The death of partying in the USA • Hacker News Board

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#471

Post by janalsncm » Thu, Jul 10, 2025, 6:41 PM UTC

As with many large scale social trends there will be several contributing factors, so nuance will always be the first victim of people with an axe to grind.

If you want to say that an decrease in X is the sole cause of a decrease in Y, it might be a good idea to check whether there are other places where 1) X increased but Y decreased or 2) X decreased but Y increased. Different moments in time, different countries, etc.

For myself personally I have moved around a good amount, so it is naturally harder to make social connection, and even if I’m invited to social events with friends in other places it is physically hard to attend them.

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#472

Post by frollogaston » Thu, Jul 10, 2025, 6:41 PM UTC

flerchin wrote: post #189

Grouping up with the guys to play an online game wouldn't count here. Nor various other online activities that I would consider social. The drop-off in alcohol is stark, but probably good? I suppose we would see an uptick in weed in legal and probably also illegal states. The article focuses on US because that's the data they have, but I wonder if it's a similar trend for other developed countries. Anyone sharing a p…

Yeah, there are good reasons that doesn't count. Maaybe if it were in-person and not over headsets.

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#473

Post by bagacrap » Thu, Jul 10, 2025, 6:42 PM UTC

I feel like it would be more worrisome if partying had doubled in the last XX years.

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#474

Post by frollogaston » Thu, Jul 10, 2025, 6:42 PM UTC

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #249

This was a post on the GenX subreddit (from a Gen Zer) from just a couple days ago asking about if parties as portrayed in late 90s/early 00s "teen movies" were actually a real thing: https://www.reddit.com/r/GenX/comments/1lu102v/were_parties_... The responses from the Gen Xers were a mix of bewilderment and sadness, stuff like "What do you mean parties like this, it's just a normal teenage party!? I feel so ancient…

Some people want to make everything about "walkable cities." Maybe they can come back with socialization stats for non-driving-age kids, or those in Manhattan.

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#475

Post by ianferrel » Thu, Jul 10, 2025, 6:44 PM UTC

Apreche wrote: post #28

This article isn’t wrong, but it neglects to mention real estate, transportation, and lodging. A party needs a venue, and it needs guests. And the guests need a way to get to and from the venue. If they stay a long time, they need a place to sleep. People these days don’t own real estate. Wealthy people own it all. Normal people are renting apartments or portions of homes. It’s kind of hard to throw a big party witho…

Homeownership rates in the US fluctuate, but are basically flat over the past ~45 years.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/RSAHORUSQ156S

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#476

Post by varelse » Thu, Jul 10, 2025, 6:44 PM UTC

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #404

1shooner wrote: post #388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The demands on kids and families I'd like to understand this more. Families like this that I know talk about it as though it's as unavoidable as their mortgage, but functionally isn't this entirely self-imposed? Is it a lack of vision for an alternative? Are whole families succumbing to peer pressure? I don't relate to it.

Narcissist parents competing with other narcissist parents to be the best parents in the universe. Social media caters to their twisted world view where everyone is living a polished life of perfection so why not them and their perfect high-success family.

[dead]

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#477

Post by skeeter2020 » Thu, Jul 10, 2025, 6:45 PM UTC

kjkjadksj wrote: post #399

1shooner wrote: post #388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The demands on kids and families I'd like to understand this more. Families like this that I know talk about it as though it's as unavoidable as their mortgage, but functionally isn't this entirely self-imposed? Is it a lack of vision for an alternative? Are whole families succumbing to peer pressure? I don't relate to it.

From what I observed about these club hockey players I saw growing up, mainly the kid loves it and made it into their identity. So the parents are probably feeling pretty forced into paying for it. That being said every family I knew doing this sort of thing could easily pay for it.

Often the kids do enjoy it, but I see a lot of essentially "pay to play" - your 10-yr-old playing tier 8 basketball shouldn't be going to out of town tournaments regularly, but club & private is big business and they push an NBA experience of travel, tourneys and gear - with the associated costs.

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#478

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jul 10, 2025, 6:45 PM UTC

weinzierl wrote: post #358

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #249

This was a post on the GenX subreddit (from a Gen Zer) from just a couple days ago asking about if parties as portrayed in late 90s/early 00s "teen movies" were actually a real thing: https://www.reddit.com/r/GenX/comments/1lu102v/were_parties_... The responses from the Gen Xers were a mix of bewilderment and sadness, stuff like "What do you mean parties like this, it's just a normal teenage party!? I feel so ancient…

"It's really sad to me how we have completely fucked a lot of youth with social media, smart phones, and over-scheduling/over-protection." I honestly believe social media, smart phones, and over-scheduling/over-protection does a lot less damage to the current generation than partying did to my generation. I can recommend the 1995 Larry Clark movie "kids" for a more balanced view how parties often looked like and whic…

[deleted]

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#479

Post by advael » Thu, Jul 10, 2025, 6:49 PM UTC

I like that this delves into the relationship between "helicopter parenting" and this trend, and maybe I missed it, but I find that it conspicuously lacks economic precarity and the decline of real wages over this time period as an explanation. Hosting social events does cost free time and money and most people have way less of both in real terms than the period it's comparing to

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#480

Post by janalsncm » Thu, Jul 10, 2025, 6:49 PM UTC

skeeter2020 wrote: post #470

germinalphrase wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was a HS teacher for about a decade. The demands on kids and families around youth sports (especially private/club leagues) is out of control. I had students, 14/15-years-old, going to their school team practice then club team practice, not getting home until past 9 pm every night. Families from three states away would enroll their kids in my school half of the year to play on the hockey team (staying with local sp…

You can't even make a high school team anymore unless you start playing club & private at a very young age. Lots of primary public schools (K-6/7) which is where I learned sports and got good at a few, often don't have sports teams anymore, or if they do it's a few passionate people with limited coaching and sports skills who just want to provide any opportunity.

The natural solution would be to increase the number of teams to also accommodate people who are interested but don’t want to or are unable to dedicate their life to sports. But if schools need to cut costs, it’s tough to do.

It’s a common trend in many domains: universities, housing, jobs. An underabundance of resources means people need to gear up to fight over the things that still exist.