Female students are being injected now with date rape drugs in nightclubs

[GoWalkabout]

I won't post the Facebook post I saw because its on a forum but apparently there have been several reported incidents of students in Exeter nightclubs being injected in the back (not by people they are with) while out. The newspapers really need to get on this story and nightclubs who are reportedly batting back complaints saying that the women are just drunk need to deal with this criminality on their premises. We are not prey.

If it were that easy to inject people by surprise, they should definitely start doing so with the covid vaccine!

I would say date rape drugs in drinks are still one of the biggest threats - as you assume it’s just the drink going to your head and not realise anything’s wrong, whereas if you feel a needle you are more likely to alert someone.

The best advice is for friends to always stick together in the club and going home. If you’re getting a taxi to different areas make sure the least drunk one is the last out so she can text everyone when she’s home safely.

I don't doubt that there is some pricking going on. I am suggesting that moving from that to 'there is an injectable sedating drug' doing the rounds is something that needs validation because, without it, it is yet another way of controlling the behaviour of women

Exactly right. Young women have to contend with enough genuine threats to their safety, without making up bogeymen. This is an urban myth, preying on the anxieties of parents whose kids have just gone to Uni. I am really saddened to see reports of girls being encouraged to spend the night in, instead of enjoying themselves. Fuck that! These poor teens have just spend 18 months stuck in the house. They need to get out and engage with the world. And it's stupid advice, as well - many more female students are sexually assaulted by fellow students in halls/student accommodation than by randoms in nightclubs.

So when did they supposedly put this ring on her? And then when outside and calling her a cry baby and trying to “take” her at no point did her boyfriend or friends get a photo of this woman for the police report, in this day and age of mobile phones someone would have tried to capture this. In my experience of student events, someone trying to “take” a collapsed girl wouldn’t be ignored. Why would they also massively out themselves in front of a busy nightclub by calling her the thing “they” placed on a ring? Sorry but this is like bad fictional writing.

@User134342134

If it were that easy to inject people by surprise, they should definitely start doing so with the covid vaccine!

And this is your take on the event? No one should have body autonomy.

Did you even bother to read the bbc link? Arrests have been made for precisely this reason in Nottingham.

I saw the post on FB as well. Terrifying.

And I'm now waiting (furiously) for the newspapers to pick it up with an accompanying oped piece explaining how women need to protect themselves against this sort of thing rather than focusing on the disgusting men doing it.

This is how fear mongering works.
Classic urban myth.

@Mummyoflittledragon one arrest has been made, in one city, and the man involved has been bailed. We don't know what he was arrested for, and so far no charges have been brought.

That is not evidence that there is a new and sudden mass targeting of women with needles in nightclubs nationwide.

I've heard of it happening in Leeds too, think there is a boycott later this month. May be true, likely exaggerated, but the thing is that our girls can't afford to take the risk that it's not. The recent thing with Sarah, Sabina and all the other attacks and sexual assaults are threatening their livelihoods, of course they're scared.

@CatBarb

It's not disinformation, someone above shared a link to a BBC article about it, why would someone make up such a thing?! There are unfortunately some bad people out there so we need to make people aware to prevent it happening to others. The universities are aware as are the police & hospitals and hopefully they can stop it.

Someone here will remember...there was a story round one Halloween and the DC were scared...it got reported on the BBC for sure because I remember looking on other news outlets...was it maybe about clowns kidnapping children?

The point being, the news outlets have got caught out publishing odd things or saying that one weird incident is a national problem.

There are several first hand accounts on wiwikau (a forum for parents of university students) and tyes, these students were taken to hospital and tested.

Due to legal concerns about naming specific areas/nightclubs the discussions have been moved to the website which you need to be a member of.

@ElvisPresleyHadABaby

I've heard of it happening in Leeds too, think there is a boycott later this month. May be true, likely exaggerated, but the thing is that our girls can't afford to take the risk that it's not. The recent thing with Sarah, Sabina and all the other attacks and sexual assaults are threatening their livelihoods, of course they're scared.

our girls can't afford to take the risk that it's not

Girls need to take sensible precautions to minimise risk but, sadly, they cannot eliminate risk. Sarah and Sabina were attacked while undertaking very low-risk activities. Are you proposing that no young women leaves her house to meet friends 5 minutes' away, or walks down a busy road on a summer evening? Because that sounds a lot like the curfew on women that the police tried to impose in the Sutcliffe days.

Girls should not be encouraged to stay at home at night. That is incredibly regressive. They should be empowered to understand how they can minimise risks while going about their normal activities. And, of course, far, far more attention should be paid to reducing violence from men.

One of the dangers of this sort of urban myth is that it distracts women from the actual threats.

@SisterJude

What's the point of putting a ring on the finger? What does that achieve? I don't get it. Probably because it's made up bullshit.

Maybe they were recruiting for Spectre?

