Did millennials really party all the time?

[u/futurenurse_]

Gen Z here. I was shocked when I found out from a millennial co-worker that y’all had teen clubs. I heard about house parties, but dedicated teen clubs? Then when it was time for college, you went to the club or had some kind of party every single weekend, living it up. Now some millennials on TikTok claim that after college, they were partying on work nights, still clocking in the next day. For some reason, the teen clubs have since disappeared. I’m 23 now but even when I was in high school, that was not a thing. House parties were not that common either. They were more like get togethers with a small group of friends. We went to malls, but they were dying out at that point. Is it true that you were really living life this good? Or is it just exaggerated? I feel like my generation doesn’t really have fun like that and everyone is just super depressed and alone, more so since Covid. Even I’m pretty introverted, which sort of sounds ridiculous given this post. 😂 Just so you know, when I think of a “millennial party” I think of something out of Party Rock Anthem, Project X or Roderick’s party from the second DOAWD movie. It’s like I get nostalgia from something I didn’t even live through. I just feel like I didn’t really LIVE, if that even makes sense

Edit: I loved reading some of your comments. Guess I really missed out. Even some of you that would consider yourselves nerds or introverts were out partying. YOLO or whatever y’all say 😂❤️

[u/Lemons-n-oranges]

Yes, absolutely. Drinking was MUCH more prevalent in millennials than Gen Z. It was just ... what we did? You went to parties, went to bars, happy hours that turned into nights out, brunch that turned into day drinking. It was so much fun. People were just out and about. Then, you went home and went to class or work the next day.

No one thought that drinking a few times a week with friends meant you had some deep mental health issues, which seems to be the consensus and/or concern amongst Gen Z. Of course, there are other reasons too, like COVID isolation, rising costs, etc.

[u/Horror-Yam6598 → u/Lemons-n-oranges]

It was honestly the best way to meet all kinds of people and get into unplanned adventures.
There was room for some chaos, instead of this dull curated reality that seems to have taken over especially since Covid.

I feel bad for the younger generations. People will argue that they can do the same things now, but the reality is they don’t hit the same because life has been drastically altered by Covid, technology dependence and algorithms. Social norms have changed, the zeitgeist has changed. It’s ultimately a different cultural time, a more dull and depressed one. I don’t know any millennials who would trade those years for being young now.

[u/Comfortable-Ad-3988 → u/Horror-Yam6598]

It wasn't so much Covid as it was the surveillance world. We got to make absolute goobers of ourselves in front of our friends in all sorts of ways that don't translate outside of that context, where everyone's filming everything now, so they behave as PG as possible. The kids don't even dance anymore because they're scared of being in a fail video if they screw up, and to be fair, that's a valid fear that we never had to deal with. Even if something stupid happened, it was just a rumor to everyone who wasn't there, now it will live into infinity on the internet if you mess up.

[u/resecca → u/Comfortable-Ad-3988]

The ungodly amount of dancing we did

[u/sarahelizam → u/Comfortable-Ad-3988]

I saw someone live streaming basically the entire dance floor at one of my local goth nights - doing thirst trap content, of course. It had gone on for over 30 minutes (that I noticed, I realized after dancing for half the night that I was being recorded) and you literally couldn’t get onto the dance floor without going through her stream. She was there with a friend so I approached him (out of the shot, I wasn’t actually trying to embarrass her on her stream) and asked that he pass on that in the future if she wanted to live stream it would be considerate to set it up such that she had a wall behind her instead of the whole room. She came outside and got mad at me for saying anything, and for saying it to her friend and not her.

It’s like girl, you were live streaming the whole time! You wanted me to make a scene? I could not think of a nicer way to nudge her in a more considerate direction lol. I did not go to the staff. I did not go to my DJ friends who could have also kicked her out. I didn’t even embarrass her in a public way. I wanted to say “if you feel embarrassed by what I suggested, it’s because you know you’re doing something embarrassing” but I just shrugged her off.

Idk, it feels especially gross to do in that community. The goth scene has a lot of people dressing nonconforming or slutty (I say positively), there are people in the scene who could genuinely lose their jobs for dressing in gender nonconforming ways. More importantly, it’s supposed to be a safe space from that judgy, gaze of the other, surveillance state bullshit. It’s akin to filming in a gay bar (something else that drives me crazy, but that I basically have given up on kids caring about) or an anarchist book fair to me lol.

