On January 14, I was drugged against my will in a bar. Not sure what had happened to me due to a huge memory lapse, I told few people about it. It then happened to my friend Rozana Ryan less than a month later. It was seeing her, half unconscious and limp, that certain memories resurfaced and my doubts were confirmed.
Seeing her almost inert, frightened and sick, I remembered the fear that inhabited me, the total loss of control, the sudden need to go home, to safety, to a familiar place. I then talked about it to those around me and learned a disturbing reality: it is much more common than I would have imagined.
Yet, when I go out with girls, we are all very careful, we do not touch our glasses when we have lost sight of them, we constantly cover them with our hand, we hang out in a group… But it’s not enough.
This is not enough because, for years, women have been the only ones to bear the burden of their own security.
We are sensitized very young to this reality, while many boys grow up without knowing the dangers of GHB, due to a lack of education under the pretext that this problem “does not concern them”, although they are often the cause. We have observed that often when a girl is drugged, the boys assume that she has had too much to drink and do not know how to act, while the girls are the first to react, to take charge of the situation.
Many do not know that this drug often leads to a stay in the hospital, sometimes even death. Not only can GHB be fatal, but it is a criminal offense and punishable by law if the person is forced to ingest it. It is an assault to force a person to ingest a drug that he has not consented to take, an assault that often leads to trauma.
No one should have to feel that danger lurking so close. No one should have to feel lucky because “nothing happened”. We were forced to take drugs, it put our mental and physical health at risk, but despite that, some of us can’t help but feel lucky because other girls get raped or have to go to the emergency room.
Knowing all this, we think it is in order for bars to invest more in the safety of their customers, whether by offering drug-resistant lids, coasters that detect GHB or by increasing security and the number cameras at bar counters.
We think it is time to focus on prevention, awareness and empowerment campaigns not only among women, but also and especially among boys.
Too many women feel they alone are responsible for their own safety, and too many men don’t know how to act in those critical situations where quick and fair action is needed to save someone’s life.
The date rape drug is a real scourge in Quebec and claims too many victims every day. It is time to act and publicly denounce this scourge which has grown far too much in recent years.