In a recent Quartz.com article titled, “What kind of person makes false rape accusations?” (commented on here), novelist Sandra Newman answers that, among others, people with (Cluster B) personality disorders do (sociopaths, narcissists, histrionics, and borderlines), which is true. People who exhibit the traits associated with these disorders, whether clinically or subclinically, are identified in the law as “high-conflict people.” Court process perfectly syncs with their drive to blame, and they may lie without compunction.

Here’s the problem: While psychological motives may be discerned in major criminal investigations, they are never detected in any “lesser” type of prosecution, particularly in civil court. “Investigators” like Ms. Newman, whose agenda is clearly to challenge the notion that false rape accusations are a serious matter, must discredit that notion while relying on the legitimacy of “lesser” so-called “epidemic” violations like stalking and domestic violence, which may also be alleged (and to a much greater extent) by high-conflict litigants. No one can know what quotient of violence hysteria is based on lies or distortions, and the Sandra Newmans out there have no interest in dispelling that hysteria or promoting a balanced perspective. Sympathy for “the adversary” is unthinkable.

The goal is to emphasize the victimization of women and to dismiss the victimization of the falsely accused (who include women, which is a fact that’s also ignored).

The title of Pulitzer-prize-winning columnist Dorothy Rabinowitz’s book, No Crueler Tyrannies: Accusation, False Witness, and Other Terrors of Our Times, characterizes (false) accusation much more squarely, that is, damningly.

Here are some stories about false accusation and its effects:

• Larry’s Story: Restraining Order Abuse and the Neighbor from Hell
• The Use of Restraining Orders to Bully Women: Jenny’s Story
• “She Said That I Had Been Burning Him Intentionally and That I Had Kidnapped Him”: Aaron’s Story of Restraining Order Abuse
• J’s Story: Restraining Order Abuse and the “Dreaded Crazy”
• “Trapped”: Betty’s Story of Restraining Order Abuse
• “On the Receiving End of a Sociopath’s Lies”: A Professional Mom’s Story of Restraining Order Abuse
• Low and Outside: An Umpire’s Story of Restraining Order Abuse (by an Underhand Screwball)
• The “Nightmare” Neil Shelton Has Lived for Three Years and Is Still Living: A Father’s Story of Restraining Order Abuse
• Feminist Response Invited: Mom Gives up after Spending $25,000 to Fight a False Restraining Order and Regain Custody of Her Son Only to Have Her Ex-Husband Start the Whole Thing over Again
• Diving into the Shallow End: What It Takes to Disprove and Recover Damages for a Restraining Order Based on Fraud
• Borderline Personality Disorder, Procedural Abuse, and Feminism: A Victim’s Reckoning of Their Tolls
• Scott’s Story: A Husband’s Account of Restraining Order Abuse
• Court-Abetted Trespassing, Burglary, Larceny, and Embezzlement: A Terminally Ill Man’s Story of Restraining Order Abuse
• Texas Officials Michael Honeycutt and Tiffany Bredfeldt Allege Sexual Solicitation in Contradictory Testimony to the Arizona Superior Court, Implicating a Tucson Man Who’s Been Falsely Accused for 11 Years: FACIALLY VOID GAG ORDER STANDS; “WOMEN’S LAW,” TCEQ DISCREDITED

Ms. Newman has elsewhere acknowledged what she thinks of liars and expressed how she feels society should regard them:

Yet the thrust of her Quartz arguments is not that liars are monstrous and should be stopped. It’s that lying, even about rape and even to people with guns and gavels, is unworthy of remark, because it “almost never [has] serious consequences.”

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*The link on Ms. Newman’s Twitter remark is broken because her account has been suspended since the publication of this post.