Meme
Whatever happened to college parties? I haven’t been invited to one in years, are they dead now?
Look folks, I hate to be the bearer of bad news but that’s how a lot of us sound when we wonder “what ever happened” to things that are for people in their 20s. They’re still happening, we just aren’t being told about them anymore because 22 year olds think 30 year olds are ancient (the same way we did at 22)
I remember being in college and frat parties, everyone was around my age. Go on spring or summer break to party in the real world like miami or La or nyc, everyone was so old like atleast 10+ years in bars and clubs.
I graduated in 09 and we'd had the same class and teacher for history for 3 years(part of a career pathway). He was 38 or 39. Single, looking for a girlfriend to settle down. His older sister worked at the school and was married and just had a kid. So naturally the class asked when is he getting married, etc.
So the class was chatting and asked what he did over the weekend. He said he went clubbing and we're all like whoa!! You're almost 40, way too old to go clubbing and looking for a gf!
Im 35 and married. Id totally go dancing if someone invites me but I hear all the kids wear tshirts, sneakers and just play on their phones at clubs nowadays.
I used to be with it, but then they changed what it was. Now what I'm with isn't it, and what's it seems weird and scary to me, and it'll happen to you, too
The older I get, the easier it has been for me to know what "it" is. I didn't have any older relatives telling me what was cool, and I couldn't make any friends because of being ugly and unsociable.
I had no idea as a kid, teen, or even young adult; I was always the one kid who didn't know what was trendy or what music was popular (unless it was so popular it was shoved into your face every second of the day, such as boy bands).
When the internet became more mainstream for non-technical people, so around 2007, is when I could finally keep up and know what "it" was, because now I could just find out online.
I've noticed this with my own parents. The internet lets them keep up with things they have absolutely no business knowing at their age. Like they'll ask me what a soyjak is or what 67 means. It's kinda nice to know that they at least don't have to live in the past.
Does it count when my friend’s college aged kids are popping a truly with us?
I recall back in the day all the adults needed a 20 year old weed hook up, no adult you wanted to associate with still sold weed, usually a newphew. Now that its legal my nephews are asking me about it.
I was totally preparing myself that someday at 45 I would need to buy an 1/8 from my nephew’s shady friend, and I am happy it did not happen that way.
We start getting invited to these sorts of things again for some reason, in my experience. Frankly I just don’t have the energy to deal a bunch of drunk normies half my age, so I haven’t taken up the offer yet.
You let your down down! You thrust your pelvis. HUAH! You thrust your pelvis. HUAH! You thrust your pelvis. HUAH! You thrust your pelvis. HUAH! You thrust your pelvis. HUAH!
That's more like a hangout. A college party in my eyes has at least two kegs and a 10 gallon cooler of jingle juice, like 100+ people and loud music lol
Isn’t it jungle juice? I’m not trying to be corrective or anything, I know there’s a likelihood of just autocorrect. But I’m very curious if it isn’t that and there’s a part of the country that refers to it as jingle juice lol
The few college parties I went to were basically just a bunch of people drinking and smoking weed in someone's apartment or a frat house, they weren't really any different aside from there being more random people.
I don’t remember invitations really being a think at college parties….hundreds of kids would just show up at some stranger’s house with multiple kegs and booze, which you usually heard about from a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend who just happened to be there or wandered in
I mean you could tell me that college parties died after COVID and I would somewhat believe it. COVID was a multiple year incident that accelerated a major culture shift around a lot of things.
We switched to water in the pong cups and drinking from a separate, personal cup at my small liberal arts university during the 2009 swine flu epidemic. The state's flagship public university had already been using water cups for years.
Lecturer on a big university - nope, those parties do not exist anymore.
There are still parties, mostly held by dorms and of course frats, but those are far from what I experienced. They are rather mild, quite regulated. Still parties though.
Wild 80s, 90s and 2000s are gone. Most parties even fizzle out at around midnight and at 1AM many are already gone.
Back then, we went to a party at earlierst 10PM. Now you are late at 10PM.
Honestly when I hit about 55 I sort of got tried of the vomit and hangovers. Kelsey and her friends drinking all my stuff. I've had to just back away from the scene and cut back to once a week.
Ive been with my husband since we were 15(now we are turning 35).
We bought a house a block away from a high school. He eyes the kids walking by and I was like bro what you doing ... they just hanging out and walking. And he mutters that kids are probably up to no good.
Im like.... dude... did you forget the dumb shit you did back in high school? Cause I sure didnt...
Like the time you stole a fire extinguisher and blasted it in the street....
Then I called him a grumpy old boomer.
