Generation Y and the Hook Up Culture

3 Reasons Why I'm Avoiding the Topic For Now

I had a conversation with an individual recently, who asked why I didn't write about hooking up. He pointed out that I had written that Generation Y dislikes marriage, Generation Y likes divorce, and even Generation Y prefers serial monogamy. Yet, I've failed to mention anything about the hook up culture that's prevalent.

For those who don't know:

Hooking Up:

A no-strings attached physical encounter (ie: from making out to having sex) with a member of the same/opposite sex.

1. Confusion owns the hook up culture. It's important to know that because confusion makes things difficult to define. From the outside, hooking up seems like two people who have no idea about anything, other than expressing their confusion in a physical manner, but on the inside, people get caught up in the moment and perceive that there's direction. As an example, a date would work something like the following:

Meet a boy/girl -> Ask for his/her phone number -> Call him/her up -> Ask him/her on a date -> Go on a date with him/her

By contrast, hooking up might be:

Meet a boy/girl -> Have sex with boy/girl -> Ask for his/her phone number -> Change mind, never call him/her

OR:

Have sex with boy/girl -> See him/her two months later -> Meet him/her -> Get his/her email -> Forget to email him/her

On top of that, a "hook up" partner is usually not a girlfriend or boyfriend. Few, if any, would describe hooking up as "dating" or "going out." Other than hooked up, no verb or noun seems to work (in some cases, young people will use the verb "see" as in "I'm seeing a boy/girl).

2. The hook up culture is predicated on both misogyny and misandry. I won't elucidate since both of these words carry heavy political and social meanings, but in a nutshell, the people who engage in hooking up make assumptions about what works and what doesn't work when it comes to the opposite sex (I don't know if I could assert this for the gay community). I think that if they were to state such, others would castigate them for political incorrectness even though they are only being honest about what worked in the hook up culture.

Make no mistake; I am not endorsing political correctness and I do not care for it. I will always choose the truth of reality over what some may wish reality was. And reality isn't a Disney movie.

3. I don't know how hooking up will change the economic environment. I theorize that it will lead to much fewer marriages. I theorize it will lead to more STDs, which means high demand in the healthcare industry (investors consider buying stocks of companies who sell drugs for various STDs). I theorize future legal battles will be fought because of it, and may even cause certain laws regarding relationships to change.

As a general rule, I try to tie all socioeconomic topics into economic and finance topics as well. Since I'm not sure how hooking up will change things, I don't want to mislead readers into thinking that I know more about the future economic outlook, related to hooking up, than I do.