The party scene at Tufts sucks. I wouldn't be surprised if half the freshman class transferred after this semester due to sheer boredom. And you know what, I really wouldn't blame them. The sad truth is that party-minded Tufts students have nothing to do on the weekends, and if you think about it, not giving kids a place to go on the weekends to drink is more dangerous than sensible.
Take our friend Johnny College for example. It's a Thursday night and JC just finished his classes for the week, and understandably, Johnny gets his friends together to get a jump on the weekend's drinking. After easily winning his first ten beirut games of the night, a feat he not only disregards but expects, Johnny starts figuring out what he wants to do with his night.
I guess there's no party tonight, otherwise everyone on campus would've heard about it by now. And goddamn, I already threw that wet T-shirt contest and got fined hundreds of dollars for noise violations, so I guess I can't have another one.'
'Besides, that Somerville cop told me that he couldn't do his job keeping people safe and fighting real crimes because he had to come bust my party instead, and I don't really want to be responsible for all that. I could go to Davis, but I lost my ID last week and so me and another 3000 other Tufts kids won't be able to go to a bar for some drinks.'
'That chick with the lazy eye and harelip will probably be looking around for me down at Sligo's anyway, so I'm not getting anywhere near there. I wonder if any of the frats are open for parties yet. Oh yeah that's right, Bacow has the Greeks confused with the fascists, so that's out of the question.'
'It's really too bad because I remember that Frat Row used to be a good place to go on weekends, especially since the cops wouldn't bust the parties as quickly because the Somerville residents were too far away to complain about the noise.'
'Oh well, I could always just take some acid and sit singing under that huge gnarly tree on the President's lawn, but that's gotten kind of old hasn't it. Well damn it all then, I'll just stay in and drink until I can't feel feelings anymore. Maybe that'll end up being fun this time.'
One could say Johnny's response here is a bit extreme, and it is, because Johnny College is a goddamn psychopath, but the fact remains that many people, myself included, have had this same reaction. When college students have nothing to do on a weekend night, we tend to respond by making drinking itself our night out.
It's not healthy, but it definitely happens and it's impossible to ignore. Especially when you consider that students in all freshman dorms have called TEMS twice as much during this year and the last compared to any years previous. It just shows that pre-gaming has become the entire night.
Of course, it could also just be that the Probation One penalty was removed from getting TEMS'ed. And while I agree with this move and can't believe it wasn't done earlier, it still seems like a naive way to write off a serious issue. If someone is really in need of medical help, they will call TEMS regardless of the consequences.
The fact that there are more kids now than ever before drinking themselves to dangerous levels of intoxication simply indicates that freshmen have nothing to do but drink. If there were parties on campus, these kids would have some sort of distraction from the drinking.
But was Tufts always this lame? Hell no, in years past I remember having to choose between parties every Thursday night. I know it seems impossible, but get this, Tufts actually used to be fun. Swear to God, and back then I never heard of kids getting TEMS'ed, nor did I ever have to risk fines and throw a party myself just to go to one.
And yes, I am pretty bitter about it, about the lost money and the growing realization that the responsibility of providing a social life at Tufts has fallen on me and other off-campus students all because our President used a few isolated incidents of injury due to drinking to close down our frats so that he could maintain a tough-guy stance on underage drinking.
My solution to this problem, the only sane one, I feel, is a reopening of the frats for parties. Kids would be able to get out and party in a social atmosphere without such an emphasis on drinking, our Somerville neighbors wouldn't complain and our school would be fun again.
I know I'll graduate before this ever comes to be, however. It sucks, but this futility doesn't matter much to me. All I can do is keep on throwing off-campus parties because I'd damn well rather be bitter, fined and pointlessly wasted than defeated. I'm sorry, but I just can't accept this new possibility that my college experience will not be as ridiculous and debaucherous as I'd like it to be.
We have a whole life of safety and sobriety ahead of us, and so let's take advantage of college while we can. I, of course, will do my part: I'm pledging to you, my readers, that I will throw parties as often as a I humanly can, but I can't be the only one. I need help from all of you who know that this school could and should be fun. This is where I've drawn my line, and I need all of you to make your stand beside me.