I absolutely hate the fact women are even having to worry about this. Clubs should be about fun and freedom. Especially post pandemic.
Legally GHB and rohypnol, often mentioned as rape drugs are only class C. Should they not be reclassified with much much higher criminal penalties?

www.talktofrank.com/drug/ghb#the-law
www.talktofrank.com/drug/benzodiazepines#the-law

Given that they must be easy to buy over the internet and in person and we all know they’re used by rapists - including the widely publicised serial rapist Sinaga in Manchester.
The fact they’re an accessory to give easy access for rape and other crimes surely means they should be regarded as much more dangerous than just a legal classification measured by their actual physical effect, or addictive qualities alone.

[quote Lockheart]@Mummyoflittledragon one arrest has been made, in one city, and the man involved has been bailed. We don't know what he was arrested for, and so far no charges have been brought.

That is not evidence that there is a new and sudden mass targeting of women with needles in nightclubs nationwide.[/quote]
Where did I say it was mass targeting of women throughout the country? I was talking about the proposal to stealth inject people with the Covid jab.

The most common rape drug is alcohol. It's cheap, it's available everywhere, you don't have to contact drug dealers to get it, , you can pretend you're just being social with the victim and you don't have to do around with a hypodermic needle in your pocket and then follow your victim for 20 minues.
As a teenage girl away from home for the first time, in clubs for the first time ever possibly due to lockdowns it's very easy to underestimate the effects on you. I speak as someone who was raped as a student in my own bed after drinking "a couple of drinks" with my flat mates and the boys from the flats down stairs. Which were incredibly strong measures and actually I was probably drinking more than I thought. The kind student from downstairs who helped me to my room and "stayed in case I was sick" actually raped me while I was passed out drunk. I was then talked about by other people in my building for weeks. I then found out I had for Chlamydia from him so had to get treatment and also have HIV tests

For most women and girls the danger is not the lurking man in the alley way or the stranger in a nightclub with a syringe of drugs and a getaway car. It's that nice bloke you chatting to at the fresher's drinks or that lad who lives next door who helps you home on the bus.
If, and its a big if, there is some massive co-ordinated rape attempts with fast acting injectable sedatives then that is scary for the women who have experienced it. But this week and every week there will be drunk young women being raped by their male friends. Let's not forget that threat which is far more mundane but far more likely.

This isn't a new thing. I was jabbed years ago. No recollection of the rest of the night. I ended up being left in my parents porch. I was 14.

I'm just very shocked at so many disbelievers! I know a girl personally who's been affected and can understand that it's hard to believe, as I did have questions, it doesn't matter if you believe it or not for me, my point is to try and prevent it happening to others or even worse.. I have no reason to make it up, I'm a mum, a teacher, a Tropic Ambassador.. just a normal person.. with no reason to make up such a thing!

@CatBarb

I'm just very shocked at so many disbelievers! I know a girl personally who's been affected and can understand that it's hard to believe, as I did have questions, it doesn't matter if you believe it or not for me, my point is to try and prevent it happening to others or even worse.. I have no reason to make it up, I'm a mum, a teacher, a Tropic Ambassador.. just a normal person.. with no reason to make up such a thing!

I don't think anyone's suggesting you have personally made this up. But you are very credulous. You don't know a girl who has been personally affected. You know a girl who thinks (or claims to think) she has been personally affected. Two very different things.

Stop spreading fear - it helps no one.

It's real:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-58951716

[quote HadEnough798]It's real:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-58951716[/quote]
PPs have made useful comments about what that item actually reports.

Social contagion is a very real phenomenon with desperate consequences for the quality of life of those affected by it and it has wider social harms (as PPs have discussed).

The same rumours up in Dundee and Aberdeen too…

[quote HadEnough798]It's real:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-58951716[/quote]
Again, one arrest with no details and no charges brought does not mean this is real, nor that it is happening country wide even if it is real.

If we start to see hospitals confirming through toxicology reports and warnings from the police, or someone charged, then I will believe it's real.

Until then, all we have are dubious anonymous reports on social media, purported photos of injection sites that either show nothing or what is obviously a common or garden spot, medically near impossible claims of effects, and a pattern of behaviour and reporting which screams urban myth.

Critical thinking really does seem to have gone out the window.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-58951716
Please see article above.
Its happening everywhere. My daughter is in Nottingham and she and her friends are petrified. This is so under reported to police because the drug impairs your memory and the victims are often embarrassed or even made to feel a sense of shame or blame because they were out drinking. I've got a friend in Edinburgh and their daughter is saying the same things. What ever from of 'spiking' whether via drinks or needles it is outrageous to think that young people are being preyed upon in this way, its a national scandal & needs to be brought into the main stream so that more undercover officers are policing bars and nightclubs. I know there will be many who say how are we going to fund that but this just cannot take place under our noses, young people are allowed to have a good time just as we did, we must shine a light on this .