What happened to university degeneracy? Lifestyles worse than 60s’ rock stars, fuelled by a mix of caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol.
Our future, lawyers, doctors, and politicians, five hours from a midterm with a beer in their hand and a stranger in their bed; did this really exist, or is it just some romanticized trope?
If I’ve learned anything over my three years at MUN, it’s that university isn’t meant to be gone through celibate, sober, and studious — it’s a time for experimentation and discovery.
Hell, if I were to attempt such a feat, I don’t think I’d make it four weeks—let alone four years.
Even still, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of students who see university as a time for exclusively academic pursuits.
As students, we hear stories about the Breezeway packed weekly, legendary parties, and a lifestyle reminiscent of the Hollywood ideal. Yet, it appears that what once embodied someone’s early twenties has been consumed by classes, part-time jobs, and social disconnection.
However, participating in this culture was not just for us ‘alcoholics’; it was a way of bringing the student body together.
The current state of campus is tragic; seldom are events of any significance, and those that are seem few and far between. So instead, students turn to George Street for their fix. And although a night on the town is great on occasion, it increases costs and drives students away from campus.
Despite Memorial students shifting towards a more straight-edge lifestyle and taking the drinking that they do off campus, it’s not entirely their fault.
In the past few decades, Memorial has become increasingly strict regarding partying and alcohol. Since 2009, Memorial approved its current Alcohol policy, which can best be described as overly repressive and neo-prohibitionist.
According to the document, “Memorial University recognizes the unique social needs of a campus community and attempts to provide an environment where these needs can reasonably be met.” However, the actual policies within the document severely limit Memorial’s student life and party culture—key components of any healthy university ecosystem.
One of the most damaging policies in the document is regarding campus events. To host an on-campus event involving alcohol, Liquor-Services must approve it, and all liquor must be ordered through a beverage order.
Assuming it is approved, your event then must adhere to the strict time slot of 5:00 pm to 8:00 pm on Fridays. At the mixer, students are required to purchase all alcohol through a trained bartender, and are limited to three drinks per person.
For any event on campus to be hosted and advertised, involving alcohol outside of the Breezeway, it must meet these requirements.
Until the early 2000s, Memorial featured a cacophony of alcohol advertisements: walls were covered with posters, The Muse featured cutouts for local bars, and beer reps could be found giving out samples around campus.
The change stemmed from a policy in 2016 banning the advertisement of alcohol on campus, disallowing any ad involving a “company name, logo, or brand of a distillery or brewery.” A policy applying to both campus space and media, including CHMR, The Gazette, and The Muse, ending all alcohol advertisements involving Memorial.
Whether you’re a frequent drunkard or a straight-edge student, it feels unanimous that an event meeting these requirements would best be described as lame or an overpriced pre-game.
Therefore, if Memorial truly recognized the social needs of the campus, it would ease these restrictions, allowing events to run later than 8:00 pm, to happen on days other than Friday, and to involve more than three drinks per person—being on campus doesn’t need to be boring.
By restricting campus life and community, Memorial has continued to become a disconnected, asocial commuter campus. If these restrictions were to be changed, it would unquestionably mean more public events and a re-ignition of campus life.
Such a change would mean more students partying on campus, opposed to downtown, having positive effects on campus, but also for the safety and finances of students.
Despite these restrictions and an ever-shifting culture, many Memorial students defy these rules and keep the university alive through parties and unhampered degeneracy.
However, these policies strongly discourage public campus events, severely limiting Memorial’s social atmosphere.
Now, although students are welcomed to host dry events, by railroading drinking into specifically Friday-only mixers, it alienates drinkers and non-drinkers, reducing event turnout. The allowance of social lubricant at currently dry events would not only help the sociability and experience of these events, but also reach a much larger audience—especially if advertising were allowed.
So, if you’re a new student attending Memorial, the best advice I have is to experiment—be part of the change, be a university degenerate, and host that party.
