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sparksofthetempest t1_j6up5rv wrote

Yeah, young people have no idea how the loss of 24 hour meeting places are also impacting socializations. I mean I guess the older women who waited on us in the 90’s at 3 a.m. weren’t thrilled but that’s how I cemented at least 3 different relationships at Denny’s, Eat and Park and Perkins. I wouldn’t know WTH to do now if I was single.

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Alexispinpgh t1_j6v2y6x wrote

I wouldn’t have made it through college without late night/very early morning Squirrel Hill Eat n Park runs. Are there any 24 hour Eat n Parks left at all, even?

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iWantANewAlt t1_j6vbkib wrote

>Are there any 24 hour Eat n Parks left at all, even?

Nope. Every single one I looked at on the location list closes at 11pm (9pm Wexford)

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Alexispinpgh t1_j6vcy66 wrote

So weird. So many of the memories of…well, my entire life, including literally working at an Eat n Park in high school, wouldn’t be possible now. Hell, I asked my now-husband out at the Squirrel Hill Eat n Park at like 1 a.m.

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iWantANewAlt t1_j6ve00p wrote

I remember they'd do a late night breakfast bar on weekends. Now Squirrel Hill doesn't even have an E&P. College students from out of town will probably never go to one. Sad.

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Alexispinpgh t1_j6vfc0s wrote

I remember going to that late night breakfast buffet many times. As a kid, my aunts took me after we went to see *NSYNC at the newly-built Heinz Field. As an adult…let’s just say some late nights ended there, lol.

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Awright83 t1_j6wzjwm wrote

That late night breakfast bar was great. Drinks at the squirrel cage then over to eat n park. RIP

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AgentG91 t1_j6wmgvo wrote

Going to EnP at 3am with friends was staple high school behavior in the early naughties.

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livefast_dieawesome t1_j6wu4hc wrote

Before I drank/could get into bars we’d drink coffee and chainsmoke at ENP until 3 am

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69FunnyNumberGuy420 t1_j6x1zbe wrote

Capitalism's end goal is to own your human experience and rent it back to you. We're now at the point where people think that personal interaction isn't valid unless it happens on commercial real estate.

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sprawn t1_j6y4gg8 wrote

Like times 10.

NAIL ON THE HEAD.

They are sticking their grimy little tentacles into every aspect of human existence.

Hope you like paying to breathe. That's next.

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polymerkid t1_j6vlwfe wrote

Same. Some of my lifelong friends came from all night Denny's hangouts

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KS_Brian t1_j6x586j wrote

Yeah I think COVID was just the straw that broke the camel's back, and the weight of it is young people no longer having a social life outside of the internet

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69FunnyNumberGuy420 t1_j6xan0x wrote

It's that young people have been trained to think that social interactions that happen outside of commercial real estate don't count.
 
When I first started dating my wife, many years ago, neither of us had any money. We spent a lot of time at local parks, or hiking trails. To this day most of our stuff outside of the house is cycling, hiking, etc.
 
I've suggested going to a park or something nature-related to people outside of this sub who were lamenting that it's too expensive to go out now, and was told that going to the park is weird.

 
People have been trained by a hundred years of capitalist brainrot to not enjoy their lives unless money is changing hands. It's sad.

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ShatteredAvenger t1_j6xp1ew wrote

I hear your point, but most parks close at dusk, are reliant on weather, require being somewhat nearby, etc. Going the park is not "weird" but it doesn't hit the same itch for a lot of folks as going to hang out somewhere late at night when the rest of the world is quiet. I don't think it's quite as simple as "people don't enjoy their lives unless money is changing hands"- you shouldn't need to pay money to have a good time, but there's also nothing inherently wrong with throwing a couple bucks somewhere.

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69FunnyNumberGuy420 t1_j6xuu5f wrote

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2016/09/14/third-places-as-community-builders/

 
America's traditional Third Places have been completely eradicated in favor of pay-to-access places. That's incredibly bad for American society and fosters alienation.

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sprawn t1_j6y5gvp wrote

Even during the day the third places that used to be constructed to foster interaction between strangers and community building are being re-designed to shortcut every interaction into a financial exchange.

In this specific instance (24 hour businesses), there were dozens of them in Pittsburgh in the eighties and nineties (and before, serving swing shift steel workers, etc, for real, they actually made steel). The specific case of coffee shops and diners had about eight of them open all night in the nineties. You could truly sit there all night doing your homework, etc... Starbucks killed coffee shops. And the result is still visible today. You cannot interact with strangers at a Starbucks. They have redesigned the coffee business into a fast food model. You go in, order, and GTFO. There may be two or three tables, but people arrive at 6 am and "camp" the tables and guard them jealously. And they are there for the Wifi, not for Magic, the Gathering, or Parcheesi or organizing a community garden. This is during the day.

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intrasight t1_j6vh215 wrote

True. But on the upside, people are having better sleep schedules since there's nothing to do in the evening besides go home.

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