Is there any crime besides rape where people are arguing that false accusers should be heavily penalized?

My state is currently trying to pass a law that makes it illegal to call 911 for "racially biased non-emergency calls". It's clearly already illegal to use 911 for non-emergencies but this would add a hate crime enhancement to that. And of course they needed to take a poke at "Karens" by naming the law C.A.R.E.N. (Caution Against Racially Exploitative Non-Emergencies). So there's that. 

I think ANY false accusations should be punished. Probably the only reason you're seeing more on rape is because that's what is most prevalent.

I see very few arguments of any weight, for punishing false rape accusations. In reality a false rape accusation, usually results in more harm to the innocent accused, than the crime they are accused of. 

I think the stigma attached to being a rapist is so profound that if a man is accused of rape, even if he is not convicted, it can ruin his life and reputation permanently. That's why so many men fear the idea of being falsely accused of rape and want a deterrent (i.e. harsh penalties for the false accuser.) Other crimes don't carry the same weight of stigma that sex offenses do. 

However, what most people don't take into account is that proving someone maliciously falsely accused another of rape is very difficult. The majority of rape cases are he said/she said, which is why the conviction/incarceration rate for alleged rapists is so low. Lack of evidence to prove that a man is a rapist beyond reasonable doubt is not the same thing as a woman having falsely accused the man, so a DA would be unlikely to push ahead in most cases anyway.

Interesting:  I think that means we'd have to dig up the statistics on false accusations for other crimes, both in terms of the number of them happening, and also what happens to both the accused and the false accuser.

But let me ask you:  If a knowingly false accusation causes someone to be hanged, can you really tell the hanged person's family that the false accuser should be fined for contempt of court or given a wasting-police-time misdemeanor?

As women have been pointing out in so many ways, and for centuries, the crime of rape is special.

So is its accusation.  Don't belittle it.

"Is there any crime besides rape where people are arguing that false accusers should be heavily penalized"

Everywhere else in the court of law, the penalties for false accusers take into account the seriousness of the penalty that the falsely accused would face if he was in fact found guilty by deceit.  So the answer is yes.  That's the design.

I think what's happened more than anything, is that the very idea of rape is still stuck in most people's minds to be the classic definition, whereby some stranger is hanging out in the bushes and brutally violates a woman and has his way with her.  But in reality, most rape is now consent based rape which can be very different, and arguably less serious, and more conflicted by subjective testimony. 

But .... if a falsely accused man is sent to prison where he is known to be a "rapist", whatever that actually means, and whether he's there by false charges, makes no difference.  His life will be seriously changed.  Rapists are NOT treated amicably in jail.  NOBODY wants to go to jail under false pretences.  Especially for rape.  Oh! ... I haven't even mentioned the socially ostracizing affects that such a charge imposes onto a man for the rest of his life, even if the charges are dropped.

.

Not that I can think of.  It's not just false accusers either.  If you read the frequent internet commentary it's all cases where there isn't a conviction in the opinion a lot of men and without a separate case to establish whether the accusation was malicious.  I was going to write people but I'm fairly certain that the number of women who share this attitude are statistically negligible. I am not oposed to investigating accusations. It is already a crime to make false accusations. I was recently mulling over slander cases and couldn't help but think how often they are brought to preserve sexual reputation rather than say, being accused of adulterating commestables.  I'd rather be gossiped about as a pervert than have a accusation of manufactering or selling dangerous products.  It's similar with NDAs being misused to hide sexual harrassment.

In Scotland the legal system has three verdicts available: Guilty, Not Proven, and Not Guilty.  At the moment there is a campaign to abolish "not proven" in sexual violence cases as because in England which contains the greater part of the UK population a Scots "not proven" is commuted to "not guilty."  I understand the sentiment but if the campaign is successful I don't think the outcome will be more guilty verdicts considering how abyssmally low rates of UK rape convictions are.  "Not proven" at least reflects the reality of the situation.

Yes, at its heart it is to intimidate the victim into silence but I think it's not even a conscious thought process but an organic artefact of social attitudes toward rape and female sexuality generally.  I'm on the edge of writing an essay here with footnotes and everything but I shall restrain myself and leave it at a lot of rapists sincerely believe that all women hate sex so that the only "crime" that can be commited toward a woman in that arena is either to not compensate her enough, i.e. he bought dinner, or a high degree of additional violence must be involved.  As long as the woman got her dinner/movie and wasn't beaten up he has done nothing wrong.  A woman's complaint doesn't count because the underlying position is that no woman would ever have sex for the sheer pleasure of it.  We're always on the make.

Are you aware that convicted rapists are targeted by other inmates and prison personal? Did you ever ask yourself why men going to prison are more likely to commit suicide if they are going away for rape? Did you ever think that perhaps men treat these accusations as more serious because rape is all to often part of the punishment for them?