers
that John is keeping to himself, which is certainly his right, but to which he
cannot reasonably appeal.  And, insofar as his royalties depart from those that new writers will receive he is making the very outlier mistake that he
erroneously accuses me of making.

Furthermore, I said absolutely
nothing about “production and marketing costs”, but rather, referred to
a fixed amount that is expected to help cover the publisher’s overhead
costs involved in publishing the book.  In my various book contracts,
that fixed amount ranges from zero to $10,000 and comes out of my 50
percent share.  Far from showing any “profound ignorance of the real
world”, it simply showed Scalzi’s lack of reading ability and
unfamiliarity with the revenue-sharing model.

Notice that he is backing down now that his argument has been exposed as ridiculous and materially self-defeating.  Suddenly the problem isn’t “no advances”,  but “no advances as its default setting”.

UPDATE II: The little rabbits actually manage to make Scalzi’s inept response look downright intelligent when they try to weigh in:


“Claiming that 10000 USD cover all the expenses involved in marketing and
producing Redshirts (Posters. Book tours. Wil Wheaton. Cover designs.
Typesetting. Editing. Proofreading.) is so fallacious that it renders
every other point invalid.”

Well, I suppose it might if anyone had ever made such a stupid and fallacious claim.  But no one did anything of the sort, least of all me.

Mailvox: rabbits gonna rabbit

And Asher’s gonna asher:

“He’s not dumb but when I point out that without science and
philosophy everything that makes his art media possible wouldn’t exist.
It doesn’t even register with him.”

It clearly runs in the family.

“The most obvious possibility is that the “it” refers to science being a necessary condition for various art media used by my brother. However, the reference doesn’t make any sense given the context which is that I am aware of the scientific advances that make my brother’s visual art possible.

The other possibility for Vox’s “it” is that “things” don’t register for me. Fine, but that is, in itself, an empty reference. What things? Everything? Some things? If not everything then what set of things? Vox doesn’t make this clear, and, in doing so he ends up sounding like Amanda Marcotte.

Yes, science being a necessary condition for various art media is clearly the most obvious possibility.  And yes, I sound EXACTLY like Amanda Marcotte.

“Your “it” has no clear object of reference.”

It is sufficiently clear to the sufficiently intelligent.  I often find Asher’s take on things to be more than a little fascinating.  It’s rather like watching a retarded Spock in action.  His attempts at ad hominem are the best; they resemble someone attempting to trash talk in a language they’ve studied for three semesters in college.

“And I suppose you your mother find sex response to attract, yes?”

The finest in Gammawear

No doubt every Gamma male and woman who treasures her Gamma orbiters will want to run out and buy one of these fine emblems of totally not being a rapist.  Available in a wide range of pastel colors.  After all, you’re going to need something to wear when you’re on the dancefloor with your quad-gendered acquaintances grooving to the Pink Rabbit Posse.

100 percent cotton and 100 percent guaranteed to prevent sexually-transmitted disease.

Come see the violence inherent in the system

Help, help, I’m being threatened!  And by the SFWA South-Central Regional Director, no less.  At 3:30 AM, I was returning from a late night out with Silvio and the boys when I noticed literally hundreds of entries coming from a site belonging to leading science fiction author and international cross-dressing star Jim Hines.  Naturally, being the secure and self-confident image of modern masculinity, I immediately hastened to scour his site for every reference to me.

Imagine the horror and fear that struck me when I read the following:

lee_martindale wrote:
Feb. 1st, 2013 04:19 pm (UTC)
Ah, yes. Mr. Beale. When I decided to run for re-election as SFWA South-Central Regional Director, someone asked me what I would do if Mr. Beale won the Presidential election. I replied, “Ask my friends to start a bail fund.”