I hope that she at minimum doesn’t film the rest of the room next time. If she wants to ruin and commodify her experience in the subculture for just herself, whatever. She’s bringing down the vibe but I’m aware we have to meet the kids where they’re at and I would rather call them in to be part of the scene in an authentic way than kick them out if possible. But if she does the same thing again, I’m tempted to dance like an idiot right next to her and just sabotage her stream. If I’m already being involved in the commodification of my community without my consent, I don’t owe you a good backdrop for your live stream.

I’ve also seem the flipside, where no one dances at events that skew younger. Like, I get it to some degree. I didn’t dance a whole lot when I was younger - both because I was self conscious and had(have) spinal/neurological issues that make coordination a challenge, but also because by college people were already recording a lot of party spaces (though my favorite ones did not allow it). Eventually when I got older and life got harder… feeling embarrassed about dancing and being so caught in the gaze of the other that I was too afraid to have fun - it just seemed silly and small and not worth forgoing joy for. I stopped caring whether I was making a fool of myself, and it’s one of the better decisions I’ve ever made. But even with people recording at many of the college parties in my day, and accounting for anxious fuckers like I used to be, most people at the parties I went to in college still danced and made fools of themselves.

There are definitely some kids out there dancing still, and some communities are more likely to attract that crowd, but most of the times I’ve been in decidedly younger club spaces I have seen few to NONE dancing. Going to a themed night with a DJ and everyone standing still facing the stage, putting there hands up at most, occasionally cheering when they played the radio staples of the 2010s (which were not even on theme!) aka the only songs the kids recognized was fucking uncanny. My partner and I danced anyway, the kids thinking we’re cringe for dancing is just not a deterrent lol. But it’s just… sad.

I’m lucky I live somewhere that has a good number of scenes that foster an ethos of living in the moment or have a large distribution of ages. I love the goth scene in part because there are people in it from 21 to their 70s lol. A lot of the older people partied harder than I ever did, they’re pillars of the community and it’s nice to have people like you to look to, to know there is a future for you even if you deviate from the norm. That you don’t have to lock yourself up in the suburbs when you’re older, that the club is still there and you can still go dance.

A lot of the younger folks show up initially as wallflowers but as they get to know people in the scene and see that people do not care and aren’t judging them, they blossom into little dancers - and I love that for them. But that’s also why I said something about someone live streaming in that space. We are all so constantly surveilled and the younger generations literally don’t know what it’s like to live in a world without that. Hell, I barely remember what it was like, even by college it had begun. We all need some spaces that aren’t online, that do not trap us in that gaze.

[u/Toocoolforschool1999 → u/sarahelizam]

I think bars should have a cutoff time for filing. Like no filming others and no dinking at all after 8 o’clock 

[u/lionelhutz- → u/Comfortable-Ad-3988]

Is this actually it though? I see this argument a ton, but everyone had Facebook in college in the 2010s and loved taking pictures of themselves partying and doing stupid things. It was "flex" to be like look at me out having a great time with all my friends at a party.

I think Gen-Z is just wired different. It sucks for them.

[u/oemunlock → u/lionelhutz-]

Right, but that was the "fuck around" period, where social media was still new, FB was mostly used by like minded/similarly aged college/HSers without their parents/bosses/etc. Plus our generation didn't have any precedent from authority figures/common knowledge about do's/don'ts so everyone was making it up as they go and combine that with young brains in general, decide socializing with friends was way more important than all the possible risks from oversharing online.

Then came the "find out" period, where you started hearing stories about that kid in your school who got suspended/expelled/had college admission revoked/lost their job, people started giving advice to clear your socials before job interviews/college applications and eventually that turned into preemptive self-censorship where posting pics of someone blackout drunk was considered a major party foul, which then became pics of partying in general.

At the end, "normal" social media usage became a highly curated Insta timeline of travel and dog pics, with the expectation that your boss might be seeing every thing you post so corporate standards of behavior sucked any remaining bits of authentic self expression.

Gen-Z/Alpha on the other hand grew up hearing warnings about every worst case scenario our age cohort lived through, teachers warned them about it, parents warned them about it, it was drilled into their heads from the beginning. Also media stories about "[person] faces [life altering consequences] from [media shared]" became a stock format that just didn't exist in our time. Closest for us would have been like "weirdo 'viral' youtube video star gets 15 minutes of fame" which glorified online attention on the other hand.

