Stag dos are debaucherous by nature. The words themselves instantly conjure up a set of stereotypes curated by pop culture and tepid Noughties films. Think sweat-soaked men waving around ties and bravado in strip clubs. Bug-eyed lads hunched over blackjack tables in all-night casinos. Raucous groups of old mates on a mission to prove their masculinity, participating in some sort of 24-hour cult defined by a strange degradation of society, women and themselves. In other words: stags are bad news.
This was the prevailing cultural narrative for a while, one that was hardly helped by the spate of stag do deaths that have taken place over the years – namely Craig Mallon, who was killed by a single punch on a Spanish stag weekend in 2012. There have been many others, with The Guardian reporting in 2018 that at least 30 British men had died in the previous decade while on stag dos, while several others had suffered life-changing injuries.
