Thanks for the response. I'm going to go through this piece by piece, and do the some of the legwork, as I enjoy this kind of stuff. I'm going disregard the Time's article, as they are backpedaling. To preface, I actually agree, there's not enough research surrounding sexual assault. Its a horrendous crime that needs our attention, and the victims need our sympathy and help (both men and women who are victims).

RTI International did some great social scientific research into sexual assault on campus

https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/221153.pdf

If you look at the study they published back in 2007, there are some glaring problems. Under methods, as anyone analyzing data should note, they say this:

The CSA Study involved conducting a Web-based survey of random samples of undergraduate students at two large public universities, one located in the South (University 1) and one located in the Midwest (University 2). The CSA Survey was administered in the Winter of 2006, and a total of 5,446 undergraduate women and 1,375 undergraduate men participated. Because the male component of the study was exploratory, the data and results presented in this summary represent women only. The CSA Study was reviewed and approved by RTI’s Institutional Review Board (IRB), as well as the university IRBs.

Unrepresentative sample size. Any data they collect will tell us how many students at that University have been sexually assault and/ or raped, not the wider public. They also ignore male victims, which is typical.

We drew random samples of students aged 18-25 and enrolled at least three-quarters’ time at each university to participate in the CSA Study. Sampled students were sent an initial recruitment e-mail that described the study, provided a unique CSA Study ID#, and included a hyperlink to the CSA Study Web site. During each of the following weeks, students who had not completed the survey were sent follow-up e-mails and a hard-copy letter encouraging them to participate. The overall response rates for survey completion for the undergraduate women sampled at the two universities were 42.2% and 42.8%, respectively.

Alright, low response rate. Big problem when looking at data. When your sample sizes are 42 percent, you can't make any conclusive claims with that. There is going to be response bias, those who have experienced something horrible like sexual assault are most likely to respond, as it personally affects them. Those who haven't most likely won't. Most statisticians would disregard this study right here, and we haven't even covered how they define sexual assault.

I don't have much problem with this report, as I applaud anyone trying to solve the issues women face with sexual assault. They even state in the Times article that if you remove sexual assault from their report, the number of rape victims is 1 in 7. Still to high, but keep in mind this is only at those two Universities. My point is, the 1 in 5 stats have been quoted by Obama and Joe Biden at the White house, which has created a hysteria around sexual assault and rape. It's lead California to redefine sexual assault in; its lead to yes means yes laws; its lead to the definition of rape where two consenting adults who have had sex, if a they have been drinking, the man has raped that woman. It's lead to mandatory consent classes for young men on campuses.

In Canada, during the Gomeshi trial, we had the hashtag #BelieveTheVictim go viral, despite the fact that Lucy Decoutere and those who accused Gomeshi had their cases destroyed in court. We had the media saying we need to change sexual assault laws, lower the burden of proof, eliminate due process. RTI may have done good work, and they may have attempted to redact some of their statements to blunt the frenzy, but its too late. The damage is already done.

Onto the wage gap:

The existence of the gender pay gap has been hotly debated by economists, lawyers, and legislators.

I did not say that it was wrong, I said it was misleading. If you take the average earnings of men and women and divide those numbers, you get about 77 cents on dollar. This is true. However, earnings do not equal wages. Women are not paid less for the same work than a man, in fact this is illegal in most places in the West.

When economists say they've debunked this, they are referring to when you control for all the factors; women and men making different career choices; taking time off for maternity leave; taking company benefits over higher wages etc, the earnings gap shrinks. There are also factors that the wage gap doesn't cover, like for example in Canada, women are more likely to take money out of the government due to health care costs for pregnancies, due to them living longer than men and thus taking more out of government money etc. There are resources out there that cover these things, if you are curious. If you cover all these factors, the in some cases the wage gap actually favours women. There is evidence that young women before thirty are actually outearning their male peers. Interesting stuff.

"classified as a disadvantaged group in Canada and thus benefit from affirmative action." by whom, the Government Bureau of Classifying Disadvantaged Groups?

Women are classified as a disadvantaged group in the Employment Equity act of Canada. The four groups covered by this are:

1. Women
2. Aboriginals
3. People with disabilities
4. Visible Minorities

Sure. But you're saying that this is characteristically SJW. It isn't.

There are individuals who exhibit these actions; assaulting people with differing points of view; dismissing people's opinions because of their identity; many other things. Social Justice Warriors do not describe groups of people, they describe actions that individuals take. Because they are part of certain groups is a coincidence.