By Dayane Hussein | Staff Writer

After enduring months of cancelled music festivals and closed bars, young people deserve to be out having the time of their lives. With a new spate of violence against women being on the rise, however, socializing has become fraught with fear.

The epidemic of spiked drinks in bars and nightclubs targeting young women has a new, terrifying twist: injecting the same chemicals into the back or legs of women. The drugs used in these crimes are thought to be the same ones used to spike drinks, including Rohypnol (Roofie) or Gamma Hydroxybutyrate (GHB). These chemicals, often know as date-rape drugs, inhibit a person’s ability to resist sexual assault.

Even though safety has been considered a fundamental human right since the dawn of the modern human rights era, women always had to go an extra mile to ensure their safety. During a night out, women are instructed to stay in groups and keep an eye on each other’s drinks; however, how can you possibly lessen the chance of getting injected with a needle? By never leaving the house?

The most perplexing aspect of the alarming increase in incidents of spiking by injection is that there is basically nothing a woman can do to protect herself. It’s not a matter of ‘keeping an eye on your drink‘ or ‘placing your hand over the top of your glass”. Needle-wielding men are on the loose.

It’s distressing to realize that women will never be able to live in peace. Women can’t walk home alone without being terrified. Women can’t grab a taxi alone without feeling anxious and paranoid. Women can’t wear certain outfits on a night out without being a target of street harassment or being followed by men who may get aggressive if they get rejected. Women can’t leave their drinks sitting anywhere; and now there’s the worry of spiking by injection?

This kind of everyday harassment always seems to keep getting worse, creepier, and more normalized. It is no longer a question of what you do or what you wear. Women are consistently targeted, and there is no way to stop it. It’s not about women’s fragility; it’s about male aggression.

With the increasing reports of young women on a night out allegedly experiencing drink spiking or even spiking via injection by an unseen stranger, I don’t think any woman would feel safe going to the club. Unfortunately, drink-spiking remains difficult to prosecute since women are afraid of not being taken seriously if they report it to the police and, even if they do, evidence may be hard to find. For these particular reasons, perpetrators are never apprehended, and they have several reasons to keep going.

Are we really surprised? Unfortunately, No. This is another thing men do with relative impunity. A woman’s safety is simply never prioritized and women are always expected to adapt and come up with new ways to protect themselves. However, this is not a sustainable solution. We need a systematic change to address problems rooted in patriarchy and sexism.