I went to public school.

OP said "Friday night party with no phones whatsoever"

They didn't say anything about social media or the internet.

Phones were a big part of our lives, they were new and fun. Absolutely they came out at parties.

My best friend in high school joined the navy and disappeared. I worked for decades to track him down. Then one day he was just on Facebook. We have nothing in common any more and nothing to talk about. But damn do I have some great memories of us hanging out.

Absolutely. Same here. When we're 50-100 years away from this social media is going to be discussed in the same conversation as prescribing heroin for a headache.

My friends and I would be glued to the N64 or xbox instead

The boomers were the hippies FYI.

Maybe it's something of the people I socialize with. But we don't look at phones when we gather. It's impolite.

Guessing you spent all that away time on Reddit.

Feel free to stay there next time.

Eat shit. Lemmy has more bullies than reddit ever did. I've been permanently banned from Reddit for criticizing fascists. I spent that time on Bluesky, which is just as toxic as Lemmy. Seriously go fuck yourself.

Fair enough. My comment wasn't meant as criticism, I just genuinely find it amusing that the rules comms on Lemmy have just aren't enforced at all.

Phones are a great distraction when you're in a liminal space with nothing interesting going on.

But parties tend to be the opposite of that. The only reason someone looks at their phone is if they're trying to avoid the party. And why even show, in that case?

"Nobody looked at their phones during a party in 1999"

Holds up picture of a LAN Party

I thought he was cutting edge because he didn't use a BlackBerry, he used an iPhone.

Also, the way Obama simped for the tech sector for eight long years might be proximate to why we're surrounded by Tech Fascists ten years after he left office.

Deport'em All

Rose tinted view. There were plenty of distractions without phones and people would just get black out drunk wayyy more often than they do now. Maybe a positive is that people can pave themselves easier now.

It’s impolite.

Are you 60+?

Same generation but wildly different people. Most people of their generation were not hippies but conservatives. Remember that Richard Nixon got reelected in a landslide, that wasn't hippies voting for him.

That is why this whole generation cliche nonsense is so absurd, it defines nothing but the prejudices of whoever is spouting it.

My town had a bowling ball factory and on winter nights when the river was frozen we would steal reject balls and throw them off the bridge downtown. They made a truly incredible noise when they hit the ice.

That sounds fucking phenomenal. Now I need to see if there are any derelict bowling alleys around here to explore.

Chasing the vibe (tm), this bar doesn't have it, maybe the next one will, to infinity

Wait so there are Boomers on Lemmy?

You ever tried to see if your dong can reach the hole?

Only when the road construction crew gets too drunk and starts playing around with the steam roller! 😁

As a post-2000 person, I can get a glimpse of that in some TV shows like breaking bad.
Also when looking at my parents pictures from when they where younger.

But I've never experienced it. You can hang out with friends and all but good luck convincing 4+ friends to NOT take their phones to a gathering.

There's always someone texting their gf/bf, someone who likes to post too much, someone deep in online gatchas.

Even an inactive user will carry their phone because of navigation, feeling insecure at night, paying stuff...

There's a billion excuses (with a range of validity) to take your phone with you.

Meh 😕

The fact that you have not realized until now should tell you something

I think the better metaphor will be the printing press. That also caught society completely offguard. We went from a world where knowledge dissemination and speech was tightly controlled by religious and political elites to one where any crank with a press could share their fringe views far and wide. While this had its benefits, it also had its drawbacks. The printing press gave us the Protestant Reformation, but it also gave us the witch burning craze.

Easily solved by social compact, box (or more fun, jenga tower) on a table, phones go in box. First person to remove phone from box for reasons other than poop break (I'm not a monster) or leaving owes the group something, even if it's just a little dance.

It's helped myself and most of the people I have done it with to truly understand how much we are actually addicted/dependant to the little electric serotonin dispensers.

YMMV on getting others to agree 😅

i was born before 2000, and I don't know it neither

i'm honestly too old to know what the fuck this means. is this tiktok leetspeak genz 67 stuff?

i swear, these young kids putting down the pipe and picking up the TikTok have confused the hell out of me

God I hope that's AI generated. The sheer load on those wires... maybe 20 machines could work off a 100A wire, but every other row there would need its own circuit and fuse.

Brownouts must have been plentiful and devastating

Tennis - Deep in the Woods

In the woods, something glowing
A burning light has started growing
It feels like a change is upon us at last
Consuming us fast, change is upon us

The smoke in the night, the ash on the light
I think that it might be the best thing in sight
I know now I am right to let you be consumed by the light

I was born after 2000. I couldnt really tell you the point of going to a party where you dont know anyone, like what seems to be most coming-of-age movies. Even some parties with friends have been extremely dull, and wrecking some strangers house seems like a great way to add weight to my conscience

I mean I was born in 1989 and I can't really remember it because I wouldn't be invited to those kinds of parties until after the invention of the smartphone.

Hell I remember in high school everyone spent most of the time swapping phone bodies around and sharing polyphonic ringtones via IR blaster. And later, Pokémon via a link cable.

Well, one could argue that not doing things that push the boundaries of your comfort zone is why echo chambers exist, whereas meeting people you don’t know and interacting with them is how you make new friends and potentially grow as a person.

I’m not saying you’re wrong for not wanting to do that, or even that you should want to do that, but that would be the point of it.

And for the record, parties that happen in movies aren’t really representative of what actual parties were commonly like, at least in my experience. The most wrecked that I’ve ever seen a house get after a party was needing to clean or pick up some trash. The way you keep the weight off of your conscience is to help the host clean up the next day, like a decent human being.

(I can’t afford a lawn, but get off of my dirt lot!)

The House Party no longer exists. It is one of the great cultural losses.

AI generated? That's quakecon! I was there! We ran lots of wires. We had to bring in 2 18 wheeler sized generators plus the hotel's power. We really only had brownouts at QC 2000, I think it was. It's was just solving for numbers once we knew the metrics to hit.

Well, that and money, but id always stepped up.

You sound like a victim. How's that working out for you?

Also to get laid. Which also helps a lot with echo chambers.

Same here.
It's still occasionally a problem, someone will be phoning while we're hanging out. But generally we're all in tune with each other.

The problem I've been having lately, is my SO wanting to text every new exciting thing we do or buy, to our friends.
I'm trying to be balanced about it, but I prefer to have fun stories to tell in person. Or have a new purchase be a surprise for the group when I bring it out.

I'm not anti phone, I text too, and tell people stuff before I see them. So again, I'm trying to be balanced, so I don't make a big fuss. It's just on my mind.

Edit: for reference from the other commenter, I'm definitely not over 60. Much younger. Though not a youth.

All the shirtless people, it must've been hot in there, all those computers and CRTs dumping out heat.

Oh God, I can smell it.

Had some friends over the other night. Busted out my vintage copy of catchphrase, the one with the paper disc.
We had a blast with that thing, hours worth. Good times.

Fantastic. It's how I know I'm not a bully. How does it feel to be a dumb cunt with an empathy disorder?

Means basically "yep yep, Gen Z are the next generation boomers alright". Least I think.

(gen Z here, older than the 67 thing, younger than leetspeak, heh)

-- Frost

Someone will a victim complex can deformity be a bully. You just demonstrated it.

I have no idea what the hell you said either.

Whoopsie, sorry hah

"yep, sounds like Gen Z are the new equivalent to boomers, as I figured."