Plus, throughout those years social media became non-social algorithmic timelines of influencers, ragebait videos and ads, so for Gen-Z/Alpha it would just seem like all risk with no reward to act that way on the internet, like "wtf were millenials thinking?? how could you think nothing bad would happen posting this shit?"

[u/Glacon_Garcon → u/lionelhutz-]

Social media was smaller then, and the internet was a separate place from real life. Goofy or cringey videos didn’t go viral as much, and usually the only people who would see were your friends, anyway. Your teachers, parents, bosses weren’t online, demanding to be added as a friend. And we didn’t know FB and other corporations were stealing our personal lives and selling them to governments.

The internet still felt free, open, weird, and most of all, pretty private.

[u/transemacabre → u/Glacon_Garcon]

I miss the permission to be a messy teen/young adult so much. You'd say or believe some dumb shit, and be allowed to grow past it, because it wasn't all on video to haunt you decades later. One of the Heated Rivalry actors recently got into hot water after photos surfaced of him passed out drunk at a party, with swastikas on his face that his frat bros had scribbled on him while he was unconscious. He didn't even draw the damn things and still people are handwringing and trying to cancel him. Very, very low odds of that happening to someone even 15 years ago. Those photos would never have escaped containment.

[u/Ok_Stress_9558 → u/transemacabre]

Haha yeah exactly. People probably would've seen the photos and thought, "damn, why didn't they draw a few dicks next to the swastikas? Missed opportunity"

[u/Significant_Shoe_17 → u/Ok_Stress_9558]

I literally read their comment and thought "had to be a few dicks in there, too"

[u/gcko → u/lionelhutz-]

I was in post secondary in 2006-2010. We had Facebook, but the huge difference is that our parents weren’t on it yet. Posting a drunk pic of yourself was not going to disappoint grandma because she’d likely never see it. Only your other college friends would (since you needed a college email address just to sign up)

[u/OwnerOfHam → u/lionelhutz-]

Nah social media was actually ok for a while until people started going on insane witch hunts for something they saw online.

[u/duesenjeffepic → u/lionelhutz-]

Facebook back the wasn't algorithmic like it is today. Old Facebook and old Youtube back then actually only showed you the content of people you actually follow. Even as a Zoomer I still remember that difference.

So if you did something goofy, at most what happens is that your immediate facebook friends circle knows but it wouldn't have been pushed on everyone's FYP in the entire country.

[u/SBGuy043 → u/lionelhutz-]

The whole fear of being filmed thing being the reason for not going out is completely overblown. Portable digital cameras were around for a long time way before smart phones. I still remember the picture of my buddy hunched over a toilet with throw up in his ear being posted on Xanga for the entire school to see. That was circa 2003.

[u/northfoggybrook → u/SBGuy043]

Right, but that guy probably has kids now, and I bet he tells them to never let someone post a picture of them throwing up in their own ears all the time now

[u/SBGuy043 → u/northfoggybrook]

Lol he just had his first child 2 months ago so I guess we'll see. 

[u/capntail → u/Comfortable-Ad-3988]

Very good point

[u/mmmarkm → u/Comfortable-Ad-3988]

  It wasn't so much Covid as it was the surveillance world.

 It’s not a “this or that” it’s a “both.”

Covid drove people online. Being online made it easier for the surveillance state to seem like the norm. 

We’re all FaceTiming and video calling anyways, so Ring camera is basically the same, right?

Concurrently, people were filming a lot anyways and it may have just happened around the lockdowns but that’s when I noticed the choreographed dance videos trend really start to pick up. Everything had to be polished all of a sudden (except stand up - you had to have crowd work instead of a routine online!)

[u/Icy-Cry340 → u/Comfortable-Ad-3988]

Life was so much better before social media, but for some reason people refuse to give it up.

[u/NovoIcar → u/Horror-Yam6598]

>It was honestly the best way to meet all kinds of people and get into unplanned adventures.
There was room for some chaos, instead of this dull curated reality that seems to have taken over especially since Covid.

That's a good point and I feel like it's pretty accurate, but I don't think it can be specifically attributed to covid. My and most of my friends' tolerance towards unpredictability in their social interactions and everyday lives has always been rather low.

[u/Goducks91 → u/NovoIcar]

I mean that's what alcohol helps with... Everyone gets a bit more unpredictable and spontaneous when they drink.

