In the aftermath of the tragic death of Sarah Everard in March 2020, the difficult conversation around sexual assault and particularly male attitudes towards women has been encouraged more freely. However, though more men are working towards educating themselves of different ways women struggle and how they can support us to feel safer there are still many things young women especially have to consider in day-to-day life.
Since Universities went back in September, spiking is an issue which has been on the rise. There have been reports of students in Edinburgh, Nottingham and Liverpool being spiked by injection. People have turned to social media to speak out about this issue and a petition to ‘make it a legal requirement for nightclubs to thoroughly search guests on entry’ has been spread and gained over 78,000 signatures.
In further response to this, female students up and down the county have created the ‘GirlsNightIn’ movement which encourages students to boycott clubs on specific dates to make a statement about clubs needing to search people upon entry. This movement was started in Edinburgh after many students felt like their nights out were being tainted by anxiety around being drugged. Due to the power of social media, the message has spread and ‘GirlsNightIn’ accounts have been created specific to different locations.
For Southampton the boycotts are taking place on the 22nd of October for Educational and non-sports societies, and on the 27th of October for sports societies. These dates target two of the most popular student nights out in Southampton: Fridays and Wednesdays. If you have been on a night out in Southampton you will have noticed that none of the main nightclubs search bags or bodies upon entry, making it easy for people to bring in drugs to spike people. Without this movement, this may continue to happen, and more women will be affected. I’ve linked the petition mentioned above if you would like to sign it. Thank you