1. Stick with beer. You quickly learn your tolerance, and are less likely to far over-shoot your limit.
My Dad gave me this advice when i was going off to college, and it served me well, and this was before date rape drugs. You have know idea how much alcohol is in punches, mixed drinks, or jello shots. If I could tell you how often in college I had to carry home friends after I had beer and they had "hairy gorilla" punch or killer strawberry daquiris ("okay, Jane, just put your arm around my shoulder. Come on, we can do this. I am NOT leaving you here.")
2. Date rape is WAY under-reported. I learned this after a good friend tried to rape me, and I started telling people how I was lucky to get him to stop. One girl I told started crying, and when I asked why, she said "With me, he didn't stop ." Another friend said "Sh#t - he did that to my roommate." So imagine how many girls this guy victimized if TWO of the people I told my story to had similar experiences with the same guy. None of us reported him to authorities (although I told as many girls as possible about what happened). A knee to the groin works if you can manage it. Sadly, I know this from experience.
3. The safety info on this thread, especially about walking around drunk and alone APPLIES TO GUYS.
Yesterday, they found the body of a Penn State freshman guy who had gone out drinking with friends. Fraternity party to apartment to fraternity. His friends left him at the last fraternity, and when he attempted to walk home, it seems as though he fell into an (outside) stairwell (stairs to the basement of a building), where his body was found a day later. If his friends had INSISTED that he return to the dorms with them, this is far less likely to have happened. Safety in numbers, folks.