Saturday, June 9, 2012

Teenage parties--- now and THEN!

There was a party in Rotorua last night. Well, at least I think there was. At the time of writing, I am not sure if it went ahead. We hear the cries of how stupid this was and that the young lady putting out the call for her ‘friends’ on Facebook to come and have a good time, is unrepentant at the prospect of young people once again placing themselves in an illegal act and potentially one of danger.
She wasn’t worried about the neighbours, although I don’t know if she invited them, and as for noise control concerns--- well obviously she had little concern for that too. One wonders at her thought processes—hell anyone can see how the whole party could have turned into a riot. I very much doubt t that her security guards could have averted any gang related ‘paybacks’ or how they would handle alcohol and drug associated distortions of normal behaviour. She wanted ‘people to have a good time and any decision to drink was there’s.’ Bit naive eh.
OK, enough on the negative side. How about I compare this trend to have these ‘Facebook’ and other social media type open invitation parties to what happened in the good/bad old days. Before we condemn this young, well-educated young lady to all sorts of labels, just think back my friends. Didn’t we attend parties we weren’t invited to? I remember as a young student, driving (OK—I was driven) around because there had been a rumour of a party happening at a certain address.
How did we find out? It was good old fashioned rumours and half-truths. Someone told their friends, who then rang a few mates and ‘Bobs your uncle;’ things quickly got out of hand and the police were called. Bottles were thrown and people were arrested. Fighting broke out and general mayhem resulted.
So what’s the difference? It’s one of scale. It is so much easier now to get the word out and the potential for real trouble is much more likely. However, the bottom line is consistent. Nothing much has changed, so before we all express our horror and disbelief, think back.

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