Tag Archives: roofies

New Definition Of Rape Approved By FBI Director

Jessica WakemanJanuary 9, 2012 //
CDC Sex Assault Data
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Adolescent girls and preteen boys are at the highest risk for sexual assault. Read More »
Victim Blaming
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Rape victims are never to blame for their assault. Read More »
I Was Date Raped
Amelia was date raped in college by a guy she liked. Read More »

“Penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.”

This is the new, expansive definition of rape approved by the FBI last week, which will more accurately reflect how sexual assaults are tabulated by the government in its Uniform Crime Report. The FBI’s working definition of “rape,” created in the 1920s, had been roundly criticized by everyone from police chiefs, sex crime investigators, and victims’ advocate for only defining assault as “the carnal knowledge of a female, forcibly and against her will.” That definition entirely left out male victims and ignored incidents when the victim was penetrated against his or her will orally, anally, with an object, and under the influence of drugs or alcohol (such as being roofied). As a result, the number of sexual assaults released by the FBI’s annual crime report drastically under-reported the crimes perpetrated in the country. Keep reading »

Why Are Politicians Attempting To Redefine Rape?

Jessica WakemanJanuary 31, 2011 //

The “No Taxpayer Funding For Abortion Act” redefines “real” rape as only that which is “forcible” and has been co-sponsored by 173 mostly Republican legislators and was called a “top priority” by Speaker of the House John Boehner. Likely knowing that fully criminalizing abortion is impossible, politicians are going after the funding of abortions in certain cases of rape and incest. Slipped a roofie and raped while you are unconscious? Raped while you are blackout drunk and unable to consent? Sexually assaulted by your uncle at age 19? If you are poor and need governmental funding to help terminate a pregnancy resulting from this horrific acts, there will be no help for you.

I hope your breakfast is sitting well with you, because you’re about to get queasy if you read on. Keep reading »

11 Women Hospitalized For Spiked Drinks At Washington College Party

Jessica WakemanOctober 14, 2010 //

Scary times: 11 women were hospitalized after being possibly drugged with “roofies,” the date rape drug, at a Central Washington University college party on Saturday night in Washington state.

Police said 50 people attended an off-campus party and many of them began falling over and passing out after just one or two drinks. “Their level of intoxication just didn’t seem to make sense,” the police chief told CNN Radio. A bottle of vodka may have been spiked with an unknown substance and then distributed to partygoers, cops said, because kids who brought their own alcohol or drank beers from cans were fine. Given how almost all of those hospitalized were women, police say that women may have been targeted — possibly for sexual assault. Keep reading »

Are Date-Rape Drugs An Urban Myth?

Amelia McDonell-ParryOctober 27, 2009 //

“Date-rape drugs are largely an urban myth used as an excuse by women who booze themselves into a stupor, it has been claimed.”

That’s the first line from an article in today’s Daily Mail, about a new study out of the University of Kent that suggests many women mistake being drunk for being drugged. Of course, there’s more to this story than the “journalists” at the Daily Mail would have you believe. For starters, it’s not that women are using “I was drugged!” as a way of excusing bad drunken behavior, but rather than they may be confusing the side effects of being intoxicated — nausea, dizziness, etc. — with those associated with being roofied. Additionally, a far more comprehensive article in the Telegraph quotes Adam Burgess, of Kent’s School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research, as saying, “Young women appear to be displacing their anxieties about the consequences of consuming what is in the bottle on to rumors of what could be put there by someone else.” Keep reading »