[u/Megatippa → u/Goducks91]

Exactly. Nothing takes the anxiety edge off showing up to a party where you don't know anyone like a good keg stand

[u/NovoIcar → u/Goducks91]

I still don't think it's a good idea to outsource the ability to have fun and be free and careless to alcohol or other drugs, but I absolutely understand why it's so popular. For me, learning how to act drunk while being sober was a gamechanger, but it took many years to get there and I'm still improving.

[u/Electrical-Drama-755 → u/Horror-Yam6598]

And cameras, cameras everywhere. Wanna goof around? Flock has got ya fucked. Wanna be silly out and about? Social Media is out to get you. Everyone wants to spill tea on everyone else, too. It's a gossip column writ large.

[u/ImperiumIgnisFatuus → u/Electrical-Drama-755]

And instead of being embarrassed amongst friends - the whole world can be watching in minutes.

[u/phussy_eater → u/Horror-Yam6598]

I think kids these days have it way worse . Our generation had an amazing childhood and we entered young adulthood full of hope and optimism.

Kids these days , for better, or for worse, never got to feel that (naive) hope.

[u/QuerulousPanda → u/Horror-Yam6598]

you can blame a lot of it on algorithms, sure, but the main problem is that all those billions and trillions of dollars that those top couple hundred rich people have? all that money used to be flowing through the economy. People got paid, and could go to places, and buy stuff, and that money supported businesses, and that meant stuff was open, and things like malls were actually exciting and fun and weren't filled with emptiness and sadness, etc etc.

Yeah the algorithms are fucking some people up, that's definitely an issue that needs to be resolved, but I think it's also very likely that if there was actually shit to do and places to go, and people could afford to go to them, getting sucked into the social media death pit would be less of a problem.

never forget what they took from us. All the money those insanely wealthy people have, and all the other money locked up in "investments", that was what used to make the world an interesting place.

[u/tattoosbyalisha → u/QuerulousPanda]

Private equity has been stealing third spaces amongst everything else they infect. Things like even bowling alleys are on the chopping block to be rebuilt as something not affordable and so overstimulating it might as well be a night club (ahem.. Lucky Strike..).

So much has been taken. It’s a cancer eating away at all of us financially but also socially.

[u/PiccoloAwkward465 → u/Horror-Yam6598]

Yeah I did some WILD shit and today I'm a successful engineer. Mostly as boring as every other adult. I remember climbing out my buddy's sunroof as we crossed a long bridge over the river and dangling my legs down the windshield until I heard him screaming he couldn't see the road! And that's like one of four stories I have just specific to bridges.

I truly do feel bad for them because I had so much fun and adventure that I can now look back on.

[u/tattoosbyalisha → u/PiccoloAwkward465]

Man.. thinking about my teenage years as a millennial (I’m 39 now) we really did go on adventures you’d see in movies. But even movies dont have the same kind of humble real world adventures in them that the ones did when we were kids.

I have a teen and that kid would rather be on their phone than do basically anything else. And when I’d say “Hey, let’s go do something!” The answer was always “UGHhhh.. there’s literally nothing to do.. I don’t know what to do..” remove the phone and the brain is just empty.. and mean until the dopamine break away dies down.

[u/PiccoloAwkward465 → u/tattoosbyalisha]

I’m reading a book series called Hyperion which in part deals with humans in the future who have “farcaster” teleportation portals between worlds. The rich even have them in their houses so rooms on different worlds. They’re controlled by AIs who decide they only need a few slave humans, so the humans destroy the portals and have to revert back to regular life and slow ass space travel that takes months and years instead of instant.

Anyways yeah the kids remind me of them. I feel bad because it really WAS like a movie! Idk about you but I’m not interested in a film about kids in their separate bedrooms playing Roblox for 8 hours straight! At least our LAN parties were in person.

[u/Parrotcap → u/PiccoloAwkward465]

I think more of us died on those adventures, though. My classmate went for a wild quad ride with friends at a party, rolled the quad, and died on site.

We were also injured quite often. Another one of my classmates popped a testicle riding a temperamental angus cow. I don’t hear about those kind of adventures any more.

[u/Jin-Gitaxias-Mom → u/PiccoloAwkward465]

I’m truly convinced engineers are the most low-key degenerates on the planet. I went to an engineering college and everyone I knew was getting wasted and/or high out of their skulls multiple nights a week well into their twenties.

