37 Comments

Here's where it gets sketchy. Two people that are both equally drunk have sex. What do you think happens to them? The woman is a victim, the man is a rapist.Isn't she just as guilty of raping him? Women, in general need to own up to their actions.

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And who forces said people to overdrink to the point of not being able to think clearly what they are doing?

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So, basically, you are accepting drinks from strangers and hope for no consequences?

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I find it really disturbing to come across an article such as this after being hospitalized just last week from being "roofied." I know what my tolerance levels are when it comes to drinking, and considering I was only through one drink and was blacked-out really unnerves me to think that someone could simply say that "oh she just had too much to drink and is just claiming to be roofied to protect her reputation."

There are side-effects to date-rape drugs that are more serious than simply forgetting what happened or having a bad hang-over the next day. I was carried into the hospital by friends after I had trouble breathing and was in extreme abdominal pain. After being admitted, an EKG test showed that I was tacacardic (high heart rate that causes heart attacks). All this stress on my body due to rufilin caused a pre-diagnosed ovarian cyst to burst, which added to my pain. This is all in addition to the hours of vomiting, heartburn after eating for a week, and constant shaking that lasted two days.

After going through all that, missing a midterm exam and having to catch a 5 hour flight two days after that ordeal, I am angered to hear that people may still believe I had simply had "too much to drink." .. or even that it was my fault for not completely covering my drink the whole night... or for even drinking at all... or even for just being a girl!

Which brings me to the question- if people, especially men as it seems to be after reading the above comments, start to attribute side-effects of being drugged while drinking to just simply having too much to drink, then at what point will people realize the difference between being intoxicated and having been slipped something in their drink? The effects that date-rape drugs have (and yes there are multiple types that have different side effects) on a person no matter how much they have had to drink are very serious and can lead to organ failures and death.

So please for the sake of people's HEALTH and SAFETY.. next time you want to assume that a girl, especially someone you know well, is just completely intoxicated by her own means, think twice because they could be in more danger than you can imagine.

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This article is a typical example of victim blaming. Perhaps these women are wrong to identify their sexual assault as "date rape" but it is only a term. If a person is too intoxicated, be it from alcohol or rohypnol(a common date rape drug), to consent it is considered rape. To the person that wrote this article, please educate yourself.

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In many locations, drunken consent is not legal consent.

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I was in one of the druggiest fraternities at my school when I was in college. Drugs were pretty accessible - I could easily get marijuana or coke, and it would have taken only a bit more effort for lsd, 2cb, ecstasy, and shrooms. We had a charity event each year where students did retarded, gross, or dangerous stunts in order to raise money for a charity. The highlight of the event one year was going to be a "Roofie Run", where a couple of students would take a roofie and run until all but one had passed out, thereby "winning" the event. It had to be cancelled because no one, in a club of 200+ dedicated drug users, knew where to get roofies.

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You're assuming a lot by saying "alcohol + rape". Willingly consumed alcohol often *creates* consent that is later regretted, that's very far from rape. Whereas a pill that makes a woman more pliable, given without her consent or knowledge, very much is rape.

Finally, yes women who willingly make themselves incapacitated among drunk men very much do have themselves to blame for getting raped. Much like a drunk small guy picking a fight with a big guy has himself to blame for getting his teeth punched out.

Imo it's unfortunate that drunk women aren't being blamed more for their risky behavior.

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The extra alcohol thing does happen of course, but by definition would be very difficult to pull off. Too stiff of a drink and the drinker simply isn't going to consume as much.

I bartended in my early 20s, and know from well worn experience, there's only so much you can do with juice and vodka and still have a tolerable drink.

Keep in mind that this isn't an indictment of women, it's an example of the well known habit of human beings to evade blame whenever possible. Just think of all of the excuses men have used as to why they cheated.

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This is the only blog I can think of that the comments are usually worth reading. The post is the meat of course, but I suppose the very nature of Robin's writing makes the comments more relevant.

Of course people - on average - will always take the route of an excuse that will absolve them from some or al blame.

It really is that simple.

That's what sets genuine people apart from the crowd. Learning to own up to one's mistakes - both large and small - is part of real maturity, and of course many, many people never get there despite their age.

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I saw on some news program once a man who was caught because it was on his hidden nanny cam. They showed part of it in the beginning, it was pretty distrubing, the girl was completely unconscious, like a doll. So there is no way she would remember anything.

Her only clues would have been the circumstances in which she awoke, and well depending on what he did with her body. If he is convincing he might convince her she passed out on the couch and, being a gentleman, he left her there.

That is totally different than remembering what happened. If she can remember and was conscious, then there was no date rape drug. I think that accounts for the zero cases.

Whether that is rape or not is a completely separate issue. The issues is, parents should care less about the minute things that might happen but probably never will (getting kidnapped, getting date rape drugs slipped in their drink, etc) and focus on teaching their kids to be responsible and watch for common dangers, like not binge drinking, etc.

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That's my general attitude, I am uncomfortable if a woman can barely stand. But plenty of women tell me they drink so that their inhibitions are lowered so they WILL go home with someone. They make the choice when they start drinking.

So basically I just never have one night stands, safer all around. But I can't really say when they do happen between two drunk people, that the man is wrong.

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It's also possible that they were hypnotized. That doesn't show up on tests, either. Better lock the guy up just in case.

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That's assumed, but not proven. It's conceivable that extra alcohol was slipped into the drinks of women who thought they were drugged. This wouldn't show up in the lab tests.

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No, the females drugged *themselves* with alcohol.

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Really folks, look first for simple ordinary explanations before looking to unusual ones.A med school teacher used to the heuristic, 'consider symptom X an uncommon symptom of a common disease before a common symptom of an uncommon disease.'

AFAICT -- given symmetrical probabilities -- this makes no sense from a Bayesian POV....unless we systematically overestimate P(uncommon disease) [in casu P(date rape drug)] because it's more exciting and/or shifts blame and/or some other bias.

Wise heuristic or not?

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