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Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/6440589/Date-rape-drink-spiking-an-urban-legend.html
Widespread spiking of drinks with date-rape drugs such as Rohypnol and GHB is an "urban legend" fuelled by young women unwilling to accept they have simply consumed too much alcohol, academics believe. A study of more than 200 students revealed many wrongly blamed the effects of a "bad night out" on date-rape drugs, when they had just drunk excessively.
Many are in "active denial" that drinking large amounts of alcohol can leave them "incoherent and incapacitated", the Kent University researchers concluded. Young women's fears about date-rape drugs are so ingrained that students mistakenly think it is a more important factor in sexual assault than being drunk, taking drugs or walking alone at night.
The study, published in the British Journal of Criminology, found three-quarters of students identified drink spiking as an important risk – more than alcohol or drugs. More than half said they knew someone whose drink had been spiked.
But despite popular beliefs, police have found no evidence that rape victims are commonly drugged with such substances, the researchers said.
Dr Adam Burgess from the university's School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research, said: "Young women appear to be displacing their anxieties about the consequences of consuming what is in the bottle on to rumours of what could be put there by someone else.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by http on Tuesday September 20 2016, @11:09PM
... since police don't look for evidence of rape when they're telling the victim, "well look what you're wearing."
Dr. Adam Burgess is malicious, and thinks others are morons. The idea that women can't tell the difference between drinking too much, drinking a lot, and being drugged is spectacularly unfounded.
I browse at -1 when I have mod points. It's unsettling.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 20 2016, @11:57PM
Well, where is the evidence that these drugs are in common use?
... since police don't look for evidence of rape when they're telling the victim, "well look what you're wearing."
How common is that really?
The idea that women can't tell the difference between drinking too much, drinking a lot, and being drugged is spectacularly unfounded.
Maybe. I don't know how well people can tell the difference. I also don't know how these researchers can know what people are or aren't unwilling to believe, so that aspect of this study appears to be bullshit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 21 2016, @12:24AM
The idea that women can't tell the difference between drinking too much, drinking a lot, and being drugged is spectacularly unfounded.
Anymore than the entire mythology of absinthe and its effects is based upon scholarly enterprise.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 21 2016, @01:06AM
> The idea that women can't tell the difference between drinking too much, drinking a lot, and being drugged is spectacularly unfounded.
Is it? Given how common binge-drinking has become for college age people maybe not so much. Just that men don't have a socially acceptable scapegoat for their choice to drink themselves unconscious. If they did they might be just as likely to blame shift too.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 21 2016, @08:26AM
> The idea that women can't tell the difference between drinking too much, drinking a lot, and being drugged is spectacularly unfounded.
And also a straw man. Nobody said they "can't tell the difference", the story simply says they're *putting the blame on* one rather than the other.
It's telling how those taking the typical SJW lines are displaying such poor logic skills.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 21 2016, @09:14AM
Given that alcohol is a drug, what exactly is the difference between drinking too much and being drugged?
Indeed, given that consumption of alcohol makes you more likely to agree to sex which you wouldn't have agreed to otherwise, there are good reasons to classify alcohol as date-rape drug.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday September 21 2016, @02:09PM
Given that alcohol is a drug, what exactly is the difference between drinking too much and being drugged?
Consent. Nobody consents to being roofied, and I doubt most people are nonconsentingly drinking at bars.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Wednesday September 21 2016, @04:30PM
... since police don't look for evidence of rape when they're telling the victim, "well look what you're wearing."
This is the horrific reality that was the norm historically and unfortunately still survives today. I completely agree with you that such a culture of "blaming the victim" is morally reprehensible.
That said, that's NOT what TFA is about. It's about more accurately identifying the pre-existing factors which influence the incidence of rape. "Blame" is a moral construct, and obviously rape victims (by definition, non-consensual) are NOT liable for the criminal actions of the rapist. However, all sorts of factors come together to create a situation which is more dangerous for victims and easier for rapists to take advantage of.
Dr. Adam Burgess is malicious, and thinks others are morons. The idea that women can't tell the difference between drinking too much, drinking a lot, and being drugged is spectacularly unfounded.
Except for the data quoted in TFA which quotes multiple studies where the incidence of drugs in the systems of rape victims is much lower than they think. Alcohol IS a drug. In large doses, it can cause wildly divergent behavior, memory loss, temporary (or permanent!) unconsciousness, etc. I wouldn't expect someone to be able to "tell the difference" between those effects from alcohol vs. another drug, unless they're perhaps an expert in taking various drugs that can cause such behavior (and let's hope most people do NOT have that kind of knowledge).
So no, I don't think anyone's accusing others of being "morons." The issue is that human nature shows we like to absolve ourselves of responsibility when we do something that's ill-advised. Otherwise, how do we explain so many lawsuits against manufacturers for using products in insane ways? If there's a question of personal error vs. bad actions of others, people frequently will focus on the possible bad actions of others.
Again, let's be clear that none of this is "blaming the victim." The rapist is still solely culpable morally and legally for the assault. The question is what pre-existing factors may have made it easier for the rapist to commit his act.
Let's also note that even IF many of these situations come about "merely" after heavy drinking rather than another drug, the excess drinking may come about in various ways. Many of those methods make it more difficult for victims to keep track of alcohol consumption or make it more difficult to stop at a reasonable point. (e.g., potential victims are often offered sweet cocktails that can have a very large quantity of alcohol in them (but are much easier to drink than, say, hard liquor alone), peer pressure can create situations where you feel talked into "just another drink," once you're already drunk, the inhibitions toward drinking more and making reasonable decisions about that go down, etc., etc.)
Cautioning women that alcohol consumption alone can help put them in a dangerous situation (and is a more frequent occurrence than other "date-rape" drugs) is a prudent thing to bring up. It's not "blaming the victim" for rape any more than saying, "you might consider taking an umbrella next time" is "blaming the victim" for the weather if you walk in after getting soaked on a stormy day. The person rained on isn't to "blame" for the weather, nor is the rape victim to blame for the actions of the rapist. But having a more accurate understanding of the situations which make it easier for rapists to take advantage of victims (much more frequently plain alcohol than other drugs) can help people make better decisions.