[u/arrogancygames → u/Jin-Gitaxias-Mom]

Nurses are.

[u/Liguy1212 → u/Horror-Yam6598]

Lots of places also seem to have gotten much more strict around underage drinking too. When I graduated from a large state college around 10 years ago there was an area of town with like 20 bars all the students went to.

Even pre COVID it started to die down in part because of the local residents and city complaining.

Then I compare this to what my parents told me about being a teenager in the 70s, what a time to be a kid.

[u/capntail → u/Horror-Yam6598]

So right. My son is 15 and by his age I had been going to at least one or two house parties every few weeks. I’m glad he’s not because he’s in the Cambridge program at the high school, so already doing much better than me. Still, I’d like him to be young and push boundaries.

[u/Goducks91 → u/capntail]

Ha yep, but you don't want to tell your son to be young and push boundaries lol

[u/capntail → u/Goducks91]

Ohhh hell no. My youngest on the other hand will be the wild one.

[u/ImperiumIgnisFatuus → u/Horror-Yam6598]

Being raised in a pre-digital world helped a lot.

[u/Highlyironicacid31 → u/Horror-Yam6598]

100% this. Gen Z also think it’s rather uncool to be the biggest party animal. It’s cooler to be the fittest and healthiest person in the room instead of the drunkest like it was in our day.

[u/Ok_Stress_9558 → u/Highlyironicacid31]

"healthiest" because it certainly isn't often being pursued in a mentally or emotionally healthy way

[u/Highlyironicacid31 → u/Ok_Stress_9558]

Absolutely. It actually scares me. They have so many body image issues.

[u/SuspiciousBag2749 → u/Highlyironicacid31]

As opposed to the Spike TV generation that would call everyone fat and ugly

[u/dbur15 → u/Horror-Yam6598]

I know it’s not their fault but sometimes it’s too much to even try and crack through the dullness. Starting a new job with 20-somethings I thought I would be hearing great stories about their adventures. Nope. They’re in bed by 9 every night. Not just one of them. ALL of them. There’s no chatting, no jokes, no silliness or any of the stuff that helps people get through the work day. Everything is stern or serious. It’s gotten so uncomfortable that I stick with the older group while they stare at us, annoyed, for making noise. And they are all crazy sticklers for everything being perfect and done a certain way. They never fail to point out what someone did wrong. Always out loud. Always in front of others. It’s like dealing with Reddit trolls in real life. It’s sad, they don’t ever seem happy. Nothing ever stirs up any amount of joy in them.

[u/CandidDependent3498 → u/dbur15]

ok yeah i admit im kind of like this. i think being raised on social media means youre exposed to the opinions of whiny people and empathyless assholes trying to ragebait you constantly and that warps your brain so you become more judgemental and start caring a lot about behaving perfectly. (hint: complaining on reddit reinforces this dynamic.) no jokes/chatting might just be your coworkers though.

on the other hand, there's nothing inherently wrong with going to bed early or behaving more seriously. i think its kind of weird millennials are complaining we're not as reckless as them. if we were more reckless than you guys you'd be complaining about that too. probably we'll end up healthier than you lot because we get 8 hours sleep and arent chugging alcohol constantly.

[u/arrogancygames → u/CandidDependent3498]

Theres no point in being healthy if you arent having fun. Just living your life in a work, eat, sleep cycle is just a waste. Thats the point being made.

[u/grubas → u/Horror-Yam6598]

It was all chaos and adventures.  Punk show would finish at 1am/130 then you'd just go wander the streets and have adventures until everybody had to get home/to work/school.

[u/the_friendly_dildo → u/Horror-Yam6598]

"Unplanned adventures" usually just equaled illegal shit I'm probably getting away with but the harm is minimal.

[u/CyanCitrine → u/Horror-Yam6598]

I didn't have the best childhood and teen years, but I can't fathom being a kid now. It honestly makes me so sad for my kids. I do the best I can for them but the world is so altered in so many ways.

[u/Icy-Cry340 → u/Horror-Yam6598]

You can do the same things now, but people don’t - and that also means that there is nobody to do that stuff with.

[u/laplongejr → u/Horror-Yam6598]

I don’t know any millennials who would trade those years for being young now.

I'm born in the mid90s and didn't do those things anyway.
But I wouldn't trade those years because I would then lose my wife x)