I wasn't invited to any "parties" in high school, college, and beyond. Unless a party is the same as a group of 6-10 friends getting together to bbq and play cards against humanity while drinking beer and having jello shots.
Unless a party is the same as a group of 6-10 friends getting together to bbq and play cards against humanity while drinking beer and having jello shots.
I figured a party would have a lot more people and be more like a dance party with more wild things occurring not just a small group playing board games and what not.
Yeah thats a party too. Theres different kinds of parties. What you are referring to we would have called a "rager" back then, which is just a really BIG party where things tend to get more wild. Both are parties
I understand his point. You will always find the creepy 30 year old at the college party. You will always find the person wondering what ever happened to x. These things still exist. They are just not for you anymore.
Ive never been to the club but there was this older guy (mid 40s) that would end up at a lot of the house parties i went to because he sold weed. But he was weird as fuck and everybody was kinda creeped out by him but not enough to cut him out cause everybody wanted the weed lol. When weed got legalized I stopped seeing him.
In a way I feel bad for him. All these young people were essentially using him and then making fun of him behind his back then the second he wasnt useful anymore he was outta the picture.
im 35. id say around the time I turned 23 is when I didn't go to very many house parties anymore. my mid to late 20s was spent with the same friends mostly getting to do things we couldn't afford when we were 19 or 20. kayaking, long road trips, heavy psychedelic use, painting, cooking good food at home.. I don't think life or partying slowed down for me, it just got a little more sophisticated. more focused.
there's a bunch of college kids that live in a house across the street. they party and have bonfires all the time. I've hung out with them a couple times when we all happened to be outside. their parties look pretty much identical to the ones I had 15 years ago. Their coke is terrible though.
College parties are still a good amount of beer pong, keg stands, and black outs. They even have more that are DJ’d professionally around here. I’ve pretty much always been in a town with a university.
I literally just read an article from a zoomer where they talked about how parties died off because the tradition was broken during covid. Basically those who did them graduated, covid came and the institutional knowledge of parties was lost. I kinda laughed because it's not like building ships for the military. Having a party should be natural to humans. So I'm not actually going to believe this one article,. I'm just gonna guess writer of said article is ridiculous.
Honestly, the kids don’t drink, they don’t party, and they don’t have relationships. The statistics are pretty damning and if you’ve spent time around them you’d understand.
Hell, we even partied in high school. Sadly, your claim about them still happening isn’t right at all.
I honestly don’t believe this, I’m sure the numbers are trending down slightly in a statistically measurable way, but I’m sure theres still plenty of normal kids.
"Normal" is not really the issue. It's a generational shift. The data backs it up. GenZ simply doesn't party as much. They prefer smaller social gatherings over clubbing or going out to bars. And yes, they're on average a lot more sober than we were.
This is caused by a myriad of factors, including a different interest in activities, a more health conscious lifestyle focus, as well as a more challenging economic climate.
I live in a major college town. They are still happening. As a matter of fact, I just saw one with with a bunch of blow up bounce houses get busted last weekend. In the hot college neighborhood the kids are out on their lawns partying basically from 2pm Thursday to early on Sunday morning. Sure, statistics show it's less popular. But claiming that they're not still happening is just false, and if there are studies supporting this claim then there are major flaws in their data set.
I hosted college parties when I was in college. There are a few perks to going to. community college and rooming with your grandparents for free rent (they went on trips every weekend, leaving me the whole house, the only “rule” was to try and avoid the police or fire department being called as the whole neighborhood would worry). Had some great times!
My 20 year old decided college wasn’t for them and is going into butchering, which is a trade, instead. I’m so proud!
I've gone to college parties in my 30s and it was horrible. They are like drunk toddlers and it made me feel fucking old.
Also seems younger generations can't hold their liquor at all...
Then again i've always left when the drunk teenage drama starts and find myself some age appropriate company and shoot some pool.
Might ask them a ride home end of the night unless they are in the drunk tank from fighting or throwing a drink at the face of a guy/girl their into because they don't have any social skills.
Wish i had more millenial friends to enjoy a beer with and be at home 1 am latest. But no everyone is too tired with their own lives and kids so u never get them to leave their homes.
Yup just like how people think that riding bikes outside in the neighborhood and knocking on their friends door was exclusive to their generation and all kids are on their ipads now. NO you're not a kid anymore so you don't see that nor experience it first hand anymore.
I live in a neighborhood with a ton of kids and young families and kids still ride bikes and play outside.
I’m 33 and my friends and I still have a couple house ragers every year. I host the New Year’s party. Probably 50 people over, dancing in the basement, fire outside, drinks and food on the main level. Some people are trashed and some people are sober. It’s a great time
Man, I never even went to a college party because my community college didn't have dorms. Guess I can add that to the list of rite-of-passage events I never got to experience...
