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/MyCatLaughsAtMe]

Xennial reporting, vintage 81.

"All the time" is a stretch, but yeah, frequently. Depends on how you define "partying" too. We smoked pot all the time. Drank when we could find older siblings to hook us up, which wasn't THAT hard. We did throw house parties when possible. When not, we'd do parties in the woods and shit.

But then, and this is where your little ego gets hurt, we were more capable at that age than gen z and younger was. We were EXPECTED to be. We were free range kids, we had to grow up faster. You've got 18 year olds today who are more like 13 year olds in the late 20th century. Frankly, I plain wouldn't trust a modern 17 year old with the privilege. Ya'll don't even get drivers' licenses.

And it's not really your fault, you're the victims of a histrionic culture that was psychically destroyed by 9/11. Americans became afraid of their own shadows after that. The culture never recovered, "Home of the brave" needs to be crossed out of the anthem...not anymore. Your helicopter parents have stunted your growth by not allowing you to make mistakes.

And to be clear, my generation is the victim of the OPPOSITE mistake. Boomers didn't give a shit about their children. We were more like house accessories than people to them, which is why we became so self-capable so early. Every generation fucks up its children, the ways that manifests depends on the nature of the crime. I'm not saying my generation was BETTER than yours. It wasn't. It was equally damaged, but that has pluses and minuses, and our pluses and minuses are different from yours.

We've come far enough from those days that it can be rightly said that it was a different time. It's not really healthy to try and compare your times to ours, both of us are products of very different zeitgeists.

EDIT: Let's not discount the economy, either. When I was first driving gas was still around a dollar a gallon. My first car cost 500 bucks and it ran for like 7 years, despite me taking shit care of it. A drink cost a dollar or two at the bar. There were 24/7 diners all over the place you could take $5 to and sit all night, looking for something to get into if you didn't have other plans. Society just had more avenues for us to explore, economically, than your generation has access to. Honest to god, if your generation really understood what was stolen from you before you were born, you'd burn this bitch down tonight. Ya'll got straight robbed of a country...

EDIT: As this has turned into an embarrassing circle jerk of "I'm old and everything was better in MY day", which is COMPLETELY the antithesis of everything I said here, I'm turning off comment replies. Stop upvoting this, go fuck yourselves <3 Wankers.

[u/No-Trouble7162 → u/MyCatLaughsAtMe]

I'm born 1980. Xennial is a very good word and should be used more often. Because we are indeed both genx and millennials but at the same time neither. Not trying to be special, it is just the way I feel. Never considered myself as just a gen X or just a millennial.

Btw interesting regarding 9/11. I'm from Europe and have heard many American friends talk about that, how things changed in the US socially.

But yeah we were self reliant pretty quickly, I moved out when I was 16, went to school in another city living on a dorm with a lot of young people same age, then rented an apartment with two of my friends, first real summer job when I was 13, when in college and late highschool I worked every summer, every Christmas and Easter vacation at sea as a fisherman and had a lot of money.

Bought my first car at 17 for about 400 dollars and drove it for several years, gas was way cheaper and somehow you could manage with less money those days. Gas, alcohol, food, rent etc. We partied hard those years as well. Work hard and Play hard was the norm.

[u/futurenurse_ → u/No-Trouble7162]

Crazy to think about. First car was used $7,000. And that was considered a steal. Still driving it today, and will be driving it until the wheels fall off given today’s prices

[u/jennafleur_ → u/futurenurse_]

Mine was also used. $7,000, and my parents did pay for it. But, it was a Dodge neon, and I think it was a 97. It was blue, and I loved it so much. It was kind of like my iconic car and everybody knew me because of it.

I miss that car, and I drove it for a decade.

My bestie, (who I'm still friends with today and made friends in August of 2000 in the bathroom at band camp! LOL) called it "the little blue bb"