Atlasians Against Witchhunts and Victim Blaming

[Anna Komnene]

We the undersigned, unequivocally oppose the so-called "Protection from False Sexual Imprisonment and Labeling Act" which is a blatant assault on the integrity of victims of sexual violence. It is already illegal to lie in a court of law, so this bill is essentially creating a new category of lying, specifically pertaining to victims of sexual violence. This bill is based on the gross assumption that victims of sexual violence are prone to lying, and it would serve to encourage those who are accused to create witchhunts against their victims in order to paint them as untrustworthy, both during and after trials in the hopes of creating some kind of morbid reversal of fortunes. Not only that, this bill dilutes the meaning of sex offender by seeking to register people who aren't sex offenders and even seeks to punish them as if they were actually a rapist!

We call on the House of Representatives to soundly reject this bill and cast it into oblivion where it belongs!

x Siren, former Fremont Senator

[JGibson]

I promise to vote NAY to this bill.

x Congressman JGibson (Lab).

[President of the great nation of 🏳️‍⚧️]

I promise to vote NAY to this bill.

x Congresswoman Peebs (Lab).

[fhtagn]

I promise to vote NAY to this bill.

x Congresswoman fhtagn (Fed).

[Mike Thick]

I encourage the Congressmen who have already posted (as well as those who have not) to vote this down, or table it, or something to ensure that this never becomes law. I respect Haslam a lot, but WADR this is hands down one of the worst bills I've ever seen in this game.

[Pheurton Skeurto]

x Senator R2D2 (Ind-MA)

[Adam Griffin]

As someone who loves witch-hunts in general, I cannot in good conscience support this terrible legislation.

[Illiniwek]

I promise to vote NAY to this bill.

x Congressman Illiniwek (Lab).

[Blair]

Back from retirement purely to oppose this garbage.

X Former President Blair

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

If it weren't already obvious from my remarks in debate, I am naturally opposed to this nightmare of a bill, and cannot in good conscience enforce it; in the unhappy event that it becomes law, I will have no alternative but to immediately resign my post as Attorney General.

x Harry S Truman

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Re-posting my post in the bill thread.

Not to be rude, but why is this necessary? Perjury is already a crime, after all; I'm afraid I don't see why sexual assault needs its own special law against false testimony.

This. In addition, I would argue that the culture of victim-blaming in incidents where sexual assault does take place is a far more pressing issue, and this bill would just compound that, providing further incentive for these horrendous crimes to go unreported.

I agree with this concern, hence why I mentioned three days ago that whatever is done, it cannot impede the prosecution and investigation of serious crimes of rape and sexual assault that occur every single day in this country.

I would also note that the damaging aspects of the false accusations of crime occur in relation to more laws than just those pertaining to sexual misconduct and so it is a mistake to singularly focus on those and those alone.

I think at this point, this should be amended to a bill that increases the penalties for perjury for all crimes. While at the same time providing more protections for witnesses of all crimes. This will help both put away lawbreakers and also help with those who are wrongly accused/convicted, as there are a number of instances where people were convicted of murder for example but there were witnesses who could have provided testimony that exonerated them.

If ones concern is the protection of people from wrongful prosecutions and even more importantly, wrongful conviction, then we should do everything possible to protect and encourage witnesses to come forward and tell the truth.