I feel alive when I go to parties. The grip social media holds on me is lessened with every swig I take. In my pocket I carry the control device, which dominates my daily life. It becomes a useless piece of gigabytes after several drinks. Trying to use the keypad becomes impossible. A simple sentence is turned into random coding that will never be deciphered. I am free. The people that surround me, in our celebration of collegiate camaraderie, are all I have now.
Social media is a black hole. The lives we once lived have been sucked deep within. We spend our days wired to a social network from which there is no unplugging. Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter are part of our daily routine, and there is no escaping the internet- ego we have created.
But come Friday evening, a storm gathers on the horizon. We gather for our ritualistic festivities, and begin losing ourselves in a frenzy of fun. Soon enough we’ll be nothing more than cavemen. We lose the ability to coherently use technology. Lightning cracks and notifications cease.
Perhaps in the process of going to parties and getting a bit sloshed, we’re leaving the daily realm of internet madness, and are entering a humanistic dimension we had forgotten about. Our friends and guests are no longer a profile page we can peruse over. Standing there in the flesh, the crowd of people are the material reflection of a pseudo-reality we have created.
And all we needed was some liquid courage, and a bit of ambition.
The positive nature of the booze culture has always represented a time when people gathered to interact with each other – in person. However, they also tended to do this daily. We’ve lost this. Getting to know each other nowadays requires nothing more than a 10 minute glance over each other’s online profile. We now judge each other on a whole other level, and the holistic aspect that once existed has now been replaced with the click of your mouse.
However, I can say with some confidence, the party scene will never be replaced by social media. There is no substitution for the physical being. No amount of “haha’s” and “Likes” will ever replace the world we have created. The party scene is not just a place where people rage until they blackout. It is an arena in which you find yourself, friends, snog buddies and sometimes even love. Unforgettable memories are not created within the cyber world, they are created in person.
Maybe I am wrong. Perhaps we are spiraling towards social media oblivion. One day, in the not so far off future, we’ll all be wired in. We’ll sit in front of a gigantic screen and video party chat with all of our friends. We’ll pop rum and coke flavored alcohol pills, and be saved from any truly embarrassing moments. To that all I can say is: you can’t buy Facebook a beer, Twitter won’t hold your hair while you puke, and YouTube won’t be there to laugh with you until you pee yourself. Cheers!
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