DATE RAPE, YESTERDAY AND TODAY: Unveiling the Lies

Date rape has been in the news a lot more than usual lately. So much so, that some people might have become a little jaded. This is why we need to bring it a little closer home.

Question: If you grew up in the seventies or eighties, has your wife or someone you know, told you a story similar to the following; or Ladies, have you had this happen to you? Were you ever out on a date with someone you did not care much for, maybe you went out with him to avoid spending the evening alone, went out on the rebound, or just agreed to one date in order to get him out of your hair? After a drink or two, did you maybe find yourself getting a lot more intimate with him than you normally would have done on a first date and by the end of that evening he was your ‘boyfriend’? If that transition happened without you making a conscious decision to change your mind about him and the one or two drinks you had that night did not involve anything more intoxicating than you are normally used to, chances are you might have been slipped a drug by your date and been an unwitting victim of date rape.

Date rape refers to a sexual act between a person who uses physical or psychological intimidation and a victim who engages in sexual intercourse against her will, or between persons that include a victim whose consent was not willingly obtained due to incapacitation by consciousness/mind-altering drugs or alcohol. Although it is considered a relatively new phenomenon, date rape has been around for as long as human relationships have existed but it was hard to prove in social situations where the victim and perpetrator were acquainted. It was therefore considered less serious than rape perpetrated by a stranger and until recently, aspersions tended to be cast on women who reported being raped by someone known to them. Today, there is a much wider awareness of the dangers of date rape and date rape drugs than twenty to thirty years ago. Social media has been instrumental in unmasking the date rape scene through the circulation of macabre date rape stories ranging from clandestine surgeries and organ theft to abductions ending in modern-day slavery half a world away. However, not that many women know that date rape drugs have been around in Nigeria for a few decades and were probably much closer to them than they realized. As a matter of fact, date rape drugs were considered a must-have rather like condoms are today with a wide cross-section of young men in the seventies and eighties. Arguably, up to three out of five young men might have actually used different drugs such as Rohypnol (or others that have a similar hypnotic and or sedative effect on the victim, making them malleable) to ‘score’ with a female on the dating scene in the eighties.  . These figures are based on anecdotal evidence. Suffice to say that this phenomenon needs to be the subject of more in-depth research.

More often than not, date rape is inflicted by a person known to the victim, which is why it is also called acquaintance rape or campus rape due to its prevalence among college populations. Rape is generally under-reported among teenagers and is even less reported when it occurs during a date. In the seventies and eighties, it was virtually taboo in emerging economies. We might finally know why. It appears that a young man who date-raped a female was taught to parry the incidence into a relationship and many naive young women who might have been confused about the incidence of such a night, welcomed the option of an emerging relationship as a face-saving step, rather than the possibility that she had let her guard down or worse, that she had been downright promiscuous by going too far on a first date.  The truth however, is that if she had a chance to carefully and knowledgeably relive the incidence of the fateful night/s, she should have paid closer attention to how her drink was handled by her date prior to things getting so heated that she found herself doing things she did not intend to.

If the foregoing sounds familiar, what should you do with that information? You might wish to confront your assailant no matter how long it has been. It might be hard to prove that a crime was committed but if you choose to pursue that path, it might give you some closure. However, the way you use that information to your advantage going forward is key. If you have no children, educate the young people in your community. If you are a parent, this knowledge should give you added incentive to educate your teenagers about this subject. If your teenager is female, she needs to understand the dangers of dating, learn to engage in safe dating practices such as dating/going on outings exclusively in groups of trusted/like-minded friends, ensure that she always gets her food/drink herself and of course, never ever return to food/drink she left unattended when in company whether in public or in private. If your teenager is male, he should be taught that sex engaged in under the influence of mind or consciousness altering substances is rape: it is not consensual and although he might consider that he ‘scored’ it will probably come back to haunt him in really potent ways. Ask Bill Cosby. If he faces prosecution, his defense team will not be able to get him off because: ‘Everyone was doing it’.

EDITOR’S NOTE
Date rape is part of a series of violent acts against women, which include but is not limited to gang rape, acid throwing, breast ironing, bride burning, dowry death and honor killing.