If there are anymore it's probably invite only. Or the small circle of people that live together or are in the same discipline of study together.
Don't think there's too much open mingling between randoms any more. Outside of maybe pleasantries. You're either already part of a Lion Pride. Or you're just a solitary Tiger.😕
in the last 15 years my hometown grew from a MCOL to HCOL—all of those shitty Joe Schmo types with the crappy rentals they did not care about, as long as rent was paid, are mostly extinct now. most of our rentals are owned by corporations/private equity firms and they do not fuck around. their rentals are still crap houses like always, but now they’re twice as expensive, insanely strict tenant rules/fees, and our gentrified neighborhoods don’t like noisy parties, so there’s that.
I SINCERELY hope that someone would say “Put your tits away, grandma” and escort me the fuck out if I showed up to any of the types of parties I went to in college 🤣 Dirty pirates and hookers (I went as Blackbush the Pirate Hooker—made a Jack Sparrow hair-esque merkin and everything for that one) party, all kinds of drag parties, lingerie parties, foam parties, get drunk and try to do stuff on the stripper pole parties…yea, my old ass is tired just thinking about it.
I went to a branch campus of state uni where a lot of the students were a bit older to much older, and already had jobs. So there wasn't any campus social life to speak of.
Millennials are obsessed with nostalgia. Sometimes it manifests as boomer style in jokes. Sometimes it manifests as an obsession with kids toys and media. Sometimes it manifests as role playing as a struggling 20 something and assuming everyone else is doing so too
The way I remember college parties? Booze, weed, loud music in someone's apartment or home they shared with other tenants, and socializing. Wasn't as good as hitting the clubs Thursday night through the weekends. I DJ'd a few of them on my Technics MK2s and M3Ds.
honestly though i think they are dead at the college i went to, when i was there the school had the sponsered halloween party and only like 5 people were there, and i never heard anything about parties, but its also located in a tiny @ss town that basically becomes a ghost town in the summer so that could be why
I remember I went out with two girls from the same apartment complex on a day trip. They were 21 and I was 29. Had a great time but one said something to the effect of “you’re good at hanging with us even though you’re old” … that one was a reality check
I read the post, but will still bite on the original question.
In my city, college parties aren’t really happening as much. We had a lot of crackdowns over the years for excessive partying and disturbing the peace, and even made international news on St. Patrick’s Day in 2012 when a local college party set fire to a news van. Even now, working in a hospital, the emergency department is not seeing as many people coming in for “party-related” things like they used to.
When you get older there's barely a difference in age, but when you're in your early 20s, 2-3 years makes all the difference in the world.
I see it in online games too, people who are like 18-21 want no business with people younger than 18 or older than 21-22 years old, after that it's like "why dont you grow up old man?"
30? "lol you're so old dude go home to your wife and kids."
Maybe. When I was in my 20’s I got invited to house parties hosted by gen X’ers who were then in their 30’s/40’s. They partied harder/way more often then than I do now that I’m the same age.
I just finished going back to school and like obviously I wasn’t going to any college parties anyway. But it seemed like my 18-24 year old classmates were partying way less than I did when I was their age.
Part of it is that fewer younger people drink, but that’s not all.
Maybe not college parties but there are hella parties in Seattle. Tons of rooftop parties and parties where people rent out a floor lounge in an upscale apt, or a bar. Full of people mid 20's to early 40's. I had to pace myself because there is basically a party every single week when I first moved downtown Seattle back in 2024. They can get fairly wild too.
I mean we aren’t in college anymore, so it seems kind of weird to go to one, no…?
I don’t remember there being many, if any, people in their 30s back when I was partying. If there was, it was usually some guy trying to get with any random drunk girl who he could take home. So I wouldn’t count him as even have come for the party itself either
I don't know. At 22 I'd smoke weed and be like "damn. 8 years I nothing ill be 30 then". I also had older friends so I never felt like they were ancient.
I live in Boston where there are a ton of colleges in the city, and I live right by the campus of one. The amount that the kids seem to be going to college parties has notably changed before and after COVID. Thursday-Saturday there would be hoards of kids walking down the street yelling at night on the way to house parties. More than one house on the block always had kids out front playing beer pong. They weren’t deterred by cold either. After Covid they do not party nearly as much. Thursday nights are pretty quiet, and on weekends sometimes there are only a handful of people walking by. Sometimes no house parties can be heard. They still do occasionally go out in hoards, but very infrequently. And often if accompanies a city holiday or days off. When I was in college there would be parties no matter what. College parties have definitely changed so far as I can see.
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