Safety guidelines for meeting up with people on the net

[Samhain]

First of all lets take a look at why meeting someone from the net could be dangerous, the reality of someone chasing you around their home with a chainsaw may be pretty far fetched, however getting attacked or assaulted isn't.
So why is it more dangerous as opposed to say, meeting someone in a pub or club?
well, when we meet a person face to face obvousily its not risk free, but the thing we do is employ all our senses to tell us whether this person is safe or not, sight sound and smelling the other person tells, gives us a basic gut instinct about what this person is really about, how often have you thought I really don't like this person, or I like him but he could never be anything other than a friend, but are unsure why?

on the net its not uncommon to really like someone then meet up and within seconds wonder what attracted you to them in the first place, this is because the net is completely void of all the senses that we use everyday to give us an impression of the people we meet

However more than this, a person on the net can give themselves a whole new personna, you will often not know the real them until you met up, this includes anyone that could potientially be dangerous, they are certainly not going to broadcast this on the net and not everyone has everyone elses best interests at heart, even though they may promise you the world

[Samhain]

Whats important here is that I'm not talking about people that you have got to know over a period of months on the forums, this (although not risk free) is of course safer.

I'm talking about someone you met with on the net with a view to having a sexual encounter or a romantic interest, often one meets up very quickly in the hopes that s/he will be the one, at times like this it may be very exciting, but one can still employ some basic safety measures
S

[Samhain]

Ok so heres a list of basic safety measures, these are open to discussion and people can add others if they like!

Don't give out any personnal contact details, I.E home address and home telephone numbers until you have met the person at least once

Meet up in a neutral place, like a cafe, meet in the daytime and let people know where you are going and who you are going to meet, show them their photo if you have one.

Never meet someone at their home, first time or have someone round to yours, being in someone elses enviroment is being in their power and someone being in your enviroment can be very violating if you end up not liking them and after this they know where to find you!

Take a friend with you, they could sit near by, your date doesn't even need to know that they are with you (although if you ask the person if they mind you bringing a friend along the first time and they say no, wouldn't this ring alarm bells?) and then leave you too it when you give them a signal to go

For other dates if you are going round to the persons home, get contact details for that person and leave it with someone you know, tell that person that if they haven't heard from you after a certain time then get concerned.
This is not unreasonable, so really question it if your date will not allow you to give out their contact details to a trusted third party

Is it what you expacted on arrival or does he have six of his friends round watching porn?
details like this will let you know how the person views you

Above all listen to your gut instinct, if its telling you are unsafe you usually are