Naturally, I was panic-stricken by the violent implications of the Regional Director’s threat.  After I got off the phone with the local police, Homeland Security, the FBI, and Interpol, and managed to compose myself following an intense round of aromatherapy, some yoga exercises, and about a gallon of green tea, I posted the following in the Questions for Candidates section of the SFWA Forum:

Two questions for Lee Martindale: It was brought to my attention that
yesterday, you wrote the following on SFWA member Jim Hines’s web site: “When
I decided to run for re-election as SFWA South-Central Regional
Director, someone asked me what I would do if Mr. Beale won the
Presidential election. I replied, “Ask my friends to start a bail
fund.””

1. What did you mean by indicating that you would need a bail fund in the event of my election as SFWA President?(1)
2. Do you believe that threatening criminal activity and violence is appropriate for an officer of the SFWA Board?

I note that this is the second implication of violence an SFWA member
has directed towards me since I declared my candidacy. Two open
questions for everyone else:

1. Are these implied threats of criminality and/or violence acceptable behavior on the part of SFWA members, and in the case of Ms Martindale, current Board members?
2. Should Ms Martindale resign her position and terminate her candidacy due to her implied threats of criminal activity?

I find it hard to see how I, or any other elected SFWA official, could be
expected to work in a productive manner with Ms Martindale in the
knowledge that she may resort to criminal activity and physical violence
over a mere difference of opinion.

(1) Ms Martindale explained that she was, in fact, implying violence,
although she claimed that she only meant violence of the self-defensive
variety.

This post is dedicated to the memory of Bane.

McRapey exercises his male privilege

It’s a quixotic choice, to be sure, but I suppose we all have our issues.  Apparently confessing to being a rapist isn’t enough for John Scalzi, as the male-privileged SFWA President has now taken it upon himself to publicly mock women for the sort of covers they prefer to see on the books they write and buy.

“The pose-off, while for charity, has its genesis in Jim taking pictures of himself in the poses that science fiction and fantasy book covers often put women in to call attention to the point that these positions are absurd (whereas the positions men are put in on covers are generally substantially less so).”

The irony, as I noted at Alpha Game, is that what Scalzi and Hines are mocking in their gamma male cluelessness about women is not male sexism, but rather, female preferences.  The book whose “sexism” and “objectification” Scalzi is protesting in the photo above happens to be THE TASTE OF NIGHT, by Vicki Pettersson.  It is described thusly:

“Equal parts Light and Shadow, Joanna Archer must fulfill a destiny she
never wanted. Once a photographer and heiress to a casino fortune, she
is now dedicated to the cause of good . . . but susceptible to the
seductions of evil.” 

An heiress who is susceptible to seduction and bears no responsibility for her actions… does this sound more like a science fiction novel intended to appeal to men or a romance novel aimed at a female audience?  As it happens, THE TASTE OF NIGHT
has 47 reviews, by Jenna, Rita, Angela, Courtney, Phyllis, Jessica,
Patience, Rhona, Kelley, Kelly, Shalonda, Chica, Karissa, Michelle,
Debra, and Susan, among others.  Since Pettersson is, we are informed, a New York Times bestselling author, it should be obvious that her work, and the cover of her book that John Scalzi is lampooning, (which you can download as wallpaper in various formats from her website should you be so inclined), are very popular with women and appeal to female tastes.

The fact is that it is not men, but women, who are drawn to pictures of women posed in this manner.  Men, as a rule, like to look at young, pretty, naked, feminine, women posing with their breasts and buttocks on display, not thick, thirty-something man-jawed women wearing clothes, brandishing weapons, and striking aggressive and unlikely power-poses.  The urban fantasy/paranormal market that distinguishes itself from high fantasy, epic fantasy, and science fiction by utilizing such imagery is predominantly female.  It is women to whom such covers are designed to appeal, it is women to whom such books are sold, and by mocking those covers, John Scalzi and Jim Hines are exercising their male privilege to mock the women who write urban fantasy books as well as the women who buy them.

Now, there is nothing wrong with mocking the books on the grounds of literary quality or their covers on the grounds of aesthetics.  But to mock them with the mistaken impression that one is striking a blow against male sexism is not only to insult female preferences, it is to betray a fundamental misunderstanding of human socio-sexuality so profound that it should be no surprise that it took a pair of male science fiction writers to do it.

Perhaps the most amusing thing is that even after progressive women questioned their actions, prompting a little belated self-reflection, it is abundantly clear that they still don’t get it. I doubt I’m the only one to wonder if Jim Hines was initially inspired to launch his campaign after getting caught by his wife taking pictures of himself in her lingerie.

“No, honey, I don’t LIKE wearing your underwear, I’m just, um, protesting the objectifying of women in science fiction!  It’s, ah, for charity!”

And just to address the usual suspects, I will freely confess that jealousy is the only reason I am posting this.  I doubt that I could ever aspire to the transcendent gamma sex appeal that shines so gloriously from the image above.

Middle Earth misogyny

Since Tolkien came up in the interview, I would be woefully remiss if I did not provide a link to this spectacular example of why feminists should probably not be asked to review anything, but especially not anything written, filmed, or otherwise created by men.

I did not read The Hobbit or the Lord of the Rings
trilogy as a child, and I have always felt a bit alienated from the
fandom surrounding them. Now I think I know why: Tolkien seems to have
wiped women off the face of Middle-earth.

Has there ever been a movement more powerfully committed to self-parody?

Rape, corrected

The predecessor of this corrected infographic has been going around, and remarkably, it appears that even card-carrying feminists have begun to realize that writing fantasy fiction about rape statistics is no longer going to convince anyone of anything anymore.  I’ve corrected this on the basis of actual empirical data, which has shown that between 41 and 50  percent of all reported rapes are false reports.  And by false reports, I mean the purported victim has recanted and admitted that the charge was false, either voluntarily or when faced with a polygraph test.  Furthermore, DNA evidence has been used to show that a statistically significant number of reported, charged, and convicted rapists are, in fact, innocent.  Consider this 2009 article in the Forensic Examiner:

Very little formal research has been conducted on the prevalence of false allegations of rape. One study looked at the 109 cases of forcible rape that were disposed of in one small midwestern town between 1978 and 1987 (Kanin, 1994). The given town was specifically selected for study because the police department used a uniquely objective and thorough protocol when investigating rape complaints. Among other procedural safeguards, officers did not have the discretion to drop rape investigations if they concluded the complaint was “suspect” or unfounded. Every rape accusation had to be thoroughly investigated and included offering a polygraph to both the accuser and the accused. Cases were only determined to be false if and when the accuser admitted that no rape occurred.

The researchers further investigated those cases that the police, through their investigation, had ultimately determined were “false” or fabricated. During the follow-up investigation, the complainants held fast to their assertion that their rape allegation had been true, despite being told they would face penalties for filing a false report. As a result, 41% of all of the forcible rape complaints were found to be false. To further this study, a similar analysis was conducted on all of the forcible rape complaints filed at two large midwestern public universities over a 3-year period. Here, where polygraphs were not offered as part of the investigatory procedure, it was found that 50% of the complaints were false.

Charles P. McDowell, a researcher in the United States Air Force Special Studies Division, studied the 1,218 reports of rape that were made between 1980 and 1984 on Air Force bases throughout the world (McDowell, 1985). Of those, 460 were found to be “proven” allegations either because the “overwhelming preponderance of the evidence” strongly supported the allegation or because there was a conviction in the case. Another 212 of the total reports were found to be “disproved” as the alleged victim convincingly admitted the complaint was a “hoax” at some point during the initial investigation. The researchers then investigated the 546 remaining or “unresolved” rape allegations including having the accusers submit to a polygraph. Twenty-seven percent (27%) of these complainants admitted they had fabricated their accusation just before taking the polygraph or right after they failed the test. (It should be noted that whenever there was any doubt, the unresolved case was re-classified as a “proven” rape.) Combining this 27% with the initial 212 “disproved” cases, it was determined that approximately 45% of the total rape allegations were false.

The reality is that rape is a relatively uncommon crime in the United States; the one in five figures bandied about by feminists at candlelight vigils are pure and unmitigated fantasy.  Of course, it is not exactly a mystery why so many women are more than a little disposed to fantasize about rape.