The phrase “he said, she said” is getting used a lot these days, and people are doing it exactly wrong. The phrase is loaded in a way that favors the he, when here it should favor the she. /1
In a vacuum, “he said, she said” should mean there’s no way to tell which person is correct and which one isn’t. It doesn’t tell you what to do about it. For instance you could err on the safe side, whatever that side might be in a given situation. /2
In accusations of sexual assault, it should mean that you can’t tell which person is lying. You should then take other facts into consideration. Namely, the vast majority of sexual assault accusations are true. You don’t know if the woman is honest, but odds are she is. /3
This still doesn’t tell you what you should do about it. For instance, the standard of proof is a lot higher if you’re on a jury than, say, considering the accused for a job promotion to a lifetime position. /4
But the vast majority of people calling Kavanaugh’s alleged attempted rape (and smothering and other related crimes) “he said, she said” are making a completely different point: we don’t know who’s lying, so we should trust the guy and give him that promotion. /5
There’s no legitimate basis for that. But part of their equation is that, all else equal, trust the guy. If you can’t prove the allegation, trust the guy. And not just that, make there be no consequences for him. No erring on the safe side. Hell, give him a promotion. /6
To them, “he said, she said” means trust the man. It’s not a tie - the man wins, by default. The scale has been tipped in the man’s favor in advance. Tipped enough to more than offset the stats about rape, and the idea of erring on the safe side. /7
It’s the same with a rich man vs a poor man, or a while woman vs a black woman. The scales are already tipped to the person with more social power in any “he said, she said” situation. “All else being equal” doesn’t apply when the all else includes inequality. /8
“He said, she said” is then a very handy weapon for the privileged to use against the unprivileged. It lets them claim even-handedness, when what they’re really doing is using all the bias cooked into the situation. /9
And that’s just what the GOP is trying to do here. They’re taking a case that is very much not just “he said, she said”, and going to great lengths to contort it into that frame. /10
Republican Senators are using the “he said, she said” framing to maintain an appearance of even-handedness in a process that from the start has been rigged, against the rules, and biased toward men. Like they always do. /11
