Anyone have ideas as to why they would even bother with making such a charge just to withdraw it so quickly? It looks especially bad in light of Wikileaks' recent activities.
In the case of the former, flaunting rape allegations only to withdraw them makes people susceptible to taking the insidious "asshat" argument at face value without wondering too much because it seems that everyone is acting responsibly and rationally in contrast to earlier.
In the latter, having filed charges whether successful or not (and with the same "asshat" implication) legitimises selling the story to gossip magazines.
In both cases, there is some tarnish to the reputation unless completely debunked. Or of course the allegations are true.
http://translate.google.com/translate?js=y&prev=_t&i...
It’s based on this article, but Google won